{"id":442,"date":"2014-06-30T11:10:25","date_gmt":"2014-06-30T11:10:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/?p=442"},"modified":"2014-06-30T11:13:07","modified_gmt":"2014-06-30T11:13:07","slug":"when-efficiency-reduces-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/when-efficiency-reduces-business\/","title":{"rendered":"When efficiency reduces business"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"color: #000000;\">How can streamlining your operations actually cost you business?\u00a0 Most companies are excited when they find ways to reduce waste and overhead when serving their customers. Just look at the general success stores arehavingwith self-checkout lines, where one cashier can now support 4-8 customers.\u00a0\u00a0 Unfortunately, lean processes are only part of the picture.\u00a0\u00a0 Unless you validate your operations holistically, you might be doing more harm than good.<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<p>Over the last couple years, I had the opportunity\u00a0to observe a foreign bank evolve their branch operations. The first steps were generally positive. \u00a0After remodeling to create better service centers, they divided their customers into three levels based on their banking profile and net worth. \u00a0(Sorry, US banks do this too.) \u00a0Younger customers who had smaller portfolios were moved to a bulk service line where agents could I quickly resolve any needs that weren&#8217;t available using self-service channels.\u00a0 The agent to customer ratio seemed to be about 4 to 1 with 4 to 8 service windows depending on the queue.\u00a0 If you were the middle tier customer, the service line was 2 to 1, and hosted by more senior service agents.<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<p>So what would happen if you applied the same efficiencies to your prestige customer line? Before, the bank had a special service area for top customers.\u00a0 They served coffee, had a private waiting area, and usually 2 to 3 available senior agents at desks. \u00a0(These agents may have processed other transactions and client needs between prestige customers, but it was hard to tell as an observer.) \u00a0Every customer was greeted by name, apologies made if their service agent was busy, and while only waiting a short time to be escorted to their personal agent.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"color: #000000;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: #000000;\">To improve operations, they kept the private waiting area and coffee, but had customer take anumberandwait to be called. \u00a0The number would display on board with the service desk they should go to. \u00a0Premier customers no longer had a dedicated agent, but were still treated by a senior agent. \u00a0Only a small change which should allow customers to be served in about thesamewait time, but result in fewer agents needed. \u00a0No big deal right?<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<p>The difference was the perception to the customers.\u00a0 This was the group that had the largest portfolios, and possibly the highest net assets in the bank. (Excluding fee revenue from the largest quantity, lowest net worth deposit customers.) \u00a0What was this group looking for? \u00a0To feel special, to feel wanted, to feel valued.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div style=\"color: #000000;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: #000000;\">Think about your last airline flight. \u00a0Is there any reason in the world why first class and medallion have a separate line to board? \u00a0If called first, they could easily enter using the same line ahead of all those lowly coach flyers. \u00a0The reason? \u00a0The airline wants to show their appreciation for the extra business by &#8220;rolling the red carpet&#8221;. \u00a0It also motivates other passengers to give more business to the airline too my motivating them through envy.<\/div>\n<div style=\"color: #000000;\"><\/div>\n<div style=\"color: #000000;\">So what was the end result for the bank and their new more efficient procedure? \u00a0They lost a customer who had been with that branch for 40 year. \u00a0The customer moved their assets to a new bank that gave the recognition he\/she desired. \u00a0How many other customers may be making the same decision?<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How can streamlining your operations actually cost you business?\u00a0 Most companies are excited when they find ways to reduce waste and overhead when serving their customers. Just look at the general success stores arehavingwith self-checkout lines, where one cashier can now support 4-8 customers.\u00a0\u00a0 Unfortunately, lean processes are only part of the picture.\u00a0\u00a0 Unless you [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[44],"tags":[14,47,72,6],"class_list":["post-442","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-guides-for-business","tag-business-architecture","tag-business-operations","tag-customer-service","tag-process-improvement"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p45zXQ-78","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hanseckman.com\/guides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}