Vignesh Sethuraman

Taking action on any complaint is very important to provide a better customer experience. This shows that the customer complaints are taken seriously and worked upon to eliminate hiccups on CX. It is also very important that any action that is taken towards customer complaints are taken considering the company policies and customer expectations. Sometimes customers expects unrealistic things which cannot be considered, and this needs to be put across to customer in a proper way. From my experience, it is always clear that customers do recommend your brand when they feel that their feedbacks are heard and worked upon.

Strategic Thinking is an essential skill you develop as you grow with your experience. Especially when you are in your mid career stage, this skill will help you lay a better foundation in your ability to overcome professional challenges. If you are able to think strategically in CX, it articulates that you have a niche skill to help the overall customer journey to be designed having a long term vision that sets you apart. In my experience, I have been appreciated by a lot of leaders on my strategic thinking to design better customer journey process, influencing the business objectives and long term vision that enhances the customer experience.

Feedback is key for improvement at any point of time. Sometimes these feedbacks that you receive from the people who consistently talk to customers certainly makes a huge difference in overall customer experience. From my experience, the more you focus on empowering your team members by giving them a platform to share their insights and feedback, it will have a great impact on redefining the existing process which will help in providing a wow customer experience. By allowing your team to share their feedback and working those feedbacks will make the team feel they are more valued and the insights & feedback they provide certainly makes a difference in the customer journey.

Resilience is key after any conflicts and positive attitude is the step towards building resilience post any internal/external conflicts. In my experience, positive attitude has always helped me to build resilience so that it minimises the impact for the customer as a result of these conflicts. It is also very important to recognise & reward the folks who take efforts to resolve conflicts within the team. Positivity will also help to keep the team's atmosphere happy, which will eventually help the team to work collaboratively and provide better customer experience. These behaviours not only help the team's morale, but also helps in eliminating further customer impacts.

"Without involvement there is no commitment." Having said that, it is the basic responsibility of a leader to involve everyone when any changes are proposed not only to get the buy in from the team, but also giving them a feel that they are heard and feels included. In my experience, more teachings and process improvement ideas have always come from the team who works directly with the customers at ground level. When you involve the team, they automatically start taking ownership which is key. Involving everyone will encourage the team to share their thoughts and also be the first step towards their commitment on the changes without any pushbacks.

Many brands do this mistake in Customer Experience that they sound differently on different medium/channels. Perhaps, this will certainly puts a huge threat in earning trust from the customers. While consistency is key in carrying the brand reputation, it is also important that all channels needs to reflect the same message to the customer which in turn reduces customer challenges and also helps in building trust and rapport with the customers. In my experience, I have come across a lot of customers who express their frustration when different channel directs customers differently. Maintaining consistent message across channel is key to display reliability and professionalism.