As universities face the “enrollment cliff” and shifting fiscal realities, evaluating your operating model is essential. Here are five critical success factors to keep in mind for optimizing campus shared services in 2026:

1. Culture – Shifting to a Service-Oriented Mindset
When many campus SSCs started, it was essential to create a culture focused on operating with professional efficiency. This remains mission-critical in 2026. SSC leaders play a key role in bringing to life a value proposition that resonates with faculty, students, and staff alike. Academic units will continue to sign up for shared services only if the SSC achieves a steady track record of lower administrative burden, relevant subject matter expertise, and world-class service. Processes must be re-designed to focus on the student and faculty “customer” experience.

2. Continuous Improvement (CI)
This is a massive driver of success. Campus stakeholders want responsive service and reduced “shadow IT” or administrative bloat. SSC leaders must own end-to-end processes—such as the student lifecycle or grant administration—and focus on continuous improvement. Leveraging frameworks like Lean or Six Sigma provides the ROI and employee ownership needed to drive results. A key point: Measure everything. Balanced metrics and broad communication of successful milestones will sell your value to the Board and the Provost.

3. Technology, AI, and the Cloud
In 2026, you must go “all-in” on cloud technology and AI integration. The landscape is complex—modern ERPs, student information systems (SIS), AI-driven predictive analytics, and workflow automation. You cannot afford to operate without an up-to-date technology strategy. Spreading the costs and benefits of these tools across multiple academic and business units lessens the risk and increases the odds of achieving institutional goals.

4. Service Level Agreements (SLAs)
SLAs are a necessary continuation of your improvement efforts. It is a worthwhile exercise to develop and iterate comprehensive SLAs that include in-scope services, turn-around times, quality of outputs, and clear dispute resolution. In a university setting, these must be balanced—they should provide accountability without becoming overly bureaucratic or rigid, ensuring they support the academic mission rather than hindering it.

5. Centers of Excellence (COEs)
Determining your institution’s operating model is one of the most challenging tasks. What are your core competencies? Which functions—such as HR, Finance, or Research Administration—should be shared across the entire university system versus kept within a specific college? As processes become standardized, they are prime candidates for a COE. However, high-touch areas like specialized faculty research support may require local subject matter expertise. Collaboration across the institution will provide the guidance needed to strike this balance.

Evolving your institutional operating model to optimize shared services in 2026 can pay handsome dividends. By keeping these success factors in mind, you can increase your odds of long-term sustainability.

Contact TSI at tsi@transforming.com to learn how we help institutions navigate these transformations.

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I have to admit, as sure as that HBR article just over 34 years ago by Michael Hammer, Reengineering Work: Don’t Automate, Obliterate (FROM THE JULY–AUGUST 1990 ISSUE) sparked my interest in this area and sent a lightning bolt of perspective change through a wide variety of organizations, I was wondering if there was another article or trend that somehow I missed that no longer made being efficient relevant.

From our experience, working with some of the fastest growing companies, as well as progressive higher education institutions, looking at how to make or keep an organization focused on efficiency, quality, customer satisfaction and profitability has never been more relevant.  But, to be fair, a lot of things have changed in the past 34+ years.

From TSI’s perspective, here are the top 5 things that have happened to process improvement over the years:

1. It has evolved and now incorporates User Experience (UX), Customer Experience (CX), Transformation or another synonym. Plenty of process definition and analysis is still being done, but it’s done with a greater awareness of what the total experience is.  Further, many organizations are more holistic, looking not just at processes (or operations) but people, culture, technology, strategy, metrics and a number of other dimensions. This is one of my favorite ways that PI has evolved.
2. Tightly coupled with ERP, CRM and other major systems – years back, many organizations optimistically and naively assumed their new ERP/CRM would fix their processes automatically. “We’ll just implement the same processes that (insert Software Product/Vendor name) implemented in (insert similar company name) and we’ll be fine”. Sadly, these organizations learned this is a fallacy and implementing an ERP without looking at processes is a recipe for disaster or just wasting a lot of time and money.
3. Process Renovation – Some organizations are taking a fresh look at the processes that have been re-engineered 10-20 years ago. In some cases, as their business model has changed with acquisitions, divestitures etc. and they realized that it is time to take another hard look at how they operate.  Just because you did this in 2005, does not mean you shouldn’t do it again.
4. Nothing – believe it or not, some organizations missed that wave 34 years ago and still haven’t taken a fresh review of how they operate. Unfortunately in many industries such as retail, publishing, higher education, pharma, high technology manufacturing and many others, we have seen the peril of failing to proactively streamline processes, systems and customer experiences.
5. Lean/Continuous Improvement/Six Sigma Culture – some organizations have reaped the rewards and feel strongly that a periodic review of how they operate is one of the most differentiating characteristics in the marketplace. They strive to be “Operationally Excellent” in all aspects of their business from how they go to market, develop products/services, hire new employees, pay vendors, service customers.

Your Call to Action

In summary, after 34 years, this notion of “process re-engineering” that was set in motion by an article describing a project at Ford Motor Company is alive and thriving.  Granted, this is taking on more adaptive and holistic dimensions, but I would ask you to contemplate the following:

When is the last time you reviewed how your company is to do business with through the eyes of your customers?  When is the last time you analyzed these areas?  When is the last time you had an outsider who is committed to telling the truth, assess your organization? 

TSI (transforming.com) is a leading performance improvement, process re-engineering, technology strategy and organization change management consulting firm based in Chicago. We collaborate with our progressive growth-oriented and higher education clients to define and implement recommendations that help our clients become more efficient, cost effective, higher quality and more customer focused.  Dan Feely is the founder of TSI and can be reached at dfeely@transforming.com

The post 34 Years Later – Is the Discipline of “Process Reengineering” Still Relevant in 2024? appeared first on Transforming Solutions Inc..

At one point in my career, I had a wonderful opportunity to speak at a global trade organization in Puerto Rico at their annual conference.  This organization is comprised of many engaged members, largely small and mid-sized business owners, many of whom started their businesses, and compete in an extremely competitive marketplace. Like many organizations, their customers range from extremely discerning and focused on high quality and service, to others who are highly price sensitive and view their services purely as a commodity.

So we titled this speech/workshop as “Defining Your Unfair Advantage” but it’s really about trying to answer a tough question:  What is truly unique about your organization?

As a background, TSI (transforming.com) is a growing consulting firm and like all companies that grow, at one point in our company’s life cycle, we were hitting a plateau.  So a few years back, we put a small advisory group – consisting of a few people both in and outside of the consulting industry.

One of our advisors asked me a basic, yet poignant question.  He asked, “Dan, what is TSI’s Unfair Advantage?”.   In other words, what are the most compelling 1-2 things that you do or you know that completely differentiates you?

So I began going through our services (albeit somewhat generically) – helping to improve a company’s efficiency…help them select technology to run their business more effectively.  And one of my advisors replied “Dan all kinds of companies do that”.

I’ll come back to TSI’s story in a minute, but the real point of this article is about you and your organization.

Understanding Your Unfair Advantage

If I was to ask you, “what is your company’s unfair advantage?”, how easy or hard would it be for you to come up with something unique?  Let me put you at ease – this is normal and it’s something that, just like we did, can be overcome by a little focused thought and work.

Keep in mind the following – a real unfair advantage has the following characteristics:

• Takes investment to define/try/refine;
• Can and should change over time;
• A well-defined and real unfair advantage is one that cannot easily be copied or bought. In other words, it truly creates an unfair advantage for your organization;
• Will likely require you to increase your performance (that may include process, technology or people) in meaningful ways AND includes how articulate your employees are at describing your organization.

Here are 4 great questions you can ponder to get started:

1. What is your organization really good at?
2. How does that compare to what your customers want/need?
3. What are your competitors good at and how does that compare to what you are good at, specifically in the context of what your customers want or need?
4. In parallel, think about this from a customer’s standpoint; are there other alternatives than what they have? This may include choosing not to do the work.

Ultimately this way of thinking is looking at the Value Proposition of your organization doing work that is perceived to be of value – this is the heart of your company’s service offering. Regardless of what industry you operate in, if any one of these dimensions is out of whack, then your business model is out of alignment.

Important Factors of Your Unfair Advantage (UA): 

So now the “nickel question” is, how can you move from defining your value proposition to carving out your organization’s Unfair Advantage?  That is definitely a great question.  At TSI, we see the UA as a function of:

Quality x Originality x Service x Convenience x Price

Therefore, in the context of your target customer segment(s) and your service offering, define the following (this is a great “homework” assignment):

• Quality – what is the quality of what you deliver? What should it be?
• Originality – how unique or different is what you offer compared to your competitors?
• Service – how do you deliver – are you punctual, polite, understandable? Also consider how comfortable your customers are working with you. Think of this as a sort of user interface for your customers.
• Convenience – how accessible are you? This can be defined by location, or your relationship to your customers.
• Price – how much do you charge and how do you charge it?

As you can probably guess, these questions are appropriate for those of you who might lead a department, such as; IT, Finance, HR, Admissions, or any other function.  How are you branding that service?  How should you and what will it take for you to live that brand?

TSI is a leading consulting firm based in the Chicago area.  We help our clients to transform; this includes the work to define key strategies and then bring them to life.

For more information on TSI’s transformation expertise, click here – https://transforming.com/services/business-transformation/

You can request more information about our service offerings by emailing us at tsi@transforming.com. To speak with TSI’s Managing Partner, you can reach him at 847-705-0960 x202, or via email at dfeely@transforming.com.

The post What is YOUR Organization’s Unfair Advantage? Where Do You Begin? appeared first on Transforming Solutions Inc..

When evaluating your business operating model, strategy and goals, here are five critical success factors to keep in mind for optimizing shared services and achieving the next level of performance.

1. Culture – when many SSCs started, it was essential to create a SSC culture focused on operating like a profit-oriented business. This remains mission critical, but despite 20+ years of experience in this arena, the concept is still elusive for some organizations. SSC leaders play key roles in articulating, selling and bringing to life the vision and SSC value proposition for customers and employees alike. Most internal business units will continue to sign-up for shared services, if (and usually ONLY if) they can achieve a steady track record of lower costs, relevant subject matter expertise, and world class service.

As part of the culture, processes must be re-designed and people continually incented to relentlessly focus on the ultimate customer, as well as their changing needs. As part of your culture and operating plan, build in competitive benchmarking and significant training to facilitate achievement of your specific, clearly-defined goals.

2. Continuous Improvement (CI) – this is a huge driver of success. It is no secret that SSC customers want lower costs and responsive service. How do you get there? Another main role of a SSC leader is to own end-to-end processes and focus on continuous improvement to deliver what customers need. Click here to visit TSI’s Process Improvement page for more information. Leveraging ISO, Six Sigma, Quick Change, and other CI frameworks will provide ample ROI, SSC employee ownership, and drive results in this area.

A key point here – measure, measure, and measure again. Balanced metrics and broad-based communication of successful performance milestones will sell your value and keep all stakeholders focused on the goals and activities that matter most.

3. Technology and the Cloud – go all in to leverage technology and the cloud. The options and possibilities are ever-evolving and complex – ERP, CRM, eCommerce, workflow, AI, mobile apps, predictive analytics, data visualization, bar coding, cloud integration, Google apps, and the list goes on… Bottom line here, you can’t afford to not have an up to date technology strategy and plan to generate top-box performance through automation, innovation, and technology utilization. Create a truly differentiating customer experience – Click here to visit TSI’s Customer Experience Training page for more information. Finally, spreading the costs and benefits across multiple business units, functions and channel partners lessens the risk and increases the odds of achieving the required benefits.

4. Service Level Agreements (SLAs) – this is a necessary continuation of CI from above. SLA’s will drive CI and customer satisfaction. It is a very worthwhile exercise to develop and iterate comprehensive SLAs – including: in-scope services, ad-hoc requests, agreed service turn-around times, quality of outputs, roles and responsibilities, metrics, cost/pricing, issue reporting and escalation, dispute resolution and other special requirements. Integrate SLAs into the culture via training, measurement, and rewards. Be careful, there is a real balancing act to assure SLAs are neither too complex nor overly simplified.

5. Local/Regional/Global Centers of Excellence (COE’s) – this is one of the more challenging elements of an organization’s operating model. It poses several questions, including – What are our core competencies? What functions and services should be shared locally, regionally, or globally? What geographies should they be located in and why? What are the risks involved? And, can certain sub-processes or activities be virtual outside of a main SSC? Naturally, as processes become standardized and routine, they are candidates for shifting to lower cost COE’s and geographies (e.g., APAC). However, for processes like Tax, a local level of subject matter expertise is required. The answers to these questions depends in large part on an organization’s geographic footprint, knowledge of a specific country’s legal, political and regulatory environments, as well as a host of many other issues. Collaboration with multiple business and channel partners can help provide guidance and direction here.

Evolving your operating model to optimize shared services and take advantage of new tools, practices and opportunities can pay handsome dividends. Keeping in mind the above critical success factors will greatly increase your odds of success. Contact TSI at tsi@transforming.com to learn more.

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Through our work at Transforming Solutions, Inc. (TSI), we believe that understanding critical aspects of emotional Intelligence and applying them to our work with clients and other parts of life is essential to achieving goals and realizing one’s potential in many areas. In addition, leading organizational research on emotional Intelligence and effective organizational management shows a strong relationship between emotional Intelligence and effective organizational management. Leaders who have high emotional Intelligence are more likely to be effective in their roles and are better able to create a positive work environment. Do a Google search “Importance of Emotional Intelligence, and you will see an overwhelming number of articles supported by research that discuss the correlation between emotional Intelligence and success. One recent study, “What matters more for entrepreneurship success? A meta-analysis comparing general mental ability and emotional intelligence in entrepreneurial settings”, was authored by Jared S. Allen, Regan M. Stevenson, Ernest H. O’Boyle, and Scott Seibert; notes Emotional Intelligence has an 89.1% predictive variance in determining an entrepreneurs success with IQ being only 10.9% predictive of their success.

Daniel Goleman, an American psychologist and renowned author, says emotional Intelligence is highly predictive of success. He has also said, “CEOs are hired for their intellect and business expertise – and fired for lack of emotional intelligence.“. Goleman explains emotional Intelligence can be broken down into the following five categories (pictured in the graphic), as summarized by Andrea Ovans’ 2015 Harvard Business Review article titled “How Emotional Intelligence Became a Key Leadership Skill“:

• Self-awareness
• Self-regulation
• Motivation (defined as “a passion for work that goes beyond money and status”)
• Empathy for others
• Social skills, such as proficiency in managing relationships and building networks

6 ways to practice your emotional Intelligence as an organizational leader

1. Practice empathy: Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. As a leader, it is essential to be empathetic toward your employees and their situations. Practicing empathy can help you build trust and respect and foster a positive workplace culture.

2. Practice active listening: Active listening involves hearing what someone is saying and understanding what they mean. As a leader, you should practice active listening to gain insight into your employees’ concerns, needs, and desires. This will help you understand what motivates them and how to best support them.

3. Manage conflict effectively: Conflicts are inevitable in any workplace, but as a leader, it is your responsibility to manage them effectively. Emotional Intelligence can help you understand the underlying emotions driving the conflict and guide you toward a solution that benefits all parties involved.

4. Provide constructive feedback: As a leader, it is essential to provide feedback to your employees. However, the way you deliver that feedback can have a significant impact. Emotional Intelligence can help you frame feedback in a constructive and empathetic way that encourages growth and development.

5. Build strong relationships: Building solid relationships with your employees is critical to success as a leader. Emotional Intelligence can help you connect with your employees deeper, understand what motivates them, and build strong bonds that contribute to a positive workplace environment.  

6. Use tools: Using tools can help you gather input from others to better understand their perspective. While you can use various surveys, check out TSI’s Free (and short) Change Readiness Assessment.

Overall, emotional Intelligence is valuable for any leader looking to improve organizational management. By focusing on empathy, active listening, conflict management, constructive feedback, and relationship building, you can strengthen your emotional Intelligence and become a more effective leader.

If you’ve liked what you read and would like to hear more on this topic or similar topics, feel free to comment or reach out to TSI for more.

The post 6 Critical Factors of Emotional Intelligence That Can Make you an OCM Boss appeared first on Transforming Solutions Inc..

In an effort to achieve your goals and realize your potential, it is crucial that you understand critical aspects of emotional intelligence, as well as understand how to apply them within your organization.

The Five Factors of Emotional Intelligence

1. Self Awareness
2. Self Regulation
3. Motivation (known as “a passion for work that goes beyond money and status”)
4. Empathy for Others
5. Social Skills, such as managing relationships building networks

Daniel Goleman, an American Psychologist, breaks emotional intelligence down into these five categories. In addition to his work, Andrea Ovans’ 2015 Harvard Business Review Article, “How Emotional Intelligence Became a Key Leadership Skill”, looks at these five categories in how they relate to being a leader. She addresses cultural intelligence, as well as the connection between empathetic leaders and financial performance.

Let’s Break Down the Five Factors of EQ

Self-Awareness:

Individuals often think of self-awareness as a few physical and emotional practices to regulate mood, body language, and tone. However, self-awareness extends to understanding how all of these factors are impacting others around you. In addition to understanding how to regulate yourself, take a few minutes every day to evaluate who you are working with, as well as the approach you need to take to manage your emotions in the settings you step foot in throughout the day. It can be easy to lose sight of this important practice, as a result of the hustle of work, meetings, and to-do lists.

Self-Regulation:

Self-regulation and self-awareness are a tag team. The actions you take to improve your emotional state are the key components to self-regulation. In order to improve your performance and the overall cohesiveness of your team, practice taking these actions daily. A tangible way to regulate yourself with your awareness is through the concept of ‘thinking before you speak’. It is one thing to be aware of how you may be affecting others, but it is a whole different battle to be able to act on that on awareness. In practice, pay attention to physical and verbal cues like body language, tone, and eye contact. These small adjustments from your team members can serve as hints to adjust your communication style.

As we continue to work with team members and other organizations who operate remotely, these cues remain the same; however, they can be more difficult to spot. Depending on the angle and nature of the virtual call, it may be difficult to read body language, tone, and eye contact. However, these cues are still present in the conversation and serve as your best hints to adjusting your communication style.

Motivation:

According to Daniel Goleman, motivation is “a passion for work that goes beyond money or status,” (Ovans 2015). This passion is important in terms of improving your position in the working world both short and long term. In an effort to maintain this passion, keep your goals (90-day, 12-month, 5-year, etc.) in mind. This will only serve to improve your position inside and outside the office. As you lead within your organization, don’t be afraid to share your passion behind these goals with others in your team. A shared level of awareness and drive will help realize personal and organizational performance metrics.

Empathy:

Empathy is the ability to identify with another person’s emotional state at a given moment and then react accordingly. However, this is easier said than done. The connection between emotional intelligence and empathy benefits both you and others simultaneously, with the right intentions behind it. For example, barriers in terms of authority, resource availability, and other factors can affect overall mood and willingness to perform. However, the ability to identify and name these barriers can benefit both parties involved. This concept extends beyond your immediate team. Empathy is also strongly correlated with how your organization understands customer service.

Social Skills:

Social skills can make or break your organization’s performance. In service-oriented organizations, beneficial social skills look like engaging on LinkedIn, networking with your community, and stepping outside of your comfort zone. Beyond extending your network, the people you surround yourself with will impact your everyday life. This impact stretches beyond your physical workspace or your organizational team. In a largely virtual and remote world, you also surround yourself with individuals online. The individuals who you follow, interact with, and build connections with will impact what you see on your feed. This, in turn, affects your everyday life.

So Now What?

This was a brief overview of emotional intelligence, as well as the five factors. However, there is so much more to understand and learn! If you are interested in continuing to explore this topic, we encourage you to dive deeper into the work of Daniel Goleman and others to learn more about your EQ.

Our Top Tips to Honing Your Emotional Intelligence Toolkit:

1. Pay attention to those communication cues we discussed earlier and then adjust accordingly
2. Consider how you are delivering your message, as well as what you are saying
3. Aim to understand others’ motivations and goals through asking good questions
4. Work to empathize with others and offer help if they want it
5. Network with others and recognize that every person you meet may benefit you in ways you couldn’t imagine (or vice versa!)
6. Use tangible tools and assessments to understand others’ perspectives even better. Check out TSI’s free and short Change Readiness Assessment to get started!

Emotional intelligence is a key player in not only our work lives, but our personal lives as well. Through these five factors, your organization has the opportunity to thrive. If you are wanting more guidance on what this could look like for your team, let us know!

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TSI was selected for several projects at The Archdiocese of Chicago.  First, TSI led the implementation of Blackbaud’s Luminate Online solution to satisfy their need for a contemporary online giving and e-communication management platform. Transforming Solutions was selected to manage this implementation to ensure on-time and on-budget delivery of the product.

TSI was also engaged to define and improve financial and gift receipt and reporting processes.  We leveraged our methodology that included program management, current state process mapping and analysis, future state process development, development of applicable policies, and change management. The outcome was a platform and a comprehensive set of online procedures related to online giving. This capability, in turn, helps the Archdiocese of Chicago better engage with constituents, strengthen its mission, and ultimately increase revenue.

Transforming Solutions worked closely with key stakeholders, C-level management, 3rd party vendors, and end-users to ensure a successful implementation. This included facilitating working sessions to map and review the current state of online giving-related processes, defining the ideal future state of these processes, and developing supporting documentation.  

Overall, the project successfully implemented a number of online giving forms with a seamless user experience, event registration, email functionality, and procedures over the course of 8 months. A data sync between the online giving platform and the database of record is also in place as part of the implementation, giving the Archdiocese more accurate and rapidly available data to drive strategic decisions and strengthen controls. Additionally, TSI conducted several ‘Voice of the Donor’ sessions that provided input of actual donors into the implementation of the technology.  

The implementation transformed the Archdiocesan ability to connect with donors via a digital platform.  Not only are donors able to give online but are also receiving more correspondence regarding the opportunity to engage further. While they were previously sending 5-6 messages per year, with Luminate Online the Archdiocese of Chicago was able to distribute 10 messages in just 3 months to just under a million donor contacts. This level of engagement generated excitement both outside and within the organization, building strong momentum for future phases of implementation.

Careful management of the project resulted in on time and under budget completion, a feat that had not been accomplished at the Archdiocese in recent memory. Furthermore, it was unknown at the time of completion, but the online functionality became instrumental in the management of the coronavirus crisis. Because of the success of the implementation, the Archdiocese was well-positioned to provide online giving functionality to parishes without such a solution. The result was an ability to continue to collect weekly contributions and special COVID-19 fund collections to support those in need.

Luminate Online has brought in over $9.4m across 60k transactions using 7 different online forms. 70 email blasts have been distributed, for 4.7m emails sent. Furthermore, the Archdiocese has added 210k contacts to the database, a 50% increase in contacts overall.

As the spring of 2020 saw the impact of covid-19 increase, the implementation of Luminate Online led to the recognition of the need for a mobile app-based engagement and online giving platform. Key to the success of this platform was ensuring that it would be easy to manage and provide the functionality to support the parishes’ effort to engage at a time when in-person worship was not possible. Using TSI’s vendor evaluation and selection process, Pushpay was identified as the preferred provider.

A successful pilot implementation effort was launched and completed in the fall of 2020. This tool has empowered and enabled the parish to connect and fund-raise in a way previously unavailable. Benefits included a centralized place for communication, a streamlined giving process, and improved process efficiency leveraging workflows and administrator dashboards and reporting. In just 3 and a half months of use, one parish has collected over $15,000 in online gifts alone.

This is just one illustration of how TSI not only ensures a successful technology implementation but also boosts the value of your investment.  

The post Developing and Implementing Next-Generation Processes and Technology appeared first on Transforming Solutions Inc..

Are You REALLY Enhancing Your Customer Experience (CX) To Create an Unfair Advantage For You? Or For Your Competition?

Customer Service in Higher Education

Upcoming Workshops in 2017; Customer Experience and Higher Education Student Experience

Our next training workshops will take place in September, 2017! 

TSI’s Newest Addition – Jessica Schein

Higher Education Business/Program Analyst

The post TSI’s Customer Experience and Student Experience Articles, Training Workshops, and our Newest Team Member! appeared first on Transforming Solutions Inc..

Improving your customer’s experience is one of the best improvements you can make this year.  You’ve probably read some of the recent research (see below).

We’ve been generating our own buzz lately around our CX Training Workshop that we’ve made some of our own improvements to.

TSI will be leading a full-day Customer Experience (CX) training workshop on February 15, 2017.

You will leave this work session:

If you are in an industry where the experience that a customer has when they receive a quote or proposal, make an order, receive that order, or pay for the order occasionally requires “customer service”, this workshop is for you.

We have reduced our price from $525 per ticket to $375. This is now our standard ticket price, but you can also take advantage of a promotional discount (referenced below) if you have multiple people from your organization you’d like to attend.

Click here to sign up

Promotion: If you, or someone from your organization would like send 2 or more team members to our fantastic event, be sure to reach out to us at tsi@transforming.com, and we will give you a discount code in return!

We hope to see you there and we are certain you will become a CX zealot!

Related (and Updated) Customer Experience (CX) Articles 

Transforming in 2017: What’s on Your Horizon?

The post TSI’s Latest Updates – Customer Experience Updates and More! appeared first on Transforming Solutions Inc..

Some of the dates are quite old. You can find some dated as far back as 1928, as well as many other decades through the 2000’s. One of the things I have noticed is that the older ones, even the ones from the 1920’s, seem to be set in much higher quality cement than the newer ones. Some sidewalk squares that are only 5-10 years old are much more worn and cracked than those from the prior century.

Well, that’s nice to know, but what’s my point? It got me to thinking about product and service quality. Why do the older squares wear better and appear to crack less? When and why did the type and quality of cement change? Did the customers/buyers know the options and differences in terms of cost and quality? Did some of the cement companies lose business due to poor quality? How has the cost varied over the years? And of course, does anybody care?

Think about your business. Most of us are in business to make money. The best way to make money is to delight customers so they return and continue to buy your products and services. In today’s hyper-competitive markets, product and service differentiation is critical to future viability, growth and success.

Customers and consumers often focus on the following criteria when making a purchasing decision:

• Price
• Quality
• Delivery options/item availability/convenience
• Needed functionality/duration
• Alternative products/substitutes
• Service, and;
• Brand/image/company reputation.

Many times, the ultimate buying decision is based on a combination of the above and it varies by customer. However, we know that quality plays a key role in customer loyalty and repeat sales. With this in mind, think about how your organization measures quality, how it compares to your competition, and to what extent it either contributes to sales growth or declining business.

Consider these 3 key quality metric groupings when evaluating the impact of product and service quality on your business:

1. Yield – the percentage of your product/service that is produced and delivered on time and according to technical specifications. What is the trend and how does a 1% change impact the bottom line? From a manufacturing perspective, yield involves the amount of product derived from a set amount of inputs and the corresponding scrappage and waste. For a retailer, perhaps one alternative metric here would be inventory stock-outs. For a services firm, the percent of projects delivered on time and on budget is a valuable measure.
2. Customer rejects/returns – how often are your products returned or rejected by customers? What are the current trends and root causes for returns? For services, what are the equivalent measures? If you are a supplier, you need to know how your end customers are measuring supplier performance and how well your products are meeting their quality standards.
3. Customer satisfaction – this is a standard metric produced by many organizations. How are you measuring it and what does it mean? Does it represent a reasonable picture of your customer’s satisfaction with your product/service value proposition? Does it vary significantly by customer segment? Are you leveraging big data and analytics to provide better clarity and insight into customer loyalty, satisfaction and profitability? Would a net promoter score (promoters minus detractors) provide useful insights, and what can be learned from each group?

So, next time you see a stamped and dated sidewalk square, ask yourself, can you afford to not zero in on customer quality and fully understand how it drives your profits and growth? Contact Transforming Solutions, Inc. to explore innovative ways to improve your company’s performance.

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