FORTUNE^TM Partners Launch Second-Annual
Top Service Leaders Awards

The justifiable obsession with customer experience in business today recalls the old forest/trees conundrum. You may remember the familiar adage. It warns against missing the big picture—the forest—by fixating too intently on individual elements—the trees.

Photo: Getty Images

According to Gartner vice president and distinguished analyst Michael Maoz, “Organizations make a mistake in focusing on the 360-degree view of the customer, rather than uncovering the view and information that matters to the customer.”

To differentiate and compete in an increasingly demanding environment, the best companies understand that the trees and forest are critically interlinked.

That’s a radical idea and an eye-opener, but the bottom line is this: To differentiate and compete in an increasingly demanding environment, the best companies understand that the trees and forest are critically interlinked. The trees are the tools firms apply to make a customer’s journey a delightful walk in the woods, with helpful markers pointing to beautiful vistas. The forest is the overall sensation of goodwill customers have for brands that have not only led them through the thickets but also made their lives better for it.

The merit of that kind of holistic approach to customer service was one of the major takeaways from the inaugural FORTUNE^TM Partners Top Service Leaders Awards. Launched in 2017, and underwritten by Salesforce, the awards honored those executives whose leadership, innovative service practices, and commitment to improving their customers’ lives helped transform their organizations for the better.

The 10 winners, chosen from a wide field of nominees in a broad a range of industries, have one major characteristic in common. They understand that even the smallest aspect of the customer experience reflects upon the bigger impression that their clients have of them. So they have used every asset—human and technological—to put customer relationship management (CRM) “at the center of our world,” as one winner, Mike Powell of RIM Logistics, said at the event.

The 2018 FORTUNE^TM Partners Top Service Leaders Awards is now accepting nominations. Five industry judges will make their determination and the 10 winners will be celebrated for their accomplishments at the Salesforce Dreamforce Conference—the premier event in the CRM industry—taking place in San Francisco from September 25 to 28, 2018.

But this year, we are upping the ante. We know that as new digital tools and channels emerge, concierge-type customer care is even more vital now than it was just a year ago.

This time, we’re seeking nominees whose dynamic, vital approach to customer experience (CX) reflects the following characteristics:

• They share the vision that contact centers are the key to digital transformation, and that digital transformation is driving the future of CX.

• They recognize that front, middle, and back offices must act as one and that cross-department silos must come down—especially between sales and marketing—to deliver the best CX.

• They regard digital transformation as an ongoing opportunity to heighten the stakeholder experience—including that of their employees—and they have learned to be agile at scale.

• They’re putting well-developed theory into practice, using AI and other cognitive tools to enhance CX, making service the linchpin of sales and hiring hybrid talent accordingly.

• They understand that field service is the next important front in the ongoing competition to surpass customer expectations—and that those firms who can deliver definitive, on-the-spot resolutions to problems will have customers for life.

This year’s awards center on these themes because they reflect the cutting-edge thinking of leaders in customer care. And we’re seeking input from executives with frontline experience in addressing these critical issues.

Mike Horton, executive director of workforce enablement at Cox Communications, for one, understands the importance of making the right tech tools available to make field service an integrated part of a flourishing customer experience.

“In order to drive self-sufficiency in our field force, we really focus on the hardware the technicians are using,” Horton recently told Field Technologies magazine. “Is it the right kind of device for the job they’re performing? Will it perform to the requirements of the job? The goal is to reduce their dependence on upstream organizations—back-office support and so on—to serve the customer.”

We’re hoping the awards program will encourage dialogue that tackles digital transformation at this kind of granular level—because, as Zeus Kerravala, founder and principal analyst at ZK Research emphasizes, digital transformation underpins every customer experience initiative.

“Becoming a digital organization has become a top priority for almost every organization across every vertical,” observes Kerravala. “[But] the big question on the minds of most CIOs I talk to is where to start. Digital transformation has so many implications that deciding on how and where to begin can almost be paralyzing.”

The leaders to be honored in 2018 will be those who have embraced such difficult challenges and can share their vision. They know it’s about thriving in a customer-centric world, given a Harvard Business Review study that found customers who had satisfying customer experiences spent 140% more on an enterprise’s products than those who didn’t. They’ll have tackled constantly shifting customer expectations with fresh insights, strategies, and tactics. They’ll be the ones who stay focused on delivering world-class customer service while remaining open to each new tool and platform available in order to continuously refine their 360-degree view of the customer.

While they’re taking the whole forest into account, they’ll also be careful to see the trees.