This document summarizes an article from Mercury Magazine about getting closer to customers. The article discusses how customer-centric organizations need to develop emotional intelligence and get closer to customers to truly understand their perspectives and experiences. It describes how one company holds regular sessions where unhappy customers share their stories directly with company representatives. This helps boost motivation to improve and gives a voice to customers that can drive meaningful change. The article also discusses overcoming resistance to meeting with customers and using techniques like filmed customer stories to spread understanding throughout a large organization. Getting closer to customers allows organizations to use empathy to improve service and better meet customer expectations.

1. 0513076079
Getting Closer To Customers
by Anna Castellano and Mandy Mainwaring
Mercury Magazine 2013-2014, Autumn/Winter
(Special Issue on the New Media Landscape),
Issue 5-6, pp. 076-079.
Mercury Magazine issue No. 5/6, [Autumn/Winter] 2013/2014. Copyright © 2013, The Department of Business
Studies, Uppsala University. All rights reserved. Reproduction of the printed magazine in whole or in part
without written permission is strictly prohibited. Mercury Magazine ISSN 2001-3272 is published by the
Department of Business Studies, Uppsala University, Box 513, SE-751 20 Uppsala, Sweden. This reprint is
available for free at www.fek.uu.se/mercury. Annual printed subscription rates for non-alumni and non-students
at the Department are 399 SEK, Euro 50, $60, £35. To subscribe please email your order to info@fek.uu.se.
Mercury Magazine is the official magazine of the Department of Business Studies at Uppsala University

2. CONTENTS/
AUTUMN/WINTER
016
Merger Mistakes
Owners of all kinds need to be more
careful in approving international
acquisitions, argues Lars Engwall.
018
PROFILE: the whiz kid
Jukka Hohenthal has met the new CEO
of ICA Gruppen and Uppsala alumnus Per
Strömberg.
021
IDEAS: DREAM CATCHING
Tore Strandvik and Anu Helkkula put
forward a new idea of how to discover
innovations that customers will buy.
022
value creation
Achieve your commercial goals by
creating value for all stakeholders, argues
founding partner of Prime Carl Fredrik
Sammeli.
025
book review: ’big data’
LSE researcher Niccolo Tempini reviews
the work of Viktor Mayer-Schönberger
and Kenneth Cukier.
028
the future of
direct selling
Magnus Brännström, CEO of Oriflame
and Chairman of SELDIA - the European
Direct Selling Association, provides his
view on the future of direct selling.
030
LEGITIMACY FOR SALE?
Anna Tyllström walks us through the
world of PR consultants, politics and the
struggle for visibility.
038
effective and happier
Carin Eriksson Lindvall explores the
sense of meaning in our work.
040
deceptions of
consistency
Public sector organizations cannot
uphold consistency and coherency in
what is to be communicated argues,
argues Josef Pallas.
046
learning from
disasters
Enikö Kaptalan-Nagy explores one of the
biggest crises in the European Union: The
Mad Cow disease.
052
THE ENTREPRENEUR
AS COMMUNICATOR
As an entrepreneur you need to develop
your storytelling skills, argues Ivo Zander.
054
THE SELLING OUT OF ART
Anders Björnsson comments on an
indecent activity among Swedish
corporations.
058
what does it take to get
your attention?
Poja Shams examines how purchasing
decisions are made in grocery stores
using eye-tracking technology.
064
why not get
a contractor in?
When specialist knowledge is lacking
in-house companies are forced to move
outside their boundaries.
068
DON’T CRY WOLF!
Managing your intellectual property
requires among other things collaborating
with enforcement agencies.
070
MOBILE SERVICES AND
OPERATOR BUSINESS
Spotify and Telia cooperate in Sweden
but can this type of partnership be a role
model in other areas of the world?
074
WHAT IS SERVICE?
Services are the backbone of our
economy but we seldom think about
them, argues Bo Edvardsson.
0 0 4 0 0 5

3. 076
GETTING CLOSER
TO CUSTOMERS
On the emotions your organization needs
in order to be truly customer-centric.
080
REAL HUMAN BEINGS
ARE A MEDIUM TOO
Magnus Söderlund focuses on a very
traditional yet powerful medium we tend
to forget ­—
the face-to-face encounter.
082
judging the manager
in media
Shallowness, superficiality, smartness,
focus on looks and appearances - is that
what we get from mediatization, asks
Magnus Frostenson.
084
tripple bottom line?
Culture quadruples the challenges, argue
Lena Zander and Ciara Sutton.
054
115
scientification
Throughout society the scientific method
have gained momentum in managing
and communicating work flows and
organizational processes, argue Leon
Michael Caesarius and Jukka Hohenthal.
118
LET’S DECIDE!
The process of decision making confuses
Henrik Bäckström.
120
MANAGERIAL DEVELOPMENT
Is it a necessary investment or mere rain
dance, asks Martin Rogberg.
122
NEED FOR SPEED?
Agile management is the key according
to Tomas Gustavsson.
088
HOW CAN ACADEMIA
SUPPORT BUSINESSES?
Academia has a lot to offer businesses,
argues Staffan Movin.
090
WHEN SCIENCE
MEETS FINANCE
Different accounting calculations
influence product innovation, argue
Henning Christner and Torkel Strömsten.
097
operating margin
Magnus Bild discusses what probably is
the most common financial indicator in
business and uveils its delicate qualities.
102
WHAT DO AUDITORS DO?
Pernilla Broberg has observed autitors at
work in Big 4 audit firms bringing forth
an updated view of auditing and the role
of auditors.
108
swedish controllers -
shaped by a book?
Nils-Göran Olve tells a story about a
book and its impact on a role.
112
LEAN MANAGEMENT
Göran Nilsson provides 14 principles
for a nuanced view on the subject that
provokes more feelings than any other
management concept around.
006 007

4. Drawing from 15 years of experience,
Anna Castellano, Head of Customer Complaints
Resolution at E.ON. UK and colleague
Mandy Mainwaring, Senior Customer
Immersion Manager, share their knowledge
on the emotions your organization needs in
order to be truly customer-centric.
W R I T T E N BY ANNA CASTELLANO and MANDY MAINWARING
ARTWO R K BY BÁRA VÁVROVÁ
MARKETING
0 7 6 0 7 7

5. with customers where we invite them to tell us their stories, the
impact on their lives, and how we made them feel as a way to
adopt the customer’s perspective there and then, with no filters.
This does not substitute market research, as it is not a quantita-tive
method and as it serves a different purpose. The aim is to get
emotionally closer to customers and boost motivation, channel
energy and mobilize resources to do better.
We typically invite eight to ten customers who have had
cause to complain to join us around a table, in a room in a
local hotel, over light refreshments and tell us their stories
for themselves. We want to understand the impact of what
we did on them and gain an appreciation of the problem from
their perspective. We want them to tell us what we should
have done that would have made it better for them, what they
would expect from us, and how we could have avoided dis-satisfying
them. We show that we are listening hard and we
encourage all to participate. We feel that we let them down;
we say that we are sorry and that we want to do better for all of
our customers. We explain that, by hearing what went wrong
for them and what would put it right, they are helping us to
improve our service for everyone else.
The people listening around the table and in the room are
made up of members of the board and representatives at all
levels of the organization. We want to ensure that they know
both how important they are to us, and also to have someone
on hand who can take care of their problem and follow up with
them – so we have a member of the operational team there
who can close the loop and satisfy the customer by offering a
complete resolution.
Of course it is not always that easy to get everyone to see
the value in meeting their customers. Business people are
naturally suspicious of “what’s in it for them”; they question
what actual value it will bring to their business area. They also
question what they need to learn from customers that will add
value to their day-to-day role.
In order to understand the reasons why not everyone
immediately jumps at the chance to spend face time with
customers, you have to look deeper at the culture of the or-ganization
and also at the behavioral preferences of the indi-vidual.
As in all things, it is important to realize that everyone
is different and therefore what appeals to some is downright
uncomfortable for others.
This is where trust comes in, where you need to create a
safe environment for colleagues to meet their customer face
to face, where they feel no risk of exposure or public humilia-tion
and where they can listen without prejudice.
This means that the culture in the organization needs to
be at a point where it is ready to accept the need for change,
where there is a desire to add value through deeper customer
understanding and to create a proposition that truly considers
what is right for the customer.
The uncomfortable truth is that when you have been re-sponsible
for the management of processes, systems and
people that cause customer dissatisfaction, it is difficult not
to attempt to defend or justify those very things that are
leading to problems. This is something that must be overcome
to move forward. A “no blame” culture would cut off endless
post mortem and ‘how we got here’ analysis sessions, and
encourage the development of creative solutions.
When listening to customers describing what has happened
to them when you have failed them and caused them unhappi-ness,
it is important to be able to look also at the bigger picture,
at the data and analysis in your organization that tells you
whether this person’s experience is representative of a wide-spread
systematic issue that affects many or whether it is a
one-off created by an individual’s behavior. Whilst neither di-minishes
the customer’s experience in anyway and should have
a profound emotional impact on an individual listening, this
helps you formulate an appropriate and proportional response.
When you have created the trust within the organization
and proved the value of face-to-face time with your customers,
the payoff is immense. Anyone who has ever worked in a large
organization and is aware of the layers and politics involved in
driving change knows that change is a very difficult thing to
achieve: harnessing the power of the customer to “champion
your crusade” not only provides you with motivation, it
arms you with the undeniable weaponry of the “voice of the
customer”. Nothing else gives you so much right to say un-comfortable
things to people who are used to being told only
palatable versions of events.
Once you have created that safe environment for colleagues,
you have the perfect scenario for meeting those customers who
you have not served well. Whilst meeting customers who had a
negative experience with your company can be a draining ex-perience,
there is no session that you leave without wanting to
change the world. Customers complain for a reason and you
want to work and eliminate that reason for other customers too.
You also want to share this motivation, harness the
energy that is driving you to improve things for your
customers and take your team and other colleagues on that
journey with you. In theory there is no reason why everyone
in an organization shouldn’t meet their customers face to
face, but practically there are economic and operational
challenges to this approach. You therefore have to adopt
creative methods to spread the feeling across large numbers
of people who have not had the same experience, to plant
the seeds and engage the masses.
Film is a powerful medium, as it brings things to life.
Customers’ experience with your organization can become
stories to tell to colleagues with that same “no blame” spirit
which helps people to be receptive and part of the change.
It is therefore important to work with the internal com-munications
team who have a wide reach and ask them to help
you to tell the story on behalf of the customer. In our organiza-tion
we have created individual customer stories that are se-quential
and engaging. These stories are told in the customers’
own words through film and are made into a mini-series that
is launched through our internal website by installments. This
format allows to build momentum from the original issue and
the impact that had, to the way we handled it and how we
made our customers feel, through to coming along to the com-plaints
session and sharing their story face to face, and culmi-nating
in the resolution - the change resulting from the lessons
learned and how customers’ have changed their opinion of the
company and the people who work there.
As you can imagine, this is very powerful and by ending on
a positive note leaves colleagues feeling motivated that success
is achievable, with an understanding of what great service
Our business has introduced regular
sessions with customers where we
invite them to tell us their stories,
the impact on their lives, and how
we made them feel as a way to adopt
the customer’s perspective there and
then, with no filters. The aim is to get
emotionally closer to customers and
boost motivation, channel energy and
mobilize resources to do better.
looks like for a customer, rather than demoralized by a story
that only highlights our failings.
Within the teams who are directly involved in complaint
resolution we share more, we invite the customer in to
co-create with them, to work on each stage in more detail to
come to solution as a consensus – to give ownership and in-volvement
for those individuals to create solutions in partner-ship
with the customer. This is engaging and empowering and
engenders a desire to put the customer first, as it creates a story
bank to support decision making and allows challenge where
others are not behaving in line with our service standards.
We met a customer, a lady called Chris at one such session,
a very reasonable, articulate lady, who had been totally let
down by us. She had been facing a complex metering issue
for some time and had multiple conversations with a number
of customer service staff without getting to the crux of the
matter. After the face-to-face session we finally resolved the
problem and we wanted our organization to learn from that
customer experience.
We invited her to film her story for our communication
program and we wrote and thanked her for the great job that
she did for us-this was her response:
“My comments were sincere. I have been impressed by the
service and genuine concern your team has shown regarding my
story. […]
I forgot I was being filmed at times as we talked. […]
Good luck for the future, your lead should be followed by
other large companies as it really ‘makes the difference’.”
Customer-centric organizations believe in addressing
difficult issues, whatever the cost, openly involving customers
in decision making and developing products and services col-laboratively,
investing in what customers want. The senior
team of companies that are going to be successful today and
tomorrow walk the talk, are honest and transparent in facing
up to problems and lead their people to behave in the same
way. Getting closer to customers and amplifying that experi-ence
allow organizations to use their emotional intelligence
to change for the better.
ustomers have certain
expectations about the
level of service they
ought to receive. Those
expectations are built
on the company rep-utation
and its brand
promise (if I buy an
Apple laptop, I expect a good looking, easy to carry and use
machine, and a system that does not crash), on specific product
or service features (if I subscribe to an Internet provider, I
expect to pay the right price and get an uninterrupted service),
on the customer’s individual preferences and situation (if I am
on a tight budget, I expect to have the option to pay by install-ments).
All customers expect support and empathy when they
get into difficulties.
When expectations are not met, customers are unhappy
and – if you are lucky - complain. In doing so, they offer a
chance to recover the situation. Complaints also give you
the opportunity to follow trends of process/ system/ behav-ioral
failures and to re-think or improve your product and
service. The resolution of customers’ issues requires taking
into account the customer as an individual and addressing
practical questions such as ‘what’s the impact of a broken water
boiler on a family with young children?’
Organizations serving a large customer base primarily via
voice and written communication channels (contact centers)
face the risk of commoditizing the relationship with their
customers and losing uniqueness in their service. The fact that
we do not see our customers, that they cannot see us, and that
we are not in the same space, creates an emotional filter. Try to
watch an opera on TV; you may hate the experience. Go to an
Opera House and you have high chances to enjoy it. Even in a
world where we are used to work at distance and talk to our
family and friends via Skype, the engagement in a client-sup-plier
relationship is reduced in the absence of a direct face-to-
face interaction.
Our stance is that company people should get exposed to
direct face-to-face contacts with customers. You may object that
dealing with hundred thousands or millions of customers is a
real challenge, especially when your company is not organized
on the territory (e.g. branches, retail shops, mobile service). And
you are right. The answer is to meet customers face to face, and
then find ways to amplify the experience by involving the rest of
the organization. Our business has introduced regular sessions
078 079