Empathy Consulting

The answer to the question, "So where do I go to get help with Customer Empathy / Customer Experience / Customer Emotions)" is not so obvious. Amazingly, there are actually still very few suppliers indeed, edging into this arena. 

So why not start here? It would always be my pleasure to chat with you on Customer Service/Empathy in general, as well as your own situation and different options and approaches to consider.  And if you wish to take it further it into an Empathy Insight or a consultancy contract, I'd be delighted to assist you.

My 17 years of unique and valuable experience of Customer Empathy and consultancy for the changes that are required to improve empathy in a commercial environment, as well as my very low overheads means that I can offer you a great service (perhaps the best qualified/ best value that you will find!)

Some examples of consultancy assignments:

Friends Provident - Service Excellence Project and F.A.C.E.

My involvement in Friends Provident was initially as a Strategic Business Consultant sitting on the steering committee of a major strategic 'Service Excellence Project' (SEP) commissioned by the Board of Friends Provident. I acted as the resident Customer Empathy expert consultant. My role was to constantly pull the human side back into the discussion, and this was very much appreciated (they were amazed at how often and easily they drifted back to traditional ways!)

For example, one area of input was the encouragement to move away from the highly established reliance on targeting specific, easy-to-measure 'behaviours' (you must DO this and that) to the far more empowering encouragement of 'attitudes'. For example, if the objective is to come across as 'welcoming' at the beginning of a call, instead of telling people to 'smile' and give them a 'welcome' script to repeat verbatim, it actually works better to simply ask them to have what you wanted in the first place: to feel, to be welcoming! 

Alongside an Empathy Audit at the time, it had a profound effect as we rolled the results out to staff within Friends Provident for their feedback and ideas through a programme of mass 'engagement' and buy-in of the entire organisation. 

One outcome was the realisation that creating good empathy with a customer was similar to being like a good friend, and as that was built into the brand (Friends Provident, or just Friends as it's often known as) staff voted to rename it the FACE program: Friends Achieving Customer Excellence.

This culminated in my facilitation of a major project to define precisely what 'being a Friend' in a business context meant to the individuals actually relating customers, and how that could be specifically encouraged and monitored without ambiguity. Once implemented, the staff absolutely loved the freedom it gave them to be themselves, and to make a connection with their customers in their own way.

The outcome of that part of the programme is detailed in the free report page, and is a must-read!

Here's what Keith Mansfield, Head of Individual Customer Services,  had to say about my contributions

" Right from day one, John provided us with valuable insights into how we could not only improve the service but also how we could go to a fundamentally higher level of service than we had ever contemplated. " I am pleased to say that Friends Provident has just won a National Customer Services award. It is absolutely fair to say that without John's encouragement and challenging, we would probably not be in that position today. " Since his involvement with the design of the programme to recover our service, John has worked extensively with my team to embed the changes needed. A key skill John brings is, of course, his accompanying knowledge of empathy. He has provided us with invaluable expertise on defining our Vision and Team Purpose in a way that really captures what the business wants to achieve (service excellence and cost reductions), yet in a way that really motivates all of our people at all levels. On top of that, John has helped us understand how to define and consistently measure our service interaction with customers. " John is a living example of what he preaches and has consistently delivered beyond our expectations in both the content and the manner of his support. He has been worth every single penny! "
Keith Mansfield, Head of Individual Customer Services, Friends Provident

Royal Sun Alliance Europe

Short version: I was invited to sit on the management Board for Royal Sun Alliance Europe as their Customer Service Consultant and helped shape their strategy and its communication into the local markets. 

HSA - Simplyhealth

Starting with a unique project to train HSA (health plans) to internally run their own Empathy Audit, I have carried on with continuing ongoing Empathy Insights and strategic  advice on applying Customer Empathy to the HSA (now Simplyhealth) Group for the last 9 years . I am their preferred 'Customer Empathy' supplier.

 click the links for other areas of consulting:

• Big Picture Consulting
• 'Spiritual Intelligence'
• Present With Passion