High Standards don't mean Depersonalised!

Running publicly funded arts organisation in the current climate is no mean feat. The vagaries of funding are potentially catastrophic. What can be done short and long term to minimise the impact and improve other income streams?

One answer is to focus on the customers and the trading side of the operation.

The idea of developing trading income doesn't have to be a fraught with risk, World Class Service are running sales and business development programmes this spring to help deal with this issue but there is a wider backdrop for every customer or visitor that we need to be aware of; every customer has three critical dimensions, their transaction value, their life time value and their referral value.

Trading successfully and gaining goodwill with the audience requires us to see all three dimensions of our customers. It seems to me that a lot of organisations get trapped in seeing only the transaction value and even that is poorly understood. The idea of the customers lifetime value isn't considered at all and their referral value is only dimly understood. If arts organisations want the public on side and to maximise their value they need to see that every individual has the choice to spend more, come back more often, stay loyal and to refer their colleagues, friends and fanily.

Improving performance as an organisation requires a step change of thinking particularly in the field of service delivery. At the moment the idea of standardising service is given short shrift, there is a perception that standards depersonalise the experience; this is the defence of random. Without high standards then anything is pretty much acceptable, poor self awareness, poor communication skills, lack of anticipation, lack of urgency and poor empathy are all acceptable. The failure to identify acceptable service levels for our customers leads to the long standing TARP finding that 68% of customer drift away due to feeling of indifference that they perceive from the business they are engaged with.

Having high standards shows you care and that is the start of the customer relationship. High standards do not depersonalise the service experience in fact they are likely to significantly improve perceptions and improve transaction and lifetime values. High standards are a referral issue, if we encounter good service we do talk about it...its rare!

The hard work of high standards is not just about attention to detail, which appears to be unfashionable, but about how we make high standards an enjoyable thing to deliver and this is the crux of the issue. If an organisations can work out how to motivate its people to deliver high standards they will see a winning approach start to emerge.

I firmly believe that high standards of service and success in trading performance are linked..