Chief Customer Officer : Getting Past Lip Service to Passionate Action [Hardcover]

Jeanne Bliss (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 31, 2006

Drawing on her first-hand experience at top companies as diverse as Lands’ End and Microsoft, Jeanne Bliss explains why even great corporations can drift to delivering mediocrity to customers, and she offers a proven solution to break the cycle.

Different divisions and departments in corporations can fail to communicate and act as a team—they create silos instead of a superior customer experience. Jeanne Bliss shows in stark detail how profits suffer when businesses focus on their organizational charts and not their customer relationships.

This book provides leaders the tools and information they need to overcome organizational inertia and deliver a meaningful customer experience. The author includes diagnostics to determine if a company’s core strengths, metrics, and systems improve or harm customer relationships. With all these tools, leaders can address the organizational challenges they face with an exhaustive review of the Chief Customer Officer role and an evaluation to determine the right solution for their culture and company.

Editorial Reviews

Review

“Drawing on first-hand experience, author Jeanne Bliss explains why even great firms can deliver mediocre customer service.” (Marketing Direct
& BrandRepublic.com, April 2007)

 

Review

“Jeanne Bliss is a powerhouse when it comes to driving customer focus. It’s in her bones. She has an uncanny ability to cut across an organization and support leaders in the quest to drive the operation of the company toward strong and powerful customer relations.”--Gary Comer, founder, Lands’ End

“Who else has led customer loyalty for five major U.S. corporations? Jeanne Bliss has an uncommon background, blending her passion for customer experiences with her ability to cut through organizations and get the job done. Business leaders would be wise to understand Jeanne’s approach to know how they can either enable or hinder the process. And those from throughout all parts of the organization will find the proven approaches to drive change that’s eluded them in the past.’--Jean-Philippe Courtois, president, Microsoft International, senior vice president, Microsoft Corporation

“The connection of customer care in a single C-level authority is an emerging discipline of the early 2000 decade--but Jeanne Bliss is already firmly in place as its oracle who can make it actionable as a major economic value-added.”-- Mack Hanan, bestselling author, Consultative Selling and CEO, the Grey Matter Group Inc.

“Talking about customer service is one thing; having it in your DNA is another. Chief Customer Office provides refreshing and needed advice for organizations that say they’ve committed to customer loyalty but don’t seem to make any progress.”--Wim Elfrink, senior vice president, customer advocacy, Cisco Systems Inc.

“Before you go around the block one more time trying to drive ‘customer focus,’ read Chief Customer Officer cover to cover. Jeanne Bliss gives you the tools, the tactics, and the real-world support you need to finally drive change across your company.”--Daniel J. Bishop, president and founder, The Maids International, Inc.--The Maids Homes Services

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Jossey-Bass; 1 edition (March 31, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0787980943
• ISBN-13: 978-0787980948
• Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 1.3 x 9.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #150,122 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Who ELSE led customer experience for 5 major US Corporations?

Jeanne Bliss began her career at Lands' End where she reported to founder Gary Comer and the company's executive committee, ensuring that in the formative years of the organization, the company stayed focused on its core principles of customer and employee focus. She was the first leader of the Lands' End Customer Experience. In addition to Lands' End, she has served Allstate, Microsoft, Coldwell Banker Corporation and Mazda Corporations as its executive leading customer focus and customer experience. Jeanne has helped achieve 95% retention rates across 50,000 person organizations, harnessing businesses to work across their silos to deliver a united and deliberate experience customers (and employees) want to repeat.

Jeanne now runs CustomerBliss http://www.customerbliss.com an international consulting business where she coaches executive leadership teams and customer leadership executives on how to put customer profitability at the center of their business, by getting past lip service; to operationally relevant, operationally executable plans and processes. Her clients include Johnson & Johnson, TD Ameritrade, St. Jude's Children's Hospitals, Bombardier Aircraft and many others.

Her two best-selling books are Chief Customer Officer: Getting Past Lip Service to Passionate Action and I Love You More than My Dog: Five Decisions that Drive Extreme Customer Loyalty in Good Times and Bad. Her blog is http://www.ccocoach.com

She is Co-founder of the Customer Experience Professionals Association. www.cxpa.org

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Got Customers? You NEED THIS BOOK! April 26, 2006

By J. Palamountain

Format:Hardcover

Jeanne Bliss tells CEOs and leaders exactly HOW to make customers the center of the business. Other authors may tell you what to do, but this book gives you a complete set of instructions on how to do the work with every level of the organization. I especially like that the diagnostics and tools offered can be used immediately and that there are a multitude of proven ways to get the CEO engaged. No matter what kind of business you are in, if you've got customers, you need this book!

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Practical advice for improving customer experience June 7, 2006

By Richard Sharp

Format:Hardcover

Jeanne Bliss articulates not only the importance of putting customers at the center of your business, but conveys the challenges that prevent most companies from successfully delivering great customer experiences. The real-world techniques she introduces are essential reading for senior executives aiming to succeed by improving the delivered customer experience.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Very detailed look at customer service June 7, 2007

By Rolf Dobelli HALL OF FAMETOP 1000 REVIEWER

Format:Hardcover

If the "customer is always right," the next question is, "Why do so many customers stop doing business with companies?" The answer is, "bad service." Customers refuse to buy from companies that render unsatisfactory service and ignore their complaints. Sadly, managers usually sound the alarm and demand new customer service initiatives only after the customers have fled. Author Jeanne Bliss, a veteran chief customer service officer, tries to explain the problem and to suggest ways to correct it. She offers so many detailed trees - in the form of questionnaires, bullet points, details and checklists - that you risk losing sight of the practical forest: the motives and methods for implementing better customer service. There is valuable information here, even if it is a bit shaded. For this reason, we particularly liked her clear, helpful and revealing chapter of first-hand stories from the field of customer service.