45 missed opportunities

Large contracts are often signed not in offices, but over a cup of coffee or during dinner in a restaurant. Today in Russia during business breakfasts they not only complete transactions, but also create new companies, find new clients; Combining business with pleasure, entrepreneurs get a rare opportunity to plunge into a parallel reality - to find out how businessmen from another industry live.

Official part

On September 30, Moscow Modus Cafe hosted a business breakfast in the "Zubry-2C" format on the topic "Customer focus as it was, is and will be." The organizers of the event are the Zubry Business community, Marketing & Brand Conversation and Mozhaiskaya and Partners gathered at Modus Cafe top managers and business owners from Miel, Yandex, Diamond Holding, Forex Club and other well-known companies, not only to have breakfast in a cozy restaurant, but also for lively useful communication. Among the 45 people who came to the meeting were four representatives of the fashion business and not a single one working in shoe retail. In fact, these are 45 missed opportunities to expand the business and deepen knowledge about working with clients. SR talks about what you can use next time (business breakfasts in the Bison-2С format are held regularly, and not only in Moscow).

In chronological order

A September morning on Plyushchikha is quiet, a riot of golden leaves, a lot of sun, wicker chairs, warm bread and the aroma of freshly brewed coffee at Modus Café. As it turned out, almost half of the guests had already forgotten what morning Moscow looked like, and so early (the business breakfast starts at 9 o'clock) pulled themselves out of a warm bed just for the sake of the relevance of the topic. But in fact we got much more. Because unlike seminars, where the format of communication is one-sided ("one speaks - the other listens, occasionally aleatherg questions"), here communication is two-way.

First 18 minutes

The guests sit down at the tables, and the first part of the business breakfast begins (there are only three of them) - an acquaintance. At each table - six people, each - three minutes to talk about their business, about themselves and answer questions. So the timing is very tough: for everything about everything - 18 minutes Fundamental moment: invited experts sit at the same table with the audience and present themselves and their business just like everyone else - this emphasizes the equality of all participants.

Second 18 minutes

Break. First meal change. Each table delegates to one of the participants the right to introduce everyone else to the meeting. “Good afternoon, my name is Anastasia. The people at our table are united by the fact that we are active, dancing, diving. ” Following is a presentation of each. “Unique people gathered at our table” (indeed, suffice it to say: “Samvel Avetisyan,” and an additional presentation is no longer required). The creators of the museum of retro cars. Founder of the “emotional” trend. The man who stood at the origins of Yandex.Market. Some participants came from Nizhny Novgorod specifically for the morning meeting. Thus, in less than an hour, everyone found out who is who, where, and what they were doing.

Third 18 minutes

Break, second meal. Messages from experts. Public activist, writer, publisher, president of the Go Federation, head of the Russian school of go and strategy, teacher of the Skolkovo business school Igor Grishin delved into the etymology of the word “customer focus” and ultimately came to the conclusion that he had thoroughly understood only one word. , it is already possible to solve some of the strategic issues. Value Management for Business General Director and Leading Personnel Loyalty Expert Konstantin Kharsky shared with his participants a step-by-step concept of transforming an ordinary company into a customer-oriented one.

Third hour

The experience of expressing your business and enriching it with new knowledge gained from experts is not the only delight of a business breakfast. The third part of the format is actually communication between the participants, and when you know who is who, when the first barrier “how to turn to a neighbor” is overcome, it is much easier to communicate. The most common question: how can I be useful for your business?

Dmitry Kuzin can be called the ideologist of the business breakfast format in Moscow; he is also the creator, inspirer and promoter of the Zubry.ru project and community. Dmitry was one of the first to adapt the business breakfast format, popular in London and New York, to Russia. Every morning, about 30 thousand entrepreneurs in London and Manchester, Glasgow and Edinburgh, Belfast and other cities come together to start their day with a shared breakfast, dating and socializing. In total, more than 2 million people participate in such meetings annually. This unusual format is called networking. In 2009, this format came to Russia under the name "Bison-2С". Why "Bison"? Because at these events people gather who rightfully call themselves or are referred to by other “business bison”. The mysterious prefix "2С" stands for simply: "Communication" and co-action. " Two key concepts for all participants. “Together we listen, together we do.” By the way, during the business breakfasts organized by Dmitry Kuzin, several joint businesses were born, and there is no need to talk about those who found new business partners. For two incomplete years, business breakfasts were held in Moscow, Ryazan and Nizhny Novgorod. Next in line are St. Petersburg, Tver and Kiev.

According to Dmitry Kuzin, the audience of visitors is deliberately rotated, but all participants have the opportunity to communicate in the blogosphere. The global goal, according to Dmitry, is to create a platform for full-fledged live communication of representatives of small and medium-sized businesses. Unlike the European format, informal conversations in the Russian version are supplemented by expert presentations that increase the effectiveness of such meetings.

What customer focus is impossible in Russia

- A business breakfast is a very good genre, it is great to meet nice people in the morning. How much can you achieve if you go to such breakfasts once a month ?! I have to repent - with the word "customer focus" I live only three weeks. It was very hard for me at first. A very long assembly of several languages, incomprehensible, awkward. Where is this customer? How to focus on it? It seems that you are looking for a moose tick that climbed under the jacket. And if you cannot understand the word, then you cannot use it. And at first it was humanitarianly disgusting to me. Now I am humanitarianly interested.

The first part of the word is about customers. They appeared in ancient Rome. In the mornings, clients gathered at the patron’s house and made a salute, that is, wished him health, it was a constant ritual. And if you imagine that a brand is a cartridge, and customers come to it, then it's impossible to see customers. The cartridge cannot see customers. It is he himself who sees them. If we continue to study etymology, then the client is not a king and a god, but a novice, and he has two main obediences. Every day go to salute the cartridge. And be a courier. If you look at today's life, we really go to the store for the brand, that is, we act as couriers. How can there be a client-cartridge connection if we are brand-oriented? There can be no customer focus in this context.

The second part of the word comes from "orient" - east, sunrise. And if customer focus is first taken apart and then assembled, it turns out that “customer focus” is putting the client in the status of the Sun. In the status without which the life of this brand is impossible, just as life on Earth is impossible without this luminary. The result was a scan of a strategically higher level.

Customer Focus Definition

Konstantin Kharsky has been developing his concept for eight years, so he began his presentation with a practical question: “What will you do first when you want to become a customer-oriented company?”

Before reading the answer, try to answer for yourself

The first thing companies do is begin to train front managers and salespeople. That is, those who communicate with customers every day. And they achieve the worst results possible. (After reading the article to the end, you will understand why.)

This is not a process or even a declared company policy. This is an estimate! How the client himself evaluates your efforts to establish relationships with him is what makes sense to all business owners. The difficulty is that the evaluation criteria are subjective and most often unknown. But you can find them out, of course, if there is a desire. As well as becoming a customer-oriented company. What needs to be done for this?

1 step. Understanding

First you need to understand what customer focus means for your company and how clear this definition is and is shared by all employees. Because here it is much more important that it be general rather than correct.

How to understand this? You need to find a client’s place in your company. Any company always has five priorities: profit, employees, reputation, brand, customers. In what order do you prioritize these for yourself?

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If you put customers first, it will be a lie, but the customers' place must be determined. By identifying priorities, you can give your interpretation of customer focus.

By the way, one small but important detail: do not improve the service if you are not going to continue to adhere to this strategy. Otherwise, this can lead to customer frustration.

But while Russian companies have somehow learned to work with customer expectations, they are often not able to formulate their requirements for them. Konstantin Kharsky says that when he suggests identifying requirements for customers, for many at first it causes surprise, bewilderment, and sometimes protest. How is this what can be expected of a client? Just come! In one of the networks selling lingerie, Konstantin organized a contest for the most complete list of requirements for a client. The most active participant was paid 15 thousand rubles. The requirements turned out to be 400!

2 step. Parenting

Konstantin Kharsky clearly outlined the difference between education and training. Greetings with elders is a training. The instilling of outlooks on life is education. When hiring, the company is obliged to honestly and frankly inform the employee how she looks at the world and what worldview she expects from him. Is it hard to do? The company itself does not know what its worldview is? It's time to formulate it. If a new person comes to the company and they do not inculcate views on life, then this is an implicit sign for a beginner: "Work as you want."

Education should begin with the first persons of the company. Here, it is probably more correct to talk about self-education. One of the main mistakes of the educators is that they think that it is possible to instill in the pupils some priorities, and follow the others themselves. How convincing is the father-smoker who brings up in his son a love for a healthy lifestyle? The question, as they say, is rhetorical.

And then everything, as with children, is a personal example, debriefing, flogging.

We have already talked about a personal example. Debriefing. You ask the employee only a few questions: what (with what thoughts, ideas, priorities) were you guided by, making this or that decision, making this or that act ?; What should be guided in a similar situation in accordance with the corporate worldview? How do you know in the future when it will be necessary to make a decision in accordance with corporate rules?

Beware of employees who force you to deal with the same mistakes with them. If a person does not draw conclusions, perhaps he needs to either establish his own business or work in another company.

Spanking is an educational procedure, when you no longer have words, but there is still hope to correct the situation, but with the help of radical methods. What can replace flogging in a business context? Just not fines. Penalties fire the weak, and the strong make the cunning. Here, each self-respecting leader must find his own individual approach and style.

3 step. Training

Only after understanding and educating sellers can be sent to trainers. The maximum that can be achieved by training employees without education is to increase their level of awareness. But in order for employees to be able to use this knowledge with the greatest efficiency, it is necessary to form an appropriate worldview.

What to teach is a largely tactical issue. Ways to solve work problems, response methods in typical and atypical situations. A more detailed training program depends on the position, profession, company and business. In general, training is just training, rehearsal of a business process.

4 step. Remuneration

Konstantin Kharsky recommends creating a reward system based on three principles.

1. For what you pay, you get. If you pay for coming to work, then you get coming to work.

2. Payment must be fair.

3. Payment must be competitive

What does fair and competitive mean? Dear reader, first answer this question for yourself.

Payment is competitive if in another company for the same work under comparable conditions a person receives a similar reward. The salary is fair if the employee's remuneration directly depends on the quality of his work: the better you work, the more you get. It is calculated by the employee’s total utility index. “You need to decide who and for what to pay, so that it contributes to their customer-oriented behavior. I don’t have a simple answer, and if he had, he would certainly have shared it, ”says Konstantin Kharsky. - All I can add is to sit and think a lot. And almost certainly it will be a radically different wage system than the current one. ” Remember that money does not motivate.

What will happen first of all to your secretary if you double raise her salary? First, she will be delighted. The second - will start spending even more. It is not money that motivates, but traditions in the company, its corporate culture.

To become customer-oriented, you need to take four steps and one jump.

The four steps are understanding, nurturing, learning, and rewarding. And the leap consists in introducing the position of an intermediary, a person protecting the interests of clients. In Western terminology, this position is called Chief Customer Officer (CCO). There is no equivalent in Russian yet. Something like a director for a client, where “client” refers to care about the interests of the client. This person, receiving a salary from the company, deals with only one question all day: what else should we do to be more customer-oriented. He should, as they say, feel the expectations of key customers with his leather, have an excellent understanding of the company's business processes, accurately formulate tasks and be able to insist on their implementation. Can you imagine how hard it is to be a good customer director? It is all a conflict of interest between the company and customers. For each company (at least the majority) in the first place is an increase in profitability, and often it is ready to achieve this at all costs. The client doesn’t like the specification at any cost.

We sincerely hope that our readers will be able to go through all the stages.

What is the difference between meetings in the ZUBRY-2С format

- Entertainment, fun, "fan." By doing business, you can have fun and have fun. Purpose: everyone who is involved in this network starts a business day on a fun, positive note.

- Productivity. The ability to do business in one day, during one meeting.

- Efficiency. The meeting should bring a result that could be developed in the future: the effectiveness of contacts, the effectiveness of knowledge gained, the effectiveness of time spent.

- Honest Networking. A genuine network of contacts, the absence of "spam." This allows you to conduct a direct and substantive conversation, which is especially necessary in business.

Typical business misconceptions

Most often, a consulting order is: "Make our salespeople customer-centric?" - “Sellers or company? “We have enough sellers.” Due to a misunderstanding of the essence of customer focus, companies reduce everything to the politeness of the staff, and in the end they do not achieve their goal. The casket opens simply: they start with the third step - learning, skipping the first two - understanding and education