Among much of interest that emerged at yesterday's PRINTplusX workshop, I was struck by a comment made by Louisa
Moger during her presentation about the transformation of Richard Edward.
As part of its turnaround the company introduced a more formal staff appraisal system (this is several years ago now), and employees were asked "what role do you play in satisfying the customer?" At the time 60% responded by saying: "I don't talk to customers so this question is not applicable to me".
Suffice to say things have changed enormously at the company since then, and Louisa gave an honest account of how challenging the cultural change had been, and that it is something that has to be continually reinforced day in, day out.
The effort has certainly been worth it. Nowadays everyone across the business understands the part they play, and Louisa spoke with justifiable pride about how good it felt walking around the factory and bringing customers and potential customers to the site. Anyone on the shopfloor will happily talk to clients - and Richard Edward's management are more than happy for them to do so because everyone understands how important their individual piece of the customer satisfaction jigsaw is. Nice.