The Interface Is the Product
Posted on October 20th, 2011
By Emmie Alexander
In our Fast Forward newsletter this week we quoted Jef Raskin, behind-the-scenes computer genius at Apple and author of The Humane Interface (Addison-Wesley, 2000):
“As far as the customer is concerned, the interface is the product.”
Think about it. In your company, it’s likely that one of your lowest-paid, least skilled employees is the interface with the customer. That’s who your customer thinks of as your company. How are you helping that person be as professional, knowledgeable, skilled, helpful, and empathic as you possibly can? What are you doing to make your “interface” the best face of your company? We discussed this issue when we were training all the managers of a large supermarket chain. At one point there was a stunned silence in the room, and then an executive spoke up: “I just realized that at 5 o’clock, when a large percentage of our customers are arriving, all our managers are getting off work leaving the store in the hands of a 17-year old kid at the checkout.” What is the “face” that your customers see?
I’m learning that the companies we do business with know a frightening amount of information about all of us. The other day one of my vendors dredged up an address I moved away from in 1983. Google and Amazon daily show me more merchandise similar to things I’ve recently purchased on line. Yet in our consulting work we find that the data these corporations collect rarely translates into knowledge or wisdom, and even less rarely to insight or empathy that helps companies create a true connection with their customers. More data, less human connection. What’s wrong with this picture?
In our newsletter we asked “What do your customers want?” I thought about how I’d answer that question as a customer. Of course I want to deal with people who are knowledgeable, professional, and helpful. But fundamentally as a customer, I want to be treated as though my needs and interests are more important than the vendor’s. Oh, I know the vendor has to make a profit. I own a business, so I get that. But in my philosophy, our profit is the side effect of our genuine commitment to meeting our customers’ needs. I learned that ethic from my father, a former Standard Oil Company executive who went on to found 7 successful small corporations. Could it be that corporations that put shareholder interests before customer value now have people camping out in the streets with signs?
Customer service isn’t limited to how you treat the end user of your products and services. Much more attention needs to be paid to how staff functions interact with their internal clients in the business units. We find that many people in HR, IT, Finance, Legal, Risk, Compliance, Audit, etc., tend to see senior staff as their customers. So it’s no wonder that the business units who are trying to sell, produce, and deliver products and services to external customers feel that these staff units sometimes put up obstacles instead of helping find ways to make the job easier. It’s as though they’re saying “We’ll be happy to provide you with outstanding service, as long as it’s our way.” Business units complain about the red tape, delays, constraints, and obstacles. Staff groups need to learn the realities of trying to run the business, learn how to look at issues through the eyes of their customers. And the business units need to engage staff partners at the beginning of any initiative or change. It’s all about collaboration.