Consistency Counts in Moments

Have you ever wondered why it's so easy to forget a password for a website you frequent? Do you chalk it up to poor memory, distraction, or getting older? There's a simple explanation for why these types of brain lapses occur, and it has to do with consistency.

Consistency helps keep us in line. Humans are creatures of habit. Most of our daily comfort comes from consistency. It's key in brainstorming, designing, delivering, and solving. Consistency in ITSM leads to positive customer experiences. Let me elaborate:

One of the questions I'm most frequently asked from my clients is, "How can we improve customer satisfaction?" While their thinking is going in the right direction, they are asking the wrong question. Most organizations look at their customers satisfaction as a static number, a percentage of their customer base that can tell them that 4 out of 5 times they are getting it right.

Unfortunately, customer satisfaction isn't a static number, and it's not easily measured, if you want to do it right. The question they should be asking is, "What can we do to improve the customer experience?" Looking for the impediments, inconveniences, and process breaks that affect your customers is a good place to start. But while you're there, you might as well go one step further....and try to make it as easy for your customers as you can. Consistency is a great way to do this.

In IT Service Management moments count. Depending on the industry; whether it's government, higher education, or healthcare, moments don't just count, but they can make an enormous impact on quality. Things move very quickly in the IT world, and much more so for those who are in IT support roles. Therefore, the experience your customer, or internal customer, receives when an issue occurs is critical. From the ability to reach you quickly  through their preferred contact channel, to the messaging they hear from each support level, and the processes each level has for issue resolution, it must be consistent.

When things go wrong, service levels are impacted, and the ability to recover quickly so that your customers experience isn't diminished, is key. Consistent incident and problem management processes, escalations, and follow-up will help you do this.

Doing things over and over the same way doesn't just help the customer, it helps you. Being consistent will help improve your internal workings, making them smoother and more efficient, and ultimately allow you to focus more on what matters....your customer.