The Process Ninja

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Process Ineptitude Personified - Westpac Insurance

Insurance as a concept is not a difficult thing to grasp - so why do so many companies make a complete mess of it?

Yesterday I called around to get some quotes on a fairly niche insurance product - landlord insurance for a holiday rental property. Most insurance companies couldn't (or rather wouldn't) provide cover. But one who did was Westpac Insurance. Happily I used their online quote tool. After entering only my address details it instantly spat me back a quote.

Hmm...something not right there. Knowing what I do know about insurance and having completed other online quotes I knew that there was something wrong. Nontheless I pressed on and was greeted with a screen which said something along the lines of "Oh you want an insurance quote, great, but this is all too difficult for our system to grasp so you're going to have to fill in a crappy form and someone will call you sometime in the future".

Confidence dwindling - but as their product looked good I pressed on and completed the online form. It gave me the option to enter my Westpac customer number which I thought was smart as it would streamline the application process.

A few hours later I had already signed up for another insurance provider (Ray White Insurance) who had provided me with some really good service.Still I was curious to see what our inept banking friends Worstpac would do next.

At 11:30 am the next day (a mere 24 hours later! - too slow!) I received a call from Westpac who proceeded to grill me about my Westpac details: "what is your card number? What is your limit? What is your address? Do you have any regular payments? Where did you collect the card from?"

"Wait, is all of this necessary? - I just want to get an insurance quote" I replied to which I was told that it was necessary as Westpac had called me and they needed to verify my ID (which I had no idea why they had trouble doing this since I knew very well what my address, card number and other details were). "What you'll need to do is to call us back."

"What????" I replied "But what if I wasn't a Westpac customer? How would I get a quote"

"Oh, you'd have to call us, we wouldn't call you".

So I take down the number I am supposed to call her back on and throw it in the bin. Or should I say, the "too hard basket".

So by all accounts Westpac don't call people back to give them quotes. They also don't make it easy for current customers to take out insurance. They also don't have an online quote tool that works. Westpac have created a process that suits themselves and not their customers, and the equation is therefore very simple - the customers will not buy - and that includes me.

- TPN 

From Now On When I Mention Any Companies in this Blog...

From now on whenever I mention a company name in this blog I will be contacting them to let them know what I am saying about them (unless, like fantastic holdings they have no means of being contacted). Whether it be good or bad they'll be told.

I'm doing this for a couple of reasons:

1. I don't think it's fair to criticise without giving them an opportunity to respond.

2. Likewise if I am saying nice things this feedback should also be provided so someone can pat themselves on the back and feel good.

3. Usually the responses from companies are either non-existant or hilarious "cut and paste jobs" straight from the bumper book of customer responses. We all need a laugh.

I'll be pasting any of their responses (unedited) into the corresponding post about them and supplying my own responses to their responses.

Look forward to some hearty laughs folks.

- TPN

Do Your Processes Give Your Customers Away?

Today I was given away. Not expensively, not cheaply, but freely. I was tossed into the garbage like an empty milkshake.

But I wasn't an empty milkshake, I was full. I had plenty of juicy milky goodness. So why was I thrown away? Because they didn't care and they didn't ask so I wasn't given an opportunity to tell them so that they had the opportunity to try to keep me.

Today I called AAMI to let them know that I wanted to cancel my home contents insurance with them. After a few confirmations and a few clicks I was told "that's all done for you, you'll receive a refund of your policy by mail...thank-you for calling AAMI..."

There was no "why are you leaving?" There was no "how can we help you to stay?" There wasn't even the slightest hint of curiosity as to why a customer with three AAMI policies would suddenly cancel one of them. Here was as obvious a moment of truth as you can find, and AAMI failed spectacularly.

The reasons for this are clear - staff are disconnected from the customer experience. They have become robotic and unable to think. They have no incentive to try to keep a customer. They just do their job and think "it's not my problem".

In an age where big business throws millions of dollars around trying to persuade us to join them, I find it a tragedy when they give us away for nothing.

- TPN

Eat Your Own Dog Food

I worked for an  IT Company that had an IT helpdesk that was beyond helpless. I worked for a Telecommunications company where the boss created an atmosphere of fear and hatred. I worked for an insurance company where the staff would burst into tears. I worked for a bank with a stationery cupboard with no stationery in it.

If this is the way we treat our employees, how do you think our customers will feel? But no, we treat our customers like kings, right? But if we look upon our employees, no matter where they sit in an organisation, they all have (or must have) an end impact on the customer experience – we are all part of the chain that leads to the customer. Break that chain or pass the wrong message down the line and we do damage.

So when you come to work for a company that earns billions of dollars profit a year and you don’t have paper to write on, don’t have a cup to drink out of and the printer has been broken for a week, what is the impact? Do you turn up at work full of the joys of spring? Or do you brood and fester your discontent until it spreads like a slow poison?

For too long now businesses have been treating their staff like disposable assets, and in the last year or so employees have been taken advantage of more and more. Whilst many organisations have suffered, many still continue to reap huge harvests – but that doesn’t stop them from cancelling xmas parties and forcing “imposed leave”. So when you talk in fuzzy Marketing speak about how you are going to look after your customers, remember that it all starts within your gilded doors. If you can’t eat your own dog food then how do you expect anyone else to?

The tide is turning, the boats are waiting on the shore.

Are you going to be one of “them” or one of us…?

- TPN

If it seems too hard, it is too hard

In those moments where you throw up your hands and say “why is it so hard?!!!” I am thinking of you. And if you are really lucky, somewhere there is a company on the cutting edge thinking about it too.

Unfortunately there are many that aren’t. I had one such “why is it so hard?!!” moment last weekend. This moment came when I stood in front of an aisle in Bunnings Warehouse (hardware store), light fitting in hand staring at the thousands of lightbulbs in front of me. All I wanted was a BW22. How hard could that be? Well as the lightbulbs were arranged by brand rather than type and as most of the boxes were the same size, it was like trying to find a raindrop in a swimming pool. Not only this, but the light bulb code was written on the boxes in tiny print, so walking along the rows and reading the codes took forever. Of course as they were organised by brand I had to find each BW22 in a different section so that I could compare the price. Then, of course I had to find out which BW22 had the Edison screw, not the bayonet.

Then I gave up.

I’ll just ask someone, I thought. 10 minutes later, after wandering to the other side of the store I finally found a little helper who cheerfully advised me on lightbulb types.

So in the end, I got what I wanted, but why did I have to spend 30 minutes to buy a lightbulb? Is this a good customer experience? Of course not!

Is it too complex to think that the store could be organised so that a small quantity of light globes (a few of each brand) could be placed next to the applicable light fittings? Wouldn’t that provide a better customer experience whilst saving the store money on staff costs due to continual customer enquiries?

And in the event a customer needs to ask a question, is it a good experience that they have to wander around looking for staff? Is it so hard to have a button to press to get help, or for the store to be monitored by cameras where customers looking for help to be spotted and quickly assisted?

It’s not that hard. But when it seems too hard, you know what to do: take your business elsewhere.

- TPN

Planes, Pains & Automobiles

I recently flew to Perth on Holiday and I was surprised how poorly both Virgin Blue and Sydney Airport performed. After all these years of aviation, why do we still follow the same process of checking in and bag handling that we have done for decades? Little has evolved since I flew on my first flight as an excited 3 year old in 1976.

First let’s talk about Sydney Airport: Firstly it’s a pain to get to from just about anywhere. From where I live (only 15ks from the CBD) it’s too expensive by taxi, too inconvenient by train and shuttle buses don’t take kids under 4. That leaves me the only option of parking in long term parking for $140 a week. So I have to drive 40 mins to the airport, dump the wife and kids at the front of the terminal, drive to long term parking and take the bus back. All in all, about 15-20 minutes. Not family friendly, in fact not anybody friendly.

Then there is Virgin Blue: of course being a process guy I have already checked in online. My thoughts of dropping my bag down a big chute and speeding off onto the plane are dealt a mammoth blow when I see that the queue for the “bag drop” is triple the queue for check-in. When I do finally get through to the desk after a 15 min wait we are told that we are late and that we can’t take the baby buggy to the gate. We have to drag it across the terminal to the oversized baggage drop before we struggle with 3 kids and 3 pieces of hand luggage down to the gate where we get on the plane just in time.

But we do get to Perth, quickly collect our bags and set off for the AVIS car hire desk. The empty desk that is. We have to use a phone on the desk to call AVIS who ask us to trek over to the other side of the terminal because they only have one staff member on (not my bloody problem!). So the Reid entourage sets off again looking like something out of the Beverly Hillbillies – our trolley stacked up to head height with small children hanging off of it with the occasional suitcase flapping onto the floor like a fat man doing a bellyflop into a swimming pool. So eventually we make it over to AVIS, get things processed quickly and go off and collect our car. However, they fail to spot a dent on the car which I have to have rectified with the rep who has to call back to the desk and have the paperwork changed. Other than that the process is very efficient.

On the way back from Perth we drop off the hire car (again, very fast and efficient). Neither Perth airport or AVIS have thought that people dropping off cars may actually need trolleys to get luggage to check-in but we fossick around and eventually find one.

Our check-in process is as equally painful as the first time. The “Bag drop” process seems to be identical to check-in so I fail to see what time or cost savings it provides to either Virgin Blue or the customer (unless you don’t have any bags to check-in). The bag drop people stand in the queue huffing and puffing and shaking their heads wondering why they didn’t go into the much shorter check-in queue. Again we are unable to take the buggy to the gate (as we were told we could by the Virgin Blue call centre).

We eventually make our flight and arrive at the hellhole that is Sydney Airport on a Sat night. After again battling to get trolleys and bags I go off to collect the car from long term parking. I wait for the bus to arrive. And wait. And wait. So do about 200 other people. After about 20 minutes the bus finally arrives. It leaves looking like the train to New Delhi – about 10 people per square metre. Heads wedged in armpits – you know how it is. I finally pick up the car, pay, head back to the airport (almost getting lost on the way as there are no signs from the parking to the airport) – and try to pick up my wife and kids. Funnily enough even though I am allowed to drop them off outside the airport I am not allowed to pick them up outside the airport (do terrorists only bomb arrivals?) so I am funnelled into a 10 min free parking area where thankfully my little entourage are waiting for me.

However I have to take a taxi home so I queue up to be able to take a taxi home at a higher price than I would have paid getting one anywhere else in Sydney.

So my reflections:

- After 30 years of incredible technology improvements, why does going to the airport seem like going back in time?
- Why is it so difficult to get to the airport, and so costly?
- Why can’t I pick up my wife and kids at the door?
- Why do I have to pay more for a cab at the airport?
- Why should I bother checking in online when it’s quicker to check in at the airport than it is to drop a bag?

Here we have a situation where it seems like every effort is made to make the customer experience worse! Because we have no other choice in airport we have to accept what we are given! Of course we have a choice to choose airlines, so pay attention Mr Branson!

The disappointing part in all of this is the inability to embrace change and to think of new ways of doing things. Airports have been doing things the same way for so long they can’t think of any other way of doing it. We need to challenge this thinking by approaching it from the customer experience and by not accepting that it is good enough.

- TPN

Outside-in Part 3 - The Method

So I've talked about what outside-in has achieved and about successful customer outcomes - by how do we practically implement outside-in?

Outside-in is fundamentally about aligning processes with successful customer outcomes. Through workshops with little more than than sticky-notes, brown paper and the front line staff in the room we can start to radically change our thinking of organisational processes.

When we look at the customer experience we are looking for three key items within the process:

Moments of Truth – any interaction with the customer – this could be a customer to person interaction, for example or a customer to system interaction. These moments represent an opportunity in time to delight the customer or to fail!

Break points – any hand-off in the process – these represent potential points where the process can break down.

Business Rules – any decision point in the process. These can add complexity, increase effort and be a potential failure point.

When we map out the process we start to identify where these three factors occur for each step in the process. We then use these to calculate the point of failure factor for our process. This point of failure factor gives us an idea of how optimised (or not optimised!) our processes are from a customer point of view. The point of failure factor has been proven to directly correlate to customer satisfaction – so a high level of potential failure will equal a propensity for customers to be dissatisfied (I wonder why?!)

Thinking about our process with all its moments of truth, break points and business rules for a moment it is easy to see how customer dissatisfaction can occur. You may think that having lots of moments of truth (i.e customer interaction) might be a good thing, but think of it this way: if you had to call up a company to get some information but each time you received the information it was inaccurate and had to call again, how long would it take to irk your dissatisfaction? And what if instead the company had not only given you the information, but had given you extra information that had helped you further?

So once the point of failure factor has been identified we seek to improve our processes. But how to we do this? We need to:

1. Eliminate
2. Improve

Each moment of truth, break point or business rule represents an opportunity, but the more of them we have the greater our chance of failure occurring. So to reduce our point of failure factor we seek to eliminate as many as we can. Obviously we can’t practically get rid of all of them, but we need to ensure that the ones that we leave in place are improved as much as possible and that they are aligned to successful customer outcomes.

This is a very high level overview of how outside-in works. If you’d like to find out more or to become trained in the technique I’d recommend you visit the following links:

BP Group - http://www.bpgroup.org/

BP Group on Linkedin - http://www.linkedin.com/groups?gid=1062077&trk=myg_ugrp_ovr

Steve Tower's Blog (World Outside-in Guru) - http://successfuloutcomes.blogspot.com/

Remember, The Process Revolution Starts Here...

- TPN

Lean six sigma group on linkedin goes feral!

Apologies folks it's been a while and yes I am still working on the post for outside in part 3. In the meantime have a look at the lean six sigma group on linkedin. World process guru Steve Towers posted a link to my post on the death of lean six sigma on the discussions there (thanks Steve...I think!) and fireworks predictably ensued!!! Whether you are interested in Lean, Six sigma or Outside in the discussion is with having a look at - particularly if you want to see the process ninja bring verbally attacked and beaten up!

They can hurt me but they won't win!

- TPN

Outside-in Part 2: Successful Customer Outcomes

So we've talked about what Outside-in has done and is currently doing for some of the best organisations in the world. But how does it actually work?

Outside in, fundamentally, is about aligning the way business is done with successful customer outcomes. That may sound like a no-brainer but careful thought is required to specify what the real customer outcome is. Outside-in takes an approach that focusses on the customer experience. The part that most organisations get wrong is that their definition of the customer experience is blinkered - the way that they have run their business and approached what they think their customers want has become immobile and inflexible.

Take two contrasting examples. British Airways struggles ahead selling seats on planes. Their approach to making money is just that - bums on seats. They are stuck in the mentality that the process is simply from check-in to baggage collection. It's thinking from decades ago. They are going slowly bust because they are a dinosaur unable to be flexible enough to adapt, to learn and to align with what today's airline passengers actually want. They can cost cut 'till the cows come home - it won't save them.

Meanwhile Ryanair are steaming ahead. They've looked at the customer experience and removed the blinkers. They've used outside-in to think outside the box - to give customers what they want - to fulfill the successful customer outcomes. They don't see the process as simply check-in to baggage collection - they have seen the opportunities: e.g.  online gambling, e-cigarettes and their latest innovation - removing check-in desks altogether.

So whilst traditional companies try to solve their problems by looking at their internal processes and improving them (with the misguided aim of improving their service to the customer) outside-in starts with the customer experience and builds the internal business processes to support the customer alignment.

But how do we do this I hear you scream?

Stay tuned for Outside-in Part 3: Moments of Truth.

- TPN