Yes, I am happy, Right Now!
Written on August 11th, 2009 by namrataMany companies research Customer Satisfaction scores as their measure of success. This is based on a fundamental assumption that a new TV screen, a laptop or a new car is purchased by a consumer to give them ‘satisfaction’. The aggregated score of many customers yields the Customer Satisfaction Index or CSI. This for many years has been the holy grail of many companies.
I am amused to hear many managers and CEO’s talk about how CSI has increased and almost implying that customers actually wake up thinking about their products. My personal biases aside, I want you to think back when was the last time you seriously thought about your toothpaste, toothbrush, stapler, pencil, toilet roll or any of the thousands of things we take for granted today.
The products that I take for granted – which I call ‘Basics’ are many. I don’t notice their presence, till they are absent. For example if my toothpaste is missing., I will rave and rant but if you ask me what brand of toothpaste I buy – I wouldn’t have a clue, neither will I be able to tell you if I am satisfied with it. Some years back Telecom, Cable TV, web based travel booking etc. were ‘WOW” products. Aspirational, interesting and new. There were discussions around service rates, innovative value adds etc. Today, I would club these into basics as well. Till the time the cable is on, I forget about the service provider and remember them when the set top box is working again.
The measurements that we use are also based somewhere on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. This view, assumes that human beings are driven by a limitless craving for material possessions. He developed a hierarchy with physiological (food, drink, sleep, etc.), needs at the bottom and developed a pyramid of other needs such as safety (bodily, health, etc.), love and belonging (friendship, etc.), esteem (from self and others), and right at the top self-actualisation.
Our product driven world economy is driven by this hierarchy. Luxury brands are sold on the basis of their ability to satisfy the need for self esteem.
I have problems with the needs being arranged in a hierarchy. I think in our lives the situation is a good deal more complicated and fluid than this. Which is why simplistic measures such as CSI at times appear really logical in boardrooms and ridiculous when someone actually asks you the same questions.
Considering the recent research on Happiness – some companies have graduated onto developing happiness scores. This again is only a way of calling the same thing by a different name. Another way of maintaining the status quo if enough customers agree with our way of working. So, Are you happy with your car? Yes, I am happy right now.
Happiness, like all other things is driven by context and measures based on simplistic questions and not ongoing interactions can give a completely false view.
However, there is a new way of looking at human needs. According to Manfred Max-Neef a Chilean economist and environmentalist, fundamental human needs are: subsistence, protection, affection, understanding, participation, recreation, creation, identity, freedom.
How can these aspects be built into corporate analysis of success?
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