The Customer Copernicus - Preview

Copyright Material - Provided by Taylor & Francis Not for redistribution

6

INTRODUC TION

well, both for customers and the business. For example, the price list is only treated as a guide and branch colleagues are encouraged to give discounts if they think it is the right thing to do. There is no national direction on what is promoted and how it is displayed. These are up to each local Timpson team. Gouy Hamilton-Fisher, Timpson’s director for colleagues and sup- port, described a recent store visit led by a temporary ‘mobile manager’ as the store manager was on holiday. A customer came in with a locket to be engraved. The £30 estimate was more than she could pay, so she thanked the man and turned to walk out. Gouy stopped her and asked her what she wanted to pay. ‘£10–£15,’ she said. He looked to the manager, who offered to engrave her locket for £12.50, much to the customer’s delight. Everyone in store has the power to make choices in areas that most businesses simply wouldn’t allow. Chairman John Timpson and chief executive James Timpson (his son) try to visit at least 15 stores every week, and such visits are part of the routine of all management colleagues. Gouy revealed that a recent store visit didn’t feel right, so they asked the area manager an open question to fnd out what was going on. It turned out the local store manager was going through a divorce. ‘I’ll get up there,’ said the area manager. Gouy reckons more than half of Timpson’s job is social work, offering interest- free loans if colleagues get in trouble with money, time off to sort things out at home, or the chance to apply for a fund to realise a long-held dream. We interpret the steady fow of Moments of Belief in Timpson’s as a tes- tament to how well outside-in beliefs are embedded. To be customer-led, care needs to be given to the people and their beliefs as well as the systems and processes that are more visible. Darren Brown, an area manager at Timpson, told us how deeply the beliefs are embedded. ‘The beliefs are strongly held – if you have the right people as colleagues, great at customer care and they feel fully sup- ported and are given freedom, then it all works.’ Another area manager, Kyle Ballard, helped us appreciate why this is so critical. ‘We work hard to recruit the right people. In photographic developing, it can be hard to say ‘the customer is always right’ – sometimes they make mistakes. But our job even then is to make them feel like they are right. So, we recruit for personality.’ 7