CUSTOMER VALUE -
REVISITED
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4
working relations
WHAT'S NewS Issue 4 April 1997
In last month's issue, What's NewS asked three Rabobankers, Ab Gillhaus,
Dominique Bech and Steven Spiekhout, for their perceptions on customer
value.The result was a lively discussion on the customer focus strategy and
its roots in our cooperative philosophy and background. But these
thinking Rabobankers also questioned just how well the strategy had been
communicated and criticized the seeming lack of definitions, structures
and guidance from the top. Hanno Riedlin had this response.
Hanno Riedlin appeared the perfect person
to ask for a reply to these pointers because
he is one of a working group involved in
defining a means to measure customer value
- that elusive commodity that is destined to
ensure our future as a knowledge-driven,
client-focused provider of financial services.
'It's true we have set up a working group,'
Riedlin confirms, 'and we are hard at work
on the issue. No hard conclusions have yet
been reached. However, I would still like to
respond to the discussion between our
people in the last issue because if there is
any criticism, either explicit or implicit, then
I think it must be correct, otherwise it
wouldn't be there.'
Why is it there?
I'd say that's probably because not
everyone has been involved intimately in
the whole process from the very start.
That would have been almost impossible.
But I myself have watched people 'see the
light', sometimes after having been
involved intensely in the process, perhaps
as members of task forces, for a very long
time. It's a great thing to see, the key to
this whole process suddenly becoming
crystal clear. And at least part of the key is
grasping that the whole process in which
we are engaged is ongoing, continual.
All dien ts
Corporate
Banking
Investment
Banking
Private
Banking
Type of dient
Solution
seeking
Buyers of a
Commodity
Product
Client Interface
Products
General
Accout
Management
-►
Specific
Accout
Management
So what is the light?
Let me set the scene first. You may
remember that when presentations on the
concept of the customer focus strategy were
made to our people we often used an
inverted pyramid. In other words, rather
than focusing on what the bank wanted, the
aim of the strategy was to concentrate on
the customer and what he wants. You may
also remember that profit was also defined
as a means rather than a goal in itself.
Profit is certainly one topic where people
are not always clear.
But it is very clear. If you say 'shareholder'
value, then no one is confused - you make
a profit so that you can pay dividends to
shareholders. We do not have
shareholders in the conventional sense of
the word - our shareholders are the
member banks. Yet, that doesn't mean we
don't have to make a profit - of course we
do. But in our thinking, the generation of
profit is a framework condition, not a
goal in itself, for the provision of customer
- not shareholder - value.
What you're saying is that given the fact
that we are different in the sense that we
are a cooperative organization, it shouldn't
be so difficult to understand this perception
Hanno Riedlin: 'Lack of time and resources
is a fallacy'.
meshes with who we are as an
organization? Grasping the difference with
shareholder or stakeholder thinking is a
mindset issue?
Absolutely. But it also has everything to
do with the fact that the customer focus
strategy is exactly that - a strategy. It is
not a rigid structure or framework
imposed from above on the organization.
It actually demands much, much more of
everyone concerned. We all have to
change how we think about our role as
bankers. In the past, we have always
approached our customers from a
product perspective. We had products,
they needed products. In the environment
we're working in today, that is not
enough.
The concept of providing tailored solutions
for dient needs, which we assume you're
referring to here, is wonderful, of course.
But its implementation requires
deployment of resources, and even, some
would argue, the availability of resources. If
you have a full workload and targets to
meet, then it is very hard to find the time to
put into the kind of extensive dient
servicing you're talking about.
I don't agree. Lack of time and resources
is a fallacy. The reason people think they
don't have time is because essentially
we're still product focused. I have
overheads I use in presentations that show
what I mean here. Of course you won't
have time to provide this level of solution
seeking if you're firing a specific type of
product at the customer and your
colleague down the corridor is spending
an equal amount of precious time aiming
his or her specific type of product at the
same customer. This is what 'knowledge-
driven' also means. It means share with
the cliënt, but, and most importantly,
share with your colleagues.
