“You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work back towards the technology.”-Steve JobsOperational excellence and customer experience present organizations with a classic “chicken or the egg” problem. Many organizations focus on operational efficiency to increase growth and profitability but in the process, they lose sight of the customer experience. Other organizations place an emphasis on providing superior customer experiences but run into problems because they have not achieved operational efficiency.So, what then is an organization to do? Fortunately, there are ways to master operational excellence and customer experience. It starts with finding an actionable definition for operational excellence that includes at its core a focus on providing value to an organization’s customers. From there, an organization must decide what operational excellence looks like for its specific business model and industry. From there, an organization can set goals and come up with a strategy for improving its business processes.
Operational excellence and customer experience: a workable definition
Operational excellence (OPEX) is not the easiest term to define. It means different things to different organizations. Yet, without an actionable definition of OPEX, an organization cannot implement or refine its processes to achieve its desired results.Onegood definition of OPEX that incorporates efficiency and growth at the organizational level is “execution of a business strategy more consistently and reliably than the competition…[it] is evidenced by results. Given two companies with the same strategy, the operationally excellent company will have lower operational risk, lower operating costs, and increased revenues relative to its competitors, which creates value for customers and shareholders.”Contrast this withIndustryweek’s definition, which focuses almost entirely on providing value to the customer. “Operational excellence is when each and every employee can see the flow of value to the customer, and fix that flow when it breaks down. It’s that simple.”So, two definitions. Two different emphases. The first tells us that customers will benefit from value created through more efficient processes. The second one fails to tell us how that value is created in the first place. Neither definition is wrong per se, just incomplete and/or in the wrong sequential order. The above quote from Steve Jobs is useful in this regard. Operational efficiency must start with providing superior customer experiences as an end goal. Implementing efficient and cost-effective business processes at the organizational level will directly or indirectly help you achieve your goal.
