I’ve been helping others answer these two questions positively and with very positive results. Being able to provide service commitments that you are confident that the significant majority of your people are able to deliver will mark you out from the competition and win more.

“The customer always leaves happy” is the first and the second is “The lifetime value of each customer is the most important thing”. Not only are these neat phrases, the kind of which you might find in many an organisation striving to put service value at the heart of the business, they are priciples  which the management then take and drive it’s performance.

Net promoter score is now there key indicator and this means scoring 9′s or 10′s in a scale from  1- 10 on the likelihood of recommending JL to a friend. They are currently the highest scoring retail group in the UK.

When faced with a difficult customer or a customer wanting money back “The Lifetime value of the customer” mantra is utilised. No referring up the chain, no delays, but a simple trusted delegated decision to be taken based on the likely outcome of acceding to the customer’s request – or not. It didnt’ take long for one of the attendees at Lesley Bannatyne’s presentation to ask the question that this must lead to staff just “giving things away”.  “Not so” was the clear cut answer. But then we get into the nature of the organisation at John Lewis where the partners (employees) are all stakeholders in the business. This model is unique to John Lewis but it is compelling in it’s evidence that ownership produces highly engaged staff and very accountable leadership. Any conversation, at any level within the business, can be interrupted to deal with a customer and any member of staff can ask a manager why any decision was made.    Simple, clear and compelling. Little wonder they excel – and turn in some of the best profits in UK retailing.

Commenting on the award Allan Ross, FIF’s Managing Director said “This award is welcome and a great boost to our people when many businesses seem to be forgetting service in the pursuit of efficiency and reduced costs”.  To win the award the company had to demonstrate that it had clear customer service objectives, a strategy to pursue them, links to business performance, customer care management,staff development and that all of this had led to growth. These are a useful set of criteria and not a million miles away from Flannigan Consulting’s “Competing on Service” approach which FIF had begun using in 2007. A great deal of effort has gone into pursuing this approach and now is the time to push hard on selling and marketing their ability to genuinely demonstrate that good or great service doesn’t happen by accident.

On the night of the award Allan Ross said to me “this is as much your award as it is ours”.  Magnanimous words happily received………mind you drink had been taken!

That’s been my working life since the Spring of this year when out of nowhere a flare up of Crohn’s disease knocked me sideways, upside down and inside out. It has been a very real struggle but through it I have sought to “look after the customers…..etc”.

I’ve been on the receiving end of great providence and unexpected and uncalled for assistance and I have learned a great deal about endurance and health and trust and grace like never before. The old adage about adversity teaching more than prosperity applies. I must be a slow learner.

Maybe you too feel as though you have been and perhaps still are on the frontline in a battle. Certainly I know a good few business owners who would identify with that. Be careful for the levels of endurance you are putting in and be mindful of those of your people. This is a time to consider recharging – properly and thoroughly. I’ll be near the front of the queue

Such an argument never ensued. Fraser Haran, Chief Exec of Westcrowns Group (they provide glazing products and flooring services) and Peter Vardy, Chief Exec of Peter Vardy Group (they are a fast growing car dealer business with Vauxhall, BMW and Mini marques) provided us with the unequivocal views that learning was at the core of who they are and what they are seeking to achieve as business leaders.

Fraser openly acknowledged that he had “begged, borrowed and stolen” what works as a leader and from people of all positions and none. Peter’s drive is underpinned through Servant Leadership. Both exuded the passion of students in love with their subject and hungry for more knowledge. 

Both have degrees in business and leadership, both have attended a range of programmes, both read or have read widely, both have sought to challenge themselves and be challenged, both are committed to what I would call the improviser model of leadership.

On a very frequent basis they are sounding out what is working and making changes to keep the company progressing whether that means listening to employees concerns about work life balance and hence not opening on a Sunday (this described as commercial suicide by other dealers……….but it hasn’t and quite the reverse) or focusing more on an individuals behaviour and commitment before performance and addressing head on those under lying issues.  The “mood of the camp” is not a cliche from their lips – it is central to their leadership of company performance.

As I heard them speak I wondered about what would be on their leadership agendas in a year’s time. I would doubt very much that it would be the same as today’s. It would be well worth reconvening in a year and finding out. The pursuit of progress sometimes feels like running through treacle. Fraser and Peter gave us an implicit motivation to demonstrate the we all need the spirit of humility to aspire to greatness. Thanks.

So it’s now tough and getting tougher. Spring roots are moot yet a Winter of discontent might yet be grumbling. The macro is for others to wring hands over – we have to respond to conditions as we find them. For some time now I have been working with directors to devise tactics in repsonse to the tough times. Here I suggest an overall strategic view………….

Boards – get focused on two inter-related things, they are: Value and Values.

Value in terms of what you are “worth” in marketplace terms, value in products and services, value in terms of the balance sheet and value analysis rather than cost analysis.

Values in terms of what you stand for or what you want to be renowned for. This applies for customers and marketplaces and for your people.

These two inter-related points are then applied in Financial Disciplines, Marketplace Offerings, Customer Relationships and Leadership and Culture.

How to apply these is what I have been engaged on of late across the boardrooms I work in. Green shoots and developments are happening. Talk to me about the specifics for your business and let’s get focused, get out there and get on with it. Spring can’t come quickly enough.

Last night’s Scottish Plant Owners Dinner provided me with a forum to share my views. A great bunch of resilient, doughty fighters against the forces of darkness (the Banks) as they are, they are out there at the sharp(est) end of industry – selling assets and people to produce and create, with a good number looking for respite or at the very least “give us a break!” Maybe that’s why their secretary Steven Mulholland of MPS introduced me saying that I would talk about coming out of the recession and the shape of the winter. Don’t worry Steven I enjoyed the talk aound the table and it won’t be too long until the longest night is over!

So if you are riding this out, surviving and on the odd sunshine filled day feeling that you may be seeing the dawn of some real new opportunities then you may be in a great position to find more customers and fill the gap that may have appeared. That is you may if the nature of buying hasn’t been radically shaken up or in fact new rules written. Perhaps there is greater conservatism in the buying process, more concern for the small print and getting the contract right.

Buying on price certainly prevails in a good number of scenarios and the pressure is on to offer value and be clear on that. Beyond that how do we win over the new customer or in fact court the previously somnolent one? The  offer of the latest, newest, fastest, would seem to hold less apppeal. The product or the service itself is becoming or is a “given”. What else will tilt the balance?

 TRUST.

“OK so the product service sounds about right for the price but who are these guys? What have they done before? What management resource are they putting into this? Who have they worked for? Who owns them?”

A series of trust questions are now elbowing into the sales and buying negotiation. Underlying this are a set of three elements of trust

1. Trusting competetence

2. Trusting reliabilty

3. Trusting their motives

The intention of all is not under question more an insidious worry about how they will deliver. Even in good times a ton of business is lost not because of fundamentals of business intention but by confidence and trust being lost by the neglect of the little things, the build up of small failures of delivery or the lack of caring response.

One major antidote that is working for clients is the use of “Customer Expectation” statements. These are a set of fundamentals for presentation and discussion with customers and a set of live or die conditions for managing your company’s delivery. As clients and I have been finding so few companies have such things and there is good news – this is a competitive opportunity and those who have been working with this are very well positioned to “Compete on Service”. Contact me to find out more about how to make this happen.

Listening to a number of MD’s recently I have been struct by the clarity and purpose many have said and demonstrated. Whilst never wishing to be in some of the circumstances they find themselves they appear to be reveling in the urgency and focus with which they are attending to their businesses. So what has the arduous months been revealing? Well if you were to be reading the FT this week you would have seen over its comment and business life sections you may have come across these nuggets……”half the the population now owns just 1 per cent of of non propertied wealth” and “from the world of high finance to local high street, regulators (eh define your terms EF) have created a model of competition that eliminates competitors”. Welcome once more to the real economy.

So while the “regulators” (?) of the macro economic world set about redefining capitalism, or not, we in the real economy have opportunity. Opportunity driven by the fact that the hunt is on for value in all marketplaces and business exchanges. Some fundamental observations arise to my mind about what shape the more successful companies will be in and so take advantage in market shifts, such as……

Those with strongest customer relationships and service delivery. Those were postive leadership is creating good morale. Those who are strengthening their key management capabilty. Those who are ambitiously marketing. Those where efficient cash management is in place.

In these current times the strategic question to be asked is whether the business is advancing in such areas and doing so more quickly than the competition. 

The most important question for the management teams….”What is adversity teaching you?” Once we catch the answers we might want to keep them as the guiding principles for the long term – way beyond recovery.

I am making light of what is the most unpredicatable set of economic circumstances we have ever faced – not as as nation but as a planet. Previously we weren’t in a global economy to the extent that we have become tied in knots with China’s GDP falling.  National debt and the value of the pound are this week’s focus……what is next?

We open the doors on Monday, say good morning to our trudging staff and hope to hold on. Hold on. Hold on and once more hold on. Hold on to our good customers, hold on to our (good) staff, hold on to your nerve and hold onto your values. Whatever was the value of your offer to the marketplace now is a time to hold onto the essence of that and build on it. Keep on keeping on. When the tide turns those who have held on will be stronger than ever.

For those in banking, property, construction, food and distribution the effects have been felt as direct hits – body blows and some fatal. Many sectors are now feeling the impact of the inevitable slow up due to the banking crisis impacting what we know as the real economy.

We privately owned companies ( chiefly small and medium sized) will find our selves on the receiving end of of tightening up on lending and a very real pressure on cash flow – unless there is structural and policy change in banking supported by government. We wait but continue to breathe………

Products and services continue to be bought, markets haven’t collapsed altogether and remarkably there are still companies growing!

I have survived and prospered in and through two previous recessions offering my services to ambitious, positive and progressive privately owned companies who grew in these times and grew well. 

The changes we are facing in these times will make the differences between companies more marked and customers will be on the hunt for real value. So the old shibboleths will surface and be more appreciated:

Value for money

Customer serving

Trust

Track record

Time for leadership in your marketplace? Certainly time to double your efforts in sales. Shrink back from this and you are doing yourself no favours and possibly be missing out on some of the best opportunities.

Meanwhile the people of your company may well be hyper vigilant for signs of difficulty in your business. The gloom and doom merchants may well be parading with placards in the corridors or stirring up depression over the coffee mugs.  Others may be going into passive mode – the human equivalent of stand by.

A time for leadership……….purposeful leadership about what you stand for in the marketplace and as a company……….strong leadership that creates confidence in the effort………..come with me leadership that says we are in this together and the stronger for that.

Cometh the hour cometh the man (or woman). 8 weeks ago “basket case”  Brown was being counted out. Now he is being counted as a world leader. “The Audacity of Hope” by Barack Obama is now made flesh.

Difficult times for sure. Bunker mentality has no place and fortune will favour the brave and the strong. Keep the faith.