The following article is an excerpt taken from a keynote address delivered at Courts’ launching of its Excellent Service Every Time (ESET) and staff incentives programs, held Thursday May 2, 1996 at the Razzmatazz Restaurant.If I were asked to define customer service in St. Lucia based on my experiences as a customer over the last 8 months, I would define it as follows:
For this event, I have been asked to offer a more macro view of the issue of customer service and service quality, and its importance and/or relevance in a developing economy such as ours. "customer service is doing the customer a favor by relieving them of their money, and offering in return a negative experience with little or no opportunity for recourse when dissatisfaction occurs" Five Realities
I would like to make five basic points in my presentation today, or what I call the five realities.
Reality #1: The amount of foreign aid, more appropriately termed foreign investment, is drying up at an alarming rate. This implies that more and more, St. Lucia must begin to focus internally for the generation of funds for its developmental projects.Reality #2: Long-term profitability of the business sector is crucial for St. Lucia’s effective and efficient development.
Reality #3: The profitability and sustainability of any company is directly related to the degree with which customers engage in its service and products.
Reality #4: The dual combination of import substitution and export orientation must become cornerstones of any industrialization strategy for St. Lucia.
Reality #5: Excellence in customer service is a wining strategy for achieving long-term profitability in the business sector, for maximizing the level of engagement between customers and organizations, and for providing a competitive weapon for those industries engaging in import substitution and export.
Explanations
Reality # 1 sets the stage for why we as a nation, must respond with expedience to the forces which many ways have already become a stranglehold on our economy. With the globalization of markets, the advancement of technology, and the degree of international competition, few nations have the ability to temper, ignore or escape the currents that draw them into the whirlpool of "economic warfare". As no country can truly ignore or escape such currents, it becomes necessary to find effective measures to temper the effects. In order to address the domestic needs of our country, we must search for an optimal balance between push and pull forces, where the push forces are those we initiate, and the pull forces are those initiated by the global economy.It is well known that revolutionary and innovative ideas often require the existence of crisis conditions for broad acceptance to take place. Perhaps our time is now. With declining foreign aid, St. Lucians will have little or no choice but to become more creative and innovative in its search for solutions. It is my belief that excellent customer service, both in the public and private sectors, must become a pivotal element in our solution strategy.
Developing countries such as ours need a stable economy if both local and foreign investors are to engage in it. St. Lucia needs a strong tax base if it is to effectively address domestics issues such as medical care, education, the safety of its people, the welfare of the elderly and the youth, and the employment of its citizens. With a shrinking pool of "foreign aid" money the tax base of the country must now bear the lion’s share of the responsibility for our development. Unquestionably, the business sector must play a pivotal role in contributing to the tax base. Such a role can only be played, and played well, if businesses are both profitable and sustainable, and that our government plays its role in facilitating a healthy business sector and a healthy relationship between that sector and its customers.
With reality # 4, the need for a dual strategy of import substitution and an export orientation is a well established model for the economic development of small states. The dual approach is necessary to maximize the turnover of money within the local economy and to maximize foreign exchange earnings respectively. Japan in the last 50 years has shown the effectiveness of such a strategy. While there are fundamental differences between Japan and St. Lucia, the principle nonetheless is still valid.
What does profitability, sustainability, tax base solidification, successful import substitution and export orientation have to do with customer service? Everything. As consumers become more and more informed about service and product quality, and as global competition intensifies, we in St. Lucia can no longer afford to continue the poor standard of service, and expect customers to actively engage our businesses and remain loyal. I am reminded of the fear of the business sector to the thought of KMART opening its doors in St. Lucia. Recently, local bakeries reacted angrily to the opening of a French bakery here. We must not allow protectionism to become a substitute for healthy competition despite cases where some measure protectionism may be necessary. The reality is that, instead of excellence in customer service being the price of entry for new businesses in St. Lucia, it is a strategic competitive weapon - an indication that we are quite behind in how our businesses ought to be competing in St. Lucia.
It is not difficult to show that excellence in customer service results in increased profitability and sustainability because its reduces costs and it maximizes the retention of customers - the most valuable asset of any organization. Import substitution will fail if quality product and quality service is not provided. Local consumers will opt for foreign better quality brands. Similarly, export initiatives will also fail if product and service quality are lacking. International customers will simply not purchase our product. The banana sector is a case in point. Poor quality bananas means lower demand, lower prices, lower revenues, and surely, increased hardship for both farmers and the economy as a whole.
It is my sincere hope and my sincere wish that the local government in a spirit of cooperation with the business sector in St. Lucia, will seize the opportunity to contribute towards making St. Lucia a much more livable place, one in which customers are respected, valued, and recognized as the primary reason why the business sector exists in the first place. It is now time for a commitment on the part of all of the stakeholders.
