1. NO TIME FOR CUSTOMERS: Conduct a Task Audit
I discuss the importance of Customers, Customer Value and Creating Value with
CEO’s and CXO’s of companies of all sizes. We discuss how increasing Customer
Value leads to increased profits. Many CXO’s end the conversation saying, “What
you are suggesting is important and certainly the Customer is crucial for us.
However, we have too many other programs in place…” The Customer priority is
generally low in these companies.
At first, I used to be mystified that the Customer was not that important to these
companies, and that they had no time for the Customer. So, I asked myself, what is
more important? What tasks are they carrying out that are more significant? I then
started to work with companies on a Task Audit (and these included India’s largest
companies). We looked at:
Necessary and Relevant work for the Customer
Necessary and Irrelevant work
Unnecessary and Relevant work
Unnecessary and Irrelevant work

2. AS DEFINITIONS, Necessary work is essential for, vital to, indispensable to,
important to, crucial to, needed by, compulsory required by or requisite for the
Customer
Relevant work is pertinent to, applicable or germane to, or appropriate to the
Customer. This is work that can be eliminated without deterioration of present
service or product
What work is the Customer willing to pay for? That would be termed as Necessary
and Relevant.
We conducted research on tasks done by executives through questionnaires. Half of
the executives answered the questions themselves and the other half with the
researchers. Not surprising, the ones who answered the questions themselves found
that 70% of their work was useful (either necessary or relevant to the Customer).
The executives who filled the questions with the help of researchers found only 50%
of their work was useful. The rest was useless (this makes sense, because people
have difficulty in admitting that what they do is useless)
Examples of useless tasks are redoing reports, unnecessary meetings, waiting for
meetings to start and most important of all, reading useless emails. If you spend two
hours on emails at least 30 minutes plus are useless. And if you are a department of
16 people you are losing one man day on useless emails. Start thinking of this and
eliminate useless work and start useful work for the Customer.
In The Times of India, March 8, 2013, there is an article called "E-fatigue setting in?
Firms may kill emails"
Mckinsey is quoted as saying employees spend 28% of their time reading, sorting
and sending emails every day.
CXO’s, you have a choice of hiding behind the excuse of not having time,
or doing something about it and in helping Customers get more Value. Act
now!
Gautam Mahajan
Contact Customer Value Foundation for help
email: mahajan@customervaluefoundation.com
website: http://www.customervaluefoundation.com