When the world seemed paused, in a break-state from the routine and the predictable, Summer 2022 suddenly came and took us back in time two years, with the travels, family & discovery time, and those late-night shenanigans all of us used to experience during this season of the year. The question is, was everyone prepared for it? 

While we were more than ready to pick up where we left off over two years ago, the travel industry seemed everything but far from ready!

Conscious Communication & Understanding Your Customers' Needs

I was personally glued to the news, reading the statements of Emirates airlines (you can read it 'here') pushing back at the inefficiency of Heathrow (among a few of the many airports that failed to be ready). 

I was also watching so many of your stories (and living my personal one too) of lost luggages, endless lines, and disappointments!

One thing that struck me the most was the US vs THEM sentiment across all the situations. But Emirates, WOW! What a statement you made! You really are on top of your game by focusing all your communication and priority on your customers and NOT on stating the operational load, the loss of revenue and etc..

Why Customers Don’t Care About Your Purpose Unless It's Evident To Them?

Is it really rocket science? Why is it so hard for all these very well-funded and ‘experienced’ groups & brands to get it? The WHY of your mere existence is your customers, guests, and community (whatever you chose to call them).

This made me reflect on a couple of things...

CONNECTING DOTS: COLLABORATION VS DISCONNECTION

In general, my experience has been that each department has a clearly defined set of processes and KPIs and results measured often by the department. When the real transformation should be (BY NOW!!) of processes that are connected across all departments and designed with one outcome in mind: the success of the service in the eyes of your customer. What does good look like? For who? … And then design it backward!

When we have a cross-department responsibility we need to create governance of roles and responsibilities not only per department but also for each’s impact on the full experience. Shared accountability towards the customer outcome is the only way everyone will collaborate to make the outcome a team effort!

INNOVATE TO IMPACT

I have seen so many roles being created over the year (and I even played one as Chief Transformation Officer! ). We have had Chief Customer Officer, Head of Brand, Head of Customer Experience, Head of … but at the end of the day, this the main role of the CEO. 

Customer experience isn’t marketing great to have, it is business excellence. It requires moving and designing across all the organization; it requires restructuring and funding; it requires top-down direction and vision, and it requires purposefulness!

THE POWER OF PURPOSEFUL ORGANIZATIONS

We are in the ’Age of Purpose’ and brands are aiming to be more meaningful by defining their bigger vision, but at the same time they're losing sight of the most important and fundamental aspect of their business - the customer. 

If from the top it is crystal clear that the 'WHY' of the organization is to make the customer happy (or whatever inspirational sentence that means that), then this should be embedded in each employee, department, KPI and LTI.

Going back to Emirates Airline’s letter (vs the non existing communications from the others), it is clearly what drives them and the processes and planning that they put in place to be ready. They had in mind one thing: the outcome of their travelers.

Now if only they could own the full experience… maybe that’s a transformation we could one day foresee? Emirates terminals in each city?