Latest / Customer Service Revolution | Customer Experience & Employee Experience for Business Leaders / 216: Is Consulting the Big Con?

Transcript

216: Is Consulting the Big Con? · Customer Service Revolution | Customer Experience & Employee Experience for Business Leaders

• 0:48
  This week's episode is brought to you by the Experience Revolution membership.
• 0:52
  If you're a leader obsessed with transforming the customer and employee experience in your organization, you need to join the Experience Revolution.
• 1:01
  Find out more at thedijuliusgroup.com forward slash membership.
• 1:07
  Hello, revolutionaries, and welcome back to another episode of the Customer Service Revolution Podcast with John DiJulius How you doing, John?
• 1:17
  I am great, Denise.
• 1:18
  How are you?
• 1:19
  I'm fantastic, thank you.
• 1:21
  Thanks.
• 1:22
  How was your weekend in New York?
• 1:25
  My week in New York was fabulous.
• 1:28
  Great weather.
• 1:29
  I spent it hanging out with my two youngest boys.
• 1:31
  My middle son Cal lives in New York City and my youngest son Bo goes to school in Long Island.
• 1:37
  So spent the whole weekend with both of them and it was really good.
• 1:42
  was a clean scrub, my youngest son's apartment.
• 1:48
  He hasn't done that since the last time I was there.
• 1:51
  But it's really rewarding.
• 1:53
  You get these moments where you feel like you're a good parent and this is one of those weekends.
• 1:59
  One of the most rewarding things I could say for being a parent is they beg me to come.
• 2:04
  all the time and I don't, know, as much as I'd like to.
• 2:09
  And then we had such a good time and they begged me to stay longer.
• 2:14
  And yeah, that was, that was just like, you know, it just, it just, it's not always like that, but that your adult kids want to hang out with their dad.
• 2:26
  But it was funny, you know, we talk about the challenges of, you know, young men and kids.
• 2:35
  my son Bo is in that age range where, you know, 22, that, you know, he doesn't interact socially.
• 2:46
  you know enough.
• 2:48
  He doesn't go out.
• 2:48
  You know, he's a full time student at Division one athlete.
• 2:52
  He doesn't go out.
• 2:53
  I can bug him and you know so we went out and.
• 2:57
  We're at this really nice Vietnamese restaurant, which I never eat Vietnamese.
• 3:01
  I like didn't want to go.
• 3:04
  But and then the waitresses there were models.
• 3:08
  Didn't real, but they were all 6 foot and.
• 3:12
  And so I wanted to put on a clinic of just striking up conversation.
• 3:19
  Cal's great at it.
• 3:20
  But Bo struggles with it, as I think a lot of kids.
• 3:24
  just say you don't have the inherent people skills.
• 3:26
  And everything I said to the, God, dad, God, I can't believe you asked, God, dad, dad.
• 3:32
  And they were great.
• 3:33
  And the waitresses and just, I'm sure it was part of her tip, but she's like, my God, you made my night.
• 3:39
  And it wasn't flirting, it wasn't anything, but it was just connecting and finding out that she has, she went to,
• 3:46
  school for theater and you know why and all that you know I know how we got the subject of height because she was six foot you know and like you know does it bother you to go out
• 3:55
  with someone shorter than you and she said no not at all she was my boyfriend now Jack he's he's six two you know but just fine at all about that and just you know all that and
• 4:05
  like you know it's just funny Bo is like at first so uncomfortable with like how can you ask someone that
• 4:11
  And so it was fun, but that's not why.
• 4:14
  We just had a great time and he lives in Oyster Bay, which is like a chagrin falls if you're from Cleveland.
• 4:21
  Yeah, with a beach, you know, and an ocean.
• 4:24
  Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 4:25
  So it was just the perfect weekend.
• 4:27
  miss him.
• 4:28
  Very nice.
• 4:29
  you?
• 4:30
  You in town, you in the country?
• 4:32
  I am in town.
• 4:33
  I was in Chicago over the weekend, but just a quick trip Saturday to Sunday.
• 4:38
  visiting Rick's family.
• 4:42
  No, I was visiting Ken's family actually.
• 4:44
  I get Rick, Ken, John.
• 4:48
  I knew of some boring boomers name, you know, compared to the people you've dated in the past, Panchos and Daveed.
• 4:56
  That's, you know, going back to a boomer boring name like Rick, John, Ken, Tim.
• 5:03
  Figured it was one of those.
• 5:05
  Yeah, Boomer name.
• 5:07
  Definitely a boomer name.
• 5:11
  So let's talk about what's happened the past few weeks, CX, in the news.
• 5:17
  Yeah, I bring everything back to CX, but the US has fallen to 24th in overall happiness according to the World Happiness Report.
• 5:29
  One report by the Inc.
• 5:30
  magazine says, due to the kindness recession,
• 5:34
  There is a growing concern that Americans, that America's experiencing declining kindness, community connection, and compassion.
• 5:43
  Extensive research shows that showing and receiving kindness has powerful effect in our mental and physical wellbeing.
• 5:50
  Simple acts of kindness can improve recovery outcomes for heart attacks.
• 5:57
  patients and reduce the effects of aging at the cellular level.
• 6:01
  The positive impact of kindness and happiness on happiness is likely greater than you might think.
• 6:07
  And then, know, even more depressing, the report finds that if you're only to assess those below 30 young adults, the US wouldn't even rank in the top 60 happiest countries.
• 6:23
  This year's report plays greater emphasis on the importance of social
• 6:27
  support and interpersonal trust, both of which are strong indicators of individual well-being, alarming nearly one in five young adults in the US reported having no one they
• 6:38
  could rely on for support.
• 6:40
  Additionally, the number of Americans eating alone has risen by 53 % over the past two decades.
• 6:46
  Something I heard that correlates with this is on a podcast.
• 6:49
  I cannot remember where I heard it.
• 6:51
  It was so interesting.
• 6:54
  Natural opioids, things that release our endorphins.
• 6:58
  They listed like the top five and it was so interesting.
• 7:01
  And this is not in any order.
• 7:04
  Exercise, sex, music.
• 7:06
  a missing one, sex, did I say sex?
• 7:09
  And yeah, I think sex made up four of the five.
• 7:13
  And what I like to call the day maker dopamine, you know, when you make some.
• 7:18
  like volunteering, purpose, any of that, family relationships, any of that fall into endorphins?
• 7:28
  I think food was actually in one of them.
• 7:31
  Yeah.
• 7:32
  But the one that was a daymaker, they called it kindness, right?
• 7:38
  But the daymaker dopamine, when you go out of your way to do something for someone else, what that does to you.
• 7:47
  Yeah, so this is just what, as leaders, have to deal with.
• 7:53
  does that mean that younger people are not doing those things?
• 7:58
  They're not exercising, they're not eating well, they're not having sex?
• 8:04
  Why is it different?
• 8:05
  sex, they're not dating.
• 8:07
  I don't know about exercising, I'm sure we can pull that up.
• 8:12
  But they're not interacting.
• 8:16
  Like we've said on earlier podcasts, the majority, 18 to 24 year olds have never asked someone out in person.
• 8:23
  They're not going to parties.
• 8:25
  They're working from home.
• 8:26
  They're going to school, a higher percentage remotely.
• 8:29
  So they're not learning those people skills.
• 8:31
  And that was my whole point of putting on what I thought was a clinic with just communicating that.
• 8:38
  you know, just learning about someone and stuff.
• 8:42
  listen, it's not being taught in school, it's not being taught at home, and businesses are gonna have to bridge that gap with their training.
• 8:49
  Well, does that become a podcast or a live stream?
• 8:54
  Sure.
• 8:54
  Yeah.
• 8:57
  Yeah, absolutely.
• 8:58
  All right, we'll get that scheduled.
• 9:00
  All right, what are we discussing today?
• 9:03
  Well, today...
• 9:05
  As you know, John, and as many of our listeners probably know, the consulting industry is under fire from books like the big con to articles that have been coming out, exposing
• 9:16
  transactional relationships and surface level results.
• 9:20
  But what if consulting could be more than just rendered brilliance?
• 9:24
  In this episode, John, let's have you weigh in on what's broken.
• 9:30
  and reveal what the Di Julius group is doing to rewrite some of these rules from co-creation to capability building and unpack what a true partnership should look like.
• 9:41
  Also, I'd like to give our listeners ways to spot red flags, why most consultants are solving the wrong problems.
• 9:48
  And if you've ever hired a consultant or maybe even thought about becoming one, I think this conversation will challenge everything that
• 9:56
  You thought you knew it.
• 9:57
  How does that sound?
• 9:59
  Great.
• 10:00
  So John, you've worked with some of the world's top brands, global brands.
• 10:04
  And when you look across the consulting industry today, what do you think clients are getting that they don't need?
• 10:11
  And what are they not getting that they desperately do?
• 10:13
  So my first experience is more as starting three businesses and hiring consultants, accountants, lawyers, all those categories.
• 10:22
  And what I heard for the longest time at first didn't make a lot of sense to me is never ask an accountant lawyer
• 10:31
  Business advice, I'm like, that doesn't make sense.
• 10:33
  But then as I got into it, if you think about, and the business advice, I believe what people mean is outside of their area of niche.
• 10:41
  Like if you're dealing with a lawyer who's negotiating a contract, you know, and all that, yes, they're there to protect you and cover your liability and make sure you don't have
• 10:51
  exposure, yes.
• 10:52
  Same thing with an accountant on your P &L and tax ramifications, all that.
• 10:59
  That's their area of expertise.
• 11:01
  And we have worked, the DiJulius Group has worked with some big consulting firms.
• 11:06
  I think it's one of the big four I think that they're down to.
• 11:10
  And when I went to work with them, I was expecting all their...
• 11:14
  accountants, CPAs, whatever they were, to be a bunch of 55 to 70 year old men.
• 11:22
  And I was shocked.
• 11:24
  It looked like a college campus.
• 11:26
  Everywhere we went, we went to all their locations in the US.
• 11:30
  And I couldn't believe that they were a college campus.
• 11:32
  So when you look at these, you know, consulting firms, law firms, the bit more of the big houses, they just hire these kids right out of school.
• 11:44
  and teach them the methodology and that's great.
• 11:48
  But they've never ran a business, been a leader in a business, started their own business, been on the pointy edge of the spear.
• 11:54
  And so that gets dangerous of allowing them to have any accountability.
• 12:02
  Steve Jobs is a great video.
• 12:03
  Do you have it?
• 12:04
  I do have it.
• 12:05
  Let me play that.
• 12:06
  a great video of why he hates hated consultants
• 14:09
  So I like what he's saying.
• 14:12
  And I actually listened to a podcast recently from an ex-McKinsey consultant who said that they spent a lot of time
• 14:24
  Learning about the industry they were going to consult in and then just enough to be able to create their presentations, not enough to really understand all of the workings that
• 14:35
  are going on.
• 14:36
  But I like how Steve Jobs talks about the ownership of it.
• 14:41
  You know, when you are building something yourself and you're there to see the outcomes, that's a big difference than just
• 14:48
  buzzing in for a month or two and tackling one project but not really seeing it through to the end.
• 14:55
  And if you've never started a company on your own or led a company with employees and have that loss of sleep and all the things that go with it, the first thing when I got into
• 15:08
  consulting, and I think most, is
• 15:11
  when you go work with a client, think you're smarter than you are and that they're not as smart and you get surprised on both ends, right?
• 15:20
  They know their business.
• 15:21
  Like you're not just dropping epiphanies on them that they haven't thought of.
• 15:27
  It's just the resources and the methodology that they haven't thought of.
• 15:31
  so, you know, I think that's really where the disconnect is.
• 15:34
  And that's where you got to be careful of, of, you know, making sure that you have, you're, dealing with, I think it's easier, obviously dealing with a boutique, consulting
• 15:42
  firm, because obviously the, entrepreneur and the way our model is, is, is if it's not me, if I'm not directly involved in the consulting, well, we have Dave, who's our VP of
• 15:53
  consulting who ran, you know, worked in corporate America and,
• 15:57
  ran for well over a decade, close to two decades, a staff and employees.
• 16:03
  And then we have other consultants, but that's why I've always been involved in any capacity where I'll get on a call at least quarterly with the CEO or the highest executive
• 16:14
  to make sure we're on the same page.
• 16:17
  Because just a consultant
• 16:19
  that has no world experience outside of the methodology, the niche that they're being, doesn't understand the long-term impacts and the flavor of the month and program of the
• 16:33
  year and that they're gonna be onto something next month and there's gonna be a generation of employees hired and gone and all these competing priorities.
• 16:46
  There was an article also that came out recently that talked about how too many consulting relationships are merely transactional, more like vendors than true partners.
• 16:57
  Why do you think that dynamic has become so common?
• 17:01
  I think it's something similar, even to what you said, that they really don't know the nuts and bolts of the business and or of the industry.
• 17:12
  And so they're just kind of dropping the template.
• 17:18
  it's not right.
• 17:19
  The template doesn't never.
• 17:21
  applies to any business.
• 17:23
  There's so many nuances.
• 17:24
  We're dealing with a big international resort right now, and this always is the case.
• 17:30
  They've rolled out things in the past that were unsuccessful.
• 17:34
  They have legacy things from the founder.
• 17:38
  and maybe the current CEO that have to be represented.
• 17:43
  So you can't just go in there and blow it up and have some new shiny object.
• 17:48
  But you have to learn both because there's nuances to that.
• 17:52
  You have to adhere to the legacy stuff and make sure that is recycled.
• 17:58
  You also have to learn what are the things maybe a former CEO or a former employee
• 18:04
  try to roll out and it has total egg on their face.
• 18:07
  So when someone brings it up, you're knowledge enough to know, you know, that's taboo and you'll lose credibility.
• 18:13
  You know.
• 18:14
  You gotta be, I also think in any company, this is just probably business to business, you gotta be cautious.
• 18:21
  think we gotta ensure that we're the right company that they're looking for, not assume that the buyer knows what they're looking for.
• 18:28
  Demonstrate that your company has certain criteria to do business with.
• 18:32
  My favorite thing that I want said on every proposal and every conversation is we will only
• 18:39
  take you on as a client.
• 18:41
  If we both agree that the value received from our consulting agreement is far greater, far outweighs the fees you will pay us.
• 18:50
  Is that acceptable?
• 18:51
  That forces us to figure out what those KPIs are, what are those return on experience that will make it and what we can talk about later.
• 19:01
  But when you create their vus, you find out what their vus are, that pays for one month of your consulting.
• 19:09
  I'm sorry, the revenue that's saved or incurred can pay for a year of your consulting, one month of it.
• 19:16
  You mentioned templates and some consultants show up with a templated playbook and they facilitate things from a templated playbook.
• 19:25
  Others show up with curiosity.
• 19:27
  What's the mindset you have and that you expect from your consultants?
• 19:32
  Yeah, I think it's, before we get into the methodology, we know what, in our business and customer experience, employee experience, what the best have and they do.
• 19:43
  And so that's our methodology.
• 19:45
  But you gotta first figure out that doesn't mean they need it all.
• 19:49
  They could be crushing some areas.
• 19:51
  They can be prohibitive to succeeding in some areas.
• 19:55
  And so you have to really do a discovery and a deep dive into what's working, what hasn't worked in the past.
• 20:03
  Have they hired consulting companies in the past where it's failed?
• 20:07
  Why?
• 20:08
  And that's definitely not always on the consulting company.
• 20:11
  That could be on internal, the resources, flavor of the month, program of the year, management of a best seller.
• 20:17
  You have to teach them what will.
• 20:20
  what makes a successful consulting project and what doesn't.
• 20:24
  And tell them, you know, we won't work with you unless you can, you know.
• 20:29
  you know, provide these things, you know, executive sponsorship and what executive sponsorship looks like.
• 20:36
  It's not just creating a budget, writing a check.
• 20:40
  It's the resources of the, are they really behind it?
• 20:43
  Are they behind it in three months, six months, 18 months from now after we've left the building, a project lead in our world that might be a chief experience officer with the
• 20:52
  bandwidth and the gravitas.
• 20:54
  And is that the right person in that or did you just promote
• 20:59
  someone or hire someone that you know isn't and that they have the resources a steering committee that represents each department each each location whatever you know the scope
• 21:10
  of the project is and then what we like to call is cx ambassadors more frontline facing that we can you know pull that that they can pull to help you know create this should be
• 21:22
  created by the consultant it should just be facilitated
• 21:25
  by the consultant.
• 21:26
  But each one is so important.
• 21:28
  Executive sponsorship, the project lead, having a steering committee of leadership, and CX Ambassadors frontline.
• 21:38
  But all those have job descriptions.
• 21:40
  All those have some type of time commitment.
• 21:43
  And if you don't have all four of those, you know, got to be willing to walk away because, you know, what I want is someone to be able to call them two, three, five years from now.
• 21:56
  And they say that we're doing something significantly different than we were before we hired them.
• 22:01
  Not that was this, you know, things felt really good for a while, but then it went back to what it was.
• 22:09
  We all look bad.
• 22:11
  and I'd rather lose the, you know, turn down the project than not set someone up for success.
• 22:17
  So that brings up a common complaint that was echoed in books like the Big Con, that traditional consultants tend to create dependency instead of real capability.
• 22:27
  So it sounds like the DiJulius Group is addressing that through the project lead and ambassadors.
• 22:35
  Is that how you consciously avoid it?
• 22:38
  Yeah, so it's creating the plan.
• 22:41
  It's also where I've learned from great books and training is if your customer's first reaction to your insights is enthusiastic agreement, like, that's exactly what we're
• 22:58
  looking for, then you actually haven't taught them anything.
• 23:01
  You don't want to just have them say, agree, right?
• 23:04
  Your goal is to kind of catch your client off guard with a different viewpoint, surprise, make them curious and get them wanting to hear more.
• 23:14
  Stop wasting my time, challenge me, teach me something new and get them to say, never thought of it that way before.
• 23:22
  And that just on the discovery call,
• 23:26
  or the proposal call that your client or potential client should be willing to pay to pay just for that.
• 23:34
  Obviously, you you're probably not charging them if you're a consulting company, but if you're not getting that, you know, and they're just, you know, I use a silly example.
• 23:43
  If I go to a hardware store and say, I need a hammer and nails and the hardware clerk says, we got hammer and nails here they are.
• 23:50
  And you leave.
• 23:52
  That might not be what you needed.
• 23:53
  You know, why?
• 23:54
  you need a hammer and nails and you go into it and this is where my you know metaphor loses its its meaning but you know maybe I don't need a hammer in their nails you know
• 24:04
  maybe I needed something totally different or I think I need a hammer and nails because I'm doing it wrong and I'll be back next month but needing a hammer and nails so you know
• 24:14
  just just you know helping them learn and educate teach them something that they didn't know and then
• 24:20
  Helping them back to your original question of creating the formula that not only gets it off the ground in momentum, but keeps it going.
• 24:28
  Toma, top of mind awareness.
• 24:30
  I think we're definitely unique because we're the only company in the world that I know of that has a customer experience executive academy, which is a master's degree for customer
• 24:43
  experience.
• 24:44
  The principles for any business, know, technology, accounting, finance, sales, marketing, operations, and customer experience, HR, all those have degrees and college and all that,
• 24:57
  but customer, it's not taught anywhere.
• 24:59
  So we provide that and all our consulting clients send someone through that academy, which is a 12
• 25:15
  month course, part-time where they come to Cleveland every quarter for three days for a year.
• 25:12
  And we've had clients, our consulting clients send one or two, and we've had them send dozens.
• 25:18
  One client, New Day USA, have sent over 30, maybe 40 over the course of 12 years.
• 25:24
  But that's them creating their own, where they don't need us after that.
• 25:29
  And these people have that expertise that they can champion it.
• 25:34
  So how does that work out for a business model?
• 25:38
  They don't.
• 25:38
  You're teaching the clients not to need the DiJulius group.
• 25:42
  That's okay.
• 25:43
  Sometimes they bring us back for refreshers.
• 25:46
  Sometimes they're buying more businesses.
• 25:49
  Sometimes they're selling.
• 25:50
  We've had, as you know, so many CEOs that have sold, moved on, and land somewhere else, and they bring us in.
• 26:00
  So, you I don't think it's about keeping them dependent on us.
• 26:04
  But there's always more.
• 26:05
  mean, they bring us back for the employee experience and the recruiting and onboarding.
• 26:10
  So there's always more if you're doing a really, really good job.
• 26:13
  And there's refresher.
• 26:14
  Things change.
• 26:15
  Things get updated.
• 26:16
  Like we talked about earlier in this podcast, a new challenge that is so much more significant than ever before is that the younger generation doesn't have the inherent
• 26:27
  people skills.
• 26:29
  So we have to help them with that relationship building, curiosity, communication skills, telephobia, all these things that it's just presented by the new generation.
• 26:38
  So that always gives you a shelf life of what people need.
• 26:42
  Plus like, you
• 26:44
  the two biggest leadership skill sets that no leader in any business ever needed up until the pandemic was leading from a distance and being concerned with employee well-being,
• 26:58
  employee wellness.
• 26:59
  Those were two things that for 100,000s of years, no business leader ever, it was never taught.
• 27:04
  in any class or school or seminar.
• 27:09
  So there's always things evolving, but we shouldn't be going backwards other than a refresher with a consulting client.
• 27:17
  I love that you brought up the consultants don't create the systems for the people, for the companies.
• 27:26
  They work with them to create them.
• 27:29
  So the idea of co-creation, how important is that in your methodology?
• 27:35
  You know, I believe it's everything.
• 27:37
  So anytime we help a client create a customer experience action statement in the three pillars, every business has created stuff in the past.
• 27:47
  They may not call it what we're calling it.
• 27:50
  And the last thing they want, because they've had it done 100 times before,
• 27:55
  and the masses, their operations, their GMs, their franchisees, their frontline employees are like, my God, like another flavor of month.
• 28:05
  And when we look at this, every time we help them create a customer experience action statement in three pillars, all we did is we look at all the different places that they're
• 28:15
  mentioning addressing the customer.
• 28:17
  And we're taking out the core values of the mission statement or the purpose statements or wherever they have it.
• 28:24
  and we're just bringing it together and just codifying it to have it make sense instead of having it so many different places and so hard to remember.
• 28:34
  So we're kind of recycling.
• 28:37
  what they've already saying, they're just not making it succinct.
• 28:40
  One of my favorite things is if you can't say it in six words or less, you don't understand it, and that's what we help, and that's what the pillars do and all that.
• 28:49
  And you get less credibility, genuinely, of when a consultant comes in and creates something.
• 28:56
  What does that consultant know about our history, our industry?
• 29:02
  So if you get a good consultant just facilitates, puts guardrails up, cautions them what doesn't work and does work, here's the highest percentage of why it's going to be
• 29:14
  successful today and 18 months from now.
• 29:20
  when it's created by the steering committee, the CX ambassadors.
• 29:24
  Now they are, that's what they are, they're ambassadors.
• 29:27
  They're going back to their departments after they attended a workshop in the call center at the front lines, at the stores in operations saying, my God.
• 29:36
  we have something that's coming down that I was a part of and I being one of us that work here.
• 29:42
  It wasn't just the people in the ivory tower at corporate that haven't done our jobs in a decade.
• 29:48
  They have no idea what it's like.
• 29:50
  It wasn't a consultant that has no idea what it's like to be on the front line, you know, and it gets such buy in and they're going to make sure that it's successful because, you
• 30:01
  know, they helped give birth to it.
• 30:03
  So what red flags do you think companies should watch out for when evaluating consultants, especially if they want real transformation, something more than, you know, just surface
• 30:15
  level change?
• 30:17
  Yeah, you know, I always say in anything to demonstrate or to learn, to demonstrate your credibility and brilliance at what you do is not in what you say, what you ask.
• 30:31
  and it's what they ask, right?
• 30:33
  know, finding out where they're losing money, but not taking, you know, this initiative and advice, you know, you know, how have you tried to fix that in the past?
• 30:43
  And if so, why didn't it work?
• 30:46
  You know all these different things of Exposing you should be taking your client on a roller coaster a journey.
• 30:53
  They should actually have a Pit in their stomach and should be nauseous after your conversation because you've made them realize the long-term impact or the long-term, you
• 31:05
  what?
• 31:05
  shame on them that they haven't addressed this sooner.
• 31:08
  What are those KPIs?
• 31:10
  You know, all those things, not just that, you know, and that, like our hiring process, that are great companies hiring process.
• 31:20
  You know, a typical hiring process is Denise is the greatest place to work.
• 31:24
  We all hug each other sing kumbaya and make a lot of money year over year.
• 31:28
  Do you want to start tomorrow versus this isn't for everyone.
• 31:32
  This is a really hard job.
• 31:35
  is, know, me and Claudia just had a call with someone that was thinking about, or is thinking about attending CXEA, sending someone to the Academy.
• 31:43
  And we wanted to make sure, you know, you know, he loved everything he heard.
• 31:47
  And we said, hold on a couple of things.
• 31:50
  One.
• 31:51
  how long they've been with you.
• 31:53
  Sometimes people say, just hired someone, she's great, she's gonna be great.
• 31:56
  That's not the person you wanna send and make that kind of a $15,000 investment into an academy.
• 32:02
  You don't know if they're gonna still be here in two years, five, you don't know if they're the role model.
• 32:08
  Then...
• 32:09
  you know the time commitment, you know, it's a it there's a time commitment.
• 32:13
  There's 12 days are going to need to be in Cleveland.
• 32:16
  There's you know work, you know, we have to make sure they know what they're getting themselves into.
• 32:21
  So we're setting them up for success and we don't have people dropping, you know, every quarter because they weren't the right person.
• 32:29
  So so you know educating your your your customer, your client on what they need and what they don't need and
• 32:36
  Again, making sure that they know you just don't want to work with anyone.
• 32:41
  Here's what you, the customer, needs.
• 32:43
  And if you can't provide that, this is probably not the right time.
• 32:46
  The educate versus sell.
• 32:48
  And educate versus sell means sometimes that means you take a better opportunity off the table today because it's not in the best interest of that customer.
• 33:01
  So the customer experience executive academy, is it necessary for someone who's a consulting client?
• 33:06
  What is the outcomes of a consulting client that has somebody go through and attend the academy versus someone who doesn't?
• 33:14
  Well, so I mean, they become your chief experience officer, your future.
• 33:20
  They know what less than 1 % of business professionals walking planet Earth know.
• 33:28
  It's as close as you could come to becoming a DiJulius Group consultant But they also have this community fraternity that they, you know, with each other that...
• 33:39
  the other attendees that they went through the course with, that is their support group.
• 33:44
  Sometimes it's a therapy group.
• 33:46
  So even though after a year it might be done and we might, you we have reunions and refreshers, they're just become so close, you know, and anyone will hire them in the
• 33:59
  world.
• 33:59
  Not that we want them to leave the company they brought, but just what they now have in value.
• 34:05
  you know, it's so hard to find that in a person outside of someone you send to the CX Academy.
• 34:13
  So they've gone through this, they learn all the information.
• 34:16
  Basically, they're learning what your consultants learn.
• 34:20
  So why hire a consultant?
• 34:22
  Why not just put them through the academy?
• 34:24
  Some people don't.
• 34:25
  Some people may be small enough that they can do it.
• 34:28
  Sometimes they realize they still need the expert.
• 34:31
  A lot of times, these people, that's not their only job.
• 34:35
  And so that makes it hard if they're not a full-time chief experience officer.
• 34:40
  And that's always changing and evolving.
• 34:42
  But they have the intellectual capacity to understand what needs to be done.
• 34:47
  But it kind of goes back to the original thing.
• 34:51
  They haven't done it repeatedly in a lot of businesses.
• 34:56
  you know, we have, so there is a discount.
• 34:59
  But some have been able to just send someone, and it's the smaller businesses that probably can send someone to the academy, and that person can move the needle
• 35:11
  significantly.
• 35:13
  If it's a larger company, they're gonna need some external help.
• 35:17
  What other information do you have for our listeners about creating real transformation with consulting work and being careful of who you hire versus just having someone come in
• 35:29
  that checks the boxes maybe that you have on your RFP?
• 35:33
  So let's go back to that original thing we have on our proposal.
• 35:37
  And when we're going to talk to someone that we say that we will only take you on as a client if we can both agree that the value you will receive from our consulting project
• 35:48
  agreement far outweighs what we're going to charge you.
• 35:51
  So we always go back to find out.
• 35:53
  We have to find out what your KPIs that you are measuring, that what you can measure.
• 35:57
  We want to create a return on experience dashboard.
• 36:00
  Three to four KPIs, key performance indicators, that are directly specific to the customer experience.
• 36:10
  Yeah, yeah.
• 36:11
  So sales is not directly specific.
• 36:13
  Sales is a lagging indicator.
• 36:15
  And there's so many other things that sales can be a result of.
• 36:20
  Maturity of your business, maturity of the market, construction, the economy.
• 36:27
  So that isn't just one.
• 36:29
  But things like retention rate, earned growth, referrals, re-signs, all those.
• 36:36
  So the one that I always say is you've got to help.
• 36:39
  a company find their voo, voo.
• 36:42
  And so, you know, I've had, I wish I had, you know, a dollar for every time I've had a CEO when we started working say this, you know, if you can help us.
• 36:52
  improve this one metric by 1%.
• 36:55
  And the metric was different every time, depending on their business.
• 36:59
  It would mean millions of dollars either in revenue or profit.
• 37:04
  So one was New Day USA.
• 37:07
  It was their veteran opt out, VOO, we call it the VOO.
• 37:11
  and I also call this a customer experience myth buster.
• 37:15
  So a veteran opt out, in their case, is they're a mortgage company that only serves veterans of the military.
• 37:23
  And typically the hard part is to get the veteran approved for the loan.
• 37:31
  If you can get them approved, great.
• 37:34
  But a lot of times, in any mortgage company, any loan business, if you can't get them approved, we can't do business with you.
• 37:41
  Okay, so now of the ones that were getting approved, 15 % of them were opting out.
• 37:48
  The veteran was opting out before the loan closed, which is a horrible thing.
• 37:53
  The hard part was done.
• 37:55
  We got you approved.
• 37:56
  Your loan's gonna close.
• 37:58
  you know, eight weeks from today, know, July 1st, and then, you know, middle of June, end of June.
• 38:05
  You, the veteran says, I'm out.
• 38:08
  I found it cheaper somewhere else, a cheaper interest rate.
• 38:12
  And that's the myth buster.
• 38:13
  The account executives would say that they were losing veterans.
• 38:18
  The veteran opt-outs were because they found it cheaper somewhere else, a cheaper interest rate.
• 38:24
  And so we did some work.
• 38:28
  15%.
• 38:29
  a month were opting out that's fumbling the ball at the one yard line, and every 1 % was worth like $150,000.
• 38:41
  So a month.
• 38:42
  So I don't know what the math is, but it's several million dollars a month.
• 38:46
  All the work's done.
• 38:48
  So Rob Posner, the president, founder, said, don't buy that it's interest rates only.
• 38:57
  So we did research and we found out these account executives who are young kids, fresh out of college, what they were doing is after they got you approved, they stopped
• 39:07
  communicating with you on a regular basis.
• 39:09
  We weren't calling you back when you'd call up and say, hey, where's my appraisal?
• 39:13
  Where's my inspection?
• 39:14
  Where's my title?
• 39:16
  Where's this?
• 39:17
  Because they were working on the ones that weren't approved yet in the pipeline.
• 39:21
  that lack of communication, lack of professionalism, frustration, they went somewhere else.
• 39:29
  And as a result, working with their IT company, we put in a process that if the, this is back then, if the account executive didn't communicate with you every 48 hours, the
• 39:46
  account closed.
• 39:47
  The account closed.
• 39:50
  Bells and sirens went off, Rob Posner the CEO, Franco Agreco the chief revenue officer, Eugene the COO, everyone got notified that my veteran, Denise Thompson, account closed.
• 40:08
  I didn't want that to happen because everyone was coming up to me.
• 40:11
  That wasn't a good thing to be on that report.
• 40:14
  As a result, in like four or five months, their monthly vus, veteran opt-outs, went from 15 % to 8%.
• 40:24
  Still drives me crazy, the 7%.
• 40:26
  But that 7%, or the 8%, but that 7 % decrease in vus times $1.5 million, I'm sorry, $150,000 was, you know.
• 40:43
  several millions of dollars that they saved a month.
• 40:48
  So Rob, you can understand that, know, Rob Posner and New Day has worked with the DiJulius Group for over 12 years because in one month we helped them save what several years of our
• 40:59
  consulting cost.
• 41:01
  But the point is you've to find out the company's VOO and the reason behind it.
• 41:05
  The VOO is a result, it wasn't the cause.
• 41:09
  The cause was that they stopped communicating with their veterans, causing their veterans to be uncertain and anxiety and move on.
• 41:18
  and they were using it as an excuse.
• 41:20
  So you got to help the company find their voo and make it financially.
• 41:24
  The companies that don't invest in customer experience don't see the financial impact.
• 41:31
  And that could be the consulting company's problem that they didn't help them find the financial impact.
• 41:39
  it's a good example of a leader really caring about what the customer's experience is, what the veteran's experience is.
• 41:47
  What is a leader's role in a consulting project?
• 41:51
  So that goes to the first thing, the executive sponsorship.
• 41:54
  We said there's four internal at the client, there's four key people, teams.
• 41:59
  Executive sponsorship.
• 42:01
  project lead, steering committee, and CX ambassadors.
• 42:05
  The executive sponsorship has to be, and if you look at every world-class customer experience company, Virgin Airlines, Amazon, Zappos, Walt Disney, Starbucks, did I say
• 42:18
  Apple?
• 42:18
  I'm not sure.
• 42:19
  All of them, all of them, when they were at their peak,
• 42:23
  Some may still are.
• 42:24
  You can tell why.
• 42:25
  Walt Disney, Steve Jobs, Jeff Bezos, Tony Hsieh, Richard Branson, we're obsessed with the experience.
• 42:32
  If the top is obsessed, then those around them will be obsessed.
• 42:37
  If you don't have executive sponsorship, it's not worth making the investment.
• 42:42
  It'll be Flavor of Month program of the year.
• 42:44
  They'll be onto something else next month.
• 42:47
  They'll be chasing the shiny object.
• 42:50
  So you need that.
• 42:51
  And on the flip side, you can tell the Spirit Airlines of the world, their CEO punishes their customers for stuff.
• 42:58
  So you can tell why companies are great at customer experience or they're horrible at customer experience.
• 43:04
  It goes back to the CEO.
• 43:06
  That makes a big difference.
• 43:08
  But it makes a big impact on the employees, everything from their work environment when they care about service to what's in their paycheck.
• 43:19
  I'm sure that the mortgage broker, what do you call them, the account executives are making a lot more because of discovering the VOO and
• 43:30
  They're losing so much money on VOOs Right?
• 43:34
  mean, they're commissioned.
• 43:37
  whatever percentage they have, 15 % of their own, that's 15%.
• 43:44
  Again, that they did all the work.
• 43:47
  It's 44 days out of 45, and they opted out.
• 43:52
  You did all the work.
• 43:55
  all the title work and all the prep and all the documents and underwriting was all done.
• 44:02
  So, that you're helping them, you know, learn how to.
• 44:05
  be the highest compensated by teaching them the discipline of being in the certainty business in that one example.
• 44:12
  But we have other great return on experience that we can talk about some other time that we've talked about in other podcasts.
• 44:18
  I love to say, and there's a podcast about this, is stop surveying your customers and just measure earned growth.
• 44:27
  That's a teaser, but that's more important than if your intention is to recommend.
• 44:35
  I don't want to know your intention.
• 44:36
  I want to know if you took action.
• 44:38
  And depending on your business model, you can track that.
• 44:40
  Leaders make a big difference in every business success or fail.
• 44:46
  So you want to talk about living an extraordinary life?
• 44:51
  Yeah, yeah, So, an extraordinary life, so countless others do, that's my personal motto.
• 44:57
  And today, what I wanna talk about, because I have an event coming up for the third company I started, Believe in Dreams, which is making dreams come true for children who
• 45:08
  have suffered incredible hardship.
• 45:11
  and are in poverty, those two things.
• 45:14
  And so that's why it's top of mind, because we have this, our annual gala coming up.
• 45:19
  And this statistic just shocks me that I don't think enough people know the number one indicator of a child's lifetime success is a numeric number.
• 45:32
  When I ask people this, usually say, their GPA, their SAT score, where they graduated in class, where they graduated in class.
• 45:44
  No, it's the zip code they were born into.
• 45:47
  you
• 45:48
  The life, the number one indicator of a child's success is the zip code they're born into.
• 45:54
  None of us control that.
• 45:56
  And so that's what Believe in Dreams strives to, and this isn't an ad for Believe in Dream, but I just think, you know, we're all pretty lucky.
• 46:04
  I think first, if you're born in the US, you're probably born on first base for most of us.
• 46:08
  You know, but, you know, it's just making a difference in...
• 46:12
  kids that know fault to their own can't dictate that.
• 46:17
  It's a beautiful event.
• 46:18
  And although you're not advertising the event, I am going to put information about it in the show notes.
• 46:24
  Not just the event, but Believe in Dreams itself, because I think it's...
• 46:29
  Well, but for the...
• 46:30
  other causes or the charity.
• 46:35
  think many of us like to help in any way we can and we don't always know where to help.
• 46:40
  So great.
• 46:43
  All right.
• 46:44
  Well, thank you, Denise.
• 46:46
  Struggling through this, I can tell you're a little bit under the weather.
• 46:49
  You have a Demi Moore type of sound raspy and...
• 46:55
  Ha!
• 46:57
  All right, Thanks, revolutionaries.
• 47:01
  We'll see you next time.