Steve Neiderhauser

High-Tech, High-Touch Customer Service

When you sell a product you’re also selling a customer experience. Some people believe the experience is so important that it’s been given a name — The Experience Economy.

 

In a social media crazed world where people tweet and blog about anything, how do you create remarkable customer experiences? Micah Solomon gives you the keys to delight customers in his book, High-tech, High-touch Customer Service.

 

The author identifies six crucial trends related to the individual consumer.  While there may be overarching business trends, learning to treat customers as individuals is key to business success. Let’s look at two trends.

 

Customers expect anticipatory technology behavior — Instantly 

 

The art of anticipation helps create customer loyalty. Micah applauds Netflix and Apple for their ability to anticipate customer needs. Netflix, for example, provides viewers with a list of movies they may want to watch next.  And Apple stores are set up to anticipate customer needs.

 

The Apple Store app allows customers to schedule an appointment so staff receive you properly upon arrival. Instead of upselling, Apple employees are trained to listen and suggest products that satisfy your needs.  

 

The Desire for Self Service

 

Customers have become accustomed to a self-service option from other retailers. Updating account info, checking status of a purchase...

 

If your company has no self-service option, customers are going to wonder, “What gives?” Micah teaches the principles of winning self service.  Customers need a choice of channels. Kiosk, website, phone...

 

Customers should have freedom to choose. If they call, your response shouldn’t be, "Hey, that is handled on our website, brilliantcompany.com.  Dude, please surf to it."

 

Self service needs an escape hatch. Have you ever received an email that came with the warning, “Do not reply.” There should be a way for the customer to contact you. There should be a way for the customer to reciprocate. Correspondence sent via US Postal service provide a way to reply, even if it is as simple as "Return to Sender."

 

Also, avoid making customers a slave to your organization structure. Hold the business buzz words. Speak in plain English — the native language of customers.

 

Micah Solomon’s book holds a wealth of wisdom that will help you win loyal customers. He organizes the info so it’s easy for you to touch. The salient points of each chapter are highlighted in a section called, “and your point is?” Cliff notes for the modern marketing man.

 

Micah also provides his take on social media. So if your company has a Facebook page and it’s not all fun and games, you may want to pick up a copy of his book and learn how to respond to people who are bashing your products in 140 character rhymes.

 

Like a movie where the hero encounters a set back, you too can turn it around.

One Benefit of Story Points

On Scrum projects I've had people come up to me and say, "I have no idea what's happening on a project unless I can see hours."  My response to that is you can't tell how the team is performing with hours.  Is the team more productive when they work 60 hours a week?  30 hours a week?

Story points (relative estimate of effort) show you the improvement of the team… Story points show the velocity and how much a team completed in a sprint.

Here's a story point chart of a team I coached. By using Scrum and Extreme Programming, the team increased its velocity by 391%.

 

The Case Against Agile

Steve Denning lists ten management objections to Agile software development.

I've found his second objection to be one of the biggest barriers to Agile.  "Agile doesn't fit our organizational culture."

Because Agile is self-organizing and projects are managed by three groups — product owner, Scrum team, and Scrum Master, functional managers are no longer needed to manage projects. This creates conflict and is often one of the reasons Agile has a hard time succeeding in an organization.

Right Amount of Planning

With each passing day it becomes easier to model or build software.

And yet, many managers find it difficult to let go of their obsession with planning. It's not that we need to throw away all planning, just that it should align with the new realities of software development.

Seth Godin makes the case — When execution gets cheaper, so should planning.

Successful Habits of Writers

The skills needed to write software and novels are similar in many ways. Lately I've seen software developers quoting "The Elements of Style" as a guide for creating software.

"Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words…"

At a software conference, I heard one developer ask for guidance.  "How do you complete software on time? I work 12 hours a day... I answer email. I read blogs. I update my Facebook status."

As laughter filled the room, the speaker, David Heinemeier Hansson, playfully said, "You may want to turn email off."  He went on to explain how he created Ruby on Rails while attending school… He worked on Rails for only a couple hours a day.  A couple of highly focused hours.

Author Jessica Brody provides three tips to help you write. I like her ticking time bomb tip.  She had an old laptop that had only three hours of battery life. Jessica would start to write and when the battery stopped so did her writing.  A clever way to train her mind to be productive.

Small bets lead to a Legend

John Legend... Did you know that John started his career as an analyst at Boston Consulting Group?

So how did he transform himself from business analyst to 9-time Grammy Award winner? He experimented… he played in clubs at night, he cut demos, he was curious.  And he listened.

John is profiled in Peter Sims book Little Bets and in this blog post where the band trumpets the book.

If the John Legend Band can riff on a business book and practice the art of placing small bets to invent the future, shouldn't your company — and employees — become artists of innovation.

Avoid cliches like the plague

In this short skit from Nancy Duarte, Bob and Finn tell us to avoid clichés. Why are clichés bad?

Once upon a time, an original idea or phrase grabbed people's attention. So much that people used the phrase all the time. Over time the edges became rounded and no longer had much impact. Now when the phrase is used, it shows a lack of original thinking.

How many times have you heard these gems. What goes around comes around. Sitting ducks. What if Fred gets hit by a bus.

The hit-by-a-bus phase is often used in business.  You're in a meeting and someone pipes up, "Fred is the only one who understands the XYZ application.  What if he gets hit by a bus?"

Because this phrase has been used so often, most people in the meeting yawn and move on. I like to change the cliché to a slightly different version. "What if Fred gets hit by a tricycle?"

This usually draws a round of laughs and helps the team solve the real problem. So be original in your thinking, writing, and presentations and create ideas that are new and entertaining.

Jeff Sutherland Scrum Talk

I just finished listening to Jeff Sutherland share his Secrets of High Quality Development using Agile.

Jeff emphasized that in addition to Scrum, teams need to implement solid engineering practices to truly realize the benefits of Scrum. His three mandatory practices?

• Continuous Integration
• Automated Testing
• Code Reviews

If you want to create high-performance teams, I encourage you to listen to Jeff or follow his blog.

Swiss Army Knife

An analysis of IT jobs shows that companies are less willing to pay a premium for specialists.  Companies are searching for people who have business skills, multiple talents... a balanced professional who can make projects happen.

To quote David Foote, "They're looking for walking Swiss Army Knives."

The emergance of Agile as a development approach may have something to do with this shift in thinking.  Agile teams are composed of people with cross-functional skills, allowing the team to deliver working software every two weeks.

Real Options in Project Management

John Rudd talks about using Real Options to manage projects.  The options approach allows you to stage your investment… business case, R&D, development.

If your team uses Agile development – an options based approach – they will deliver working software every two weeks, giving executive management a biweekly decision point instead of once a year like some large projects do.

Are User Stories like Movies

Several months ago I heard an Agile consultant lecture that User Stories are like the stories we see in movies because there's three parts to a user story — Beginning, middle, end.

That's like saying a Rueben sandwich tastes great because it has three parts.  The first bite, the last bite, and all the bites in the middle.  In fact, story expert James Bonnet writes about the limits of the three act structure.

Here's two ways User Stories are like stories.

• They both revolve around problems. The problem in a movie has to be big enough to capture our attention.
• A good movie invokes surprise, delight,curiosity. The screenwriter avoids spelling out every detail, making us active participants in the movie.  User Stories are like that too.

Product Owners should write User Stories in a way that elicits a conversation with developers.  No need to describe every detail of a requirement.  The conversation assures developers actively participate in the design.

So the conversation concept produces some of the same benefits that screenwriters create by using implied dialogue techniques.

Software as a Service

A coworker asked about design concepts for software as a service. I pointed him to Getting Real.  A book by the guys from 37signals. Getting Real is a smaller, faster, better way to build software.

At one company I coached an architect on design and how important it is to build options into products from the start. He said, "You mean we want to have a lot of preferences the user can select."

The road to agility is not paved with user preferences.  Truth is, preferences have a cost, a cost to build and maintain.

Like a master chef, you should know when to hold the preferences.

Software Architecture

When I work as a software architect, I want direct contact with the customer, whether it be a consulting engagement or creating a product for a company.  I want to limit any filters a client manager may apply to the information so I know how to delight the customer.

This approach works when the architect has taken the time to learn marketing concepts and speaks the language of business. Architects must have the ability to anticipate needs of customer and create options allowing customers to respond to shifting business landscapes.

How does a software person develop his marketing chops? Start by reading three books.

Purple Cow - Your products need to be remarkable.

Creating Customer Evangelists - The perfect compliment to a Purple Cow. And with the rise of Agile Software development, the perfect marketing approach for Agile.

Flexible Product Design - Brings together the disciplines of architecture and product management. Also discusses real options and set-based design.

Minimal Viable Product

Roman Pichler explains how the lean concept of a minimal viable product translates to Agile development.

It entails creating a first product version to test the vision as quickly and cheaply as possible. This could be a throwaway prototype such as a mock-up or a product increment, working software that is tested and documented.

Some companies still spend three months writing a crazy-large requirements document that no one, including the customer, can wrap their mind around. They'll even poison the customer experience by asking customers to read the requirements and sign off on them.

In the Agile or Scrum development process, the product backlog — list of features — is derived from the product vision. The team implements the backlog and working software is given to the customer to evaluate. Now we're using Dr. Deming's Plan-Do-Check-Act cycle.

What's more, Pichler's Product Vision Board will help the product owner communicate her vision for the product.

Perhaps only one or two people in a company are truly clued in to how product development works. That's what great about Agile. Because when you have a talented Scrum Master, he'll teach everyone in the company how to score in the game of product development.

NoNo the Penguin

If you discovered an entertaining method to learn the ways of a change agent would you jump on it. Because our world is moving faster and faster with each passing day, your answer should probably be "Yes, I want to master the art of change."

Lucky for you, John Kotter has written a story called Our Iceberg Is Melting. Its about a colony of penguins who learn their iceberg is no longer a safe place to live. How does this melting-iceberg-cute-penguin story help you?

Well, story is like a central IV to your brain.  Story delivers insights that help you navigate this ambiguous world. Professor Kotter deftly uses story techniques to capture your imagination and inspire you.

Let's consider one of the characters — NoNo the penguin.

How did NoNo get his name.  One theory suggested his first words as a baby were not "Ma" or "Pa," but "No, No."  This perturbing penguin objected to every idea Fred (hero of the story who wants to save penguin colony from melting iceberg) came up with to solve the melting iceberg problem.

I told a coworker about NoNo the penguin. He replied, "Yes, we had a NoNo at the last place I worked.  That guy hated new ideas."  I bet you've endured more than one NoNo during your career.  In the IceBerg story, NoNo is an archetype.  Story consultant, James Bonnet calls this the holdfast or threshold guardian archetype.

If you're unable to overcome the resistance created by a holdfast, you may not be up to the challenge or ready to receive the benefits of change.

Show, Don't Tell

For a change effort to succeed, you'll need to do more showing than telling. Here again, John Kotter's story delivers.  Instead of lecturing that demonstrations are more effective than a briefcase of facts, Kotter creates a scene for Fred, showing the future of the iceberg.  To prove the melting ice could fracture into thousands of ice chunks, Fred fills a bottle with water and leaves it out overnight.

At dawn's first light, Fred retrieves the bottle and displays it for doubting penguins to see.  Shock rocks the penguins. The bottle is broken and fractured.  This could be the fate of the iceberg, and the penguins. So they take steps to act.

The hidden message? Instead of reading facts, get your audience to see, feel, act.

Our Iceberg is Melting shows Kotter's 8-step process for leading change. The story provides a context for rapidly learning the 8 steps.  You may want to share the story with a small team, and then provide the story to the entire group that must change.

Stories like Our Iceberg is Melting will help your teams develop ambidextroius skills, allowing them to switch between a story that motivates and the details needed to implement change.

Replace requirements with Stories

There's a movement in software development to replace large requirements documents with short user stories.  That's a good thing because stories eliminate hand offs and add a dash of fun.

User stories can also be used by marketing, event planners and other groups to define their product or experience.

There are three terms you should become familiar with to understand user stories — Stories, Epic and Themes.

Epics are large user stories that are too big to implement.  So you break down Epics into stories your team can execute and implement.  The smaller stories replace the Epic.

Read Mike Cohn's blog post for an explanation of Stories, Epics and Themes.

Career Advice from Seth

Seth Godin serves up three points for scoring a job at a small company. Small companies are the hiring engine for our economy.

What's my favorite tip?

"Learn to write…  There's more writing in business today than ever before, and if you can become a persuasive copywriter, you're practically a salesperson, and even better, your work scales."

Becoming a better writer and developing copywriting skills gives you an advantage over other candidates, or employees after you're hired. Consider the fellow who composes a two-page email reply while you accomplish more with two thoughtful sentences.

Stephen King tells us -- "Writing is refined thinking."

So whose emails, and ideas, will be read in the future?

Copywriting teaches us how to think about persuasion and suggests that we write like we talk.  Learning to write in a conversational style will help your writing in all areas -- memos, presentations, web copy.