Editor’s note: Brad Holleran is a principal in Holleran Consulting, a marketing research firm based in York, Pa.

Companies that are truly customer focused define quality by how well they meet the wants, needs and expectations of their customers. Knowing and understanding what is important to customers and how an organization performs can lead to improvements in processes, production and service delivery and, ultimately, the bottom line.

The experiences of two companies in different industries illustrate the value of integrating customer satisfaction research into quality improvement initiatives.

A journey, not a destination

Senior Campus Living is a national developer and manager of campus style retirement communities designed for middle income affordability. Kerry Jones, director of management services, leads the company’s comprehensive initiatives to improve the quality of its product, which Jones defines as "the service and care of our residents." Senior Campus Living approaches quality improvement as an evolution, an ongoing process, not a program; a journey as opposed to a destination. As a jumping-off place for its quality journey, the company used the results of its recent resident satisfaction surveys to help delineate priority areas of focus.

With the help of a research firm, which used a combination of a written survey instrument and phone and personal interviews, Senior Campus Living gathered input from more than 3,500 residents and guardians in two states. This included customers from across the spectrum of their facilities, including independent living, assisted living and skilled nursing settings.

Some of the respondents’ top areas of concern matched those of importance to Senior Campus Living, as well, such as prudent fiscal management of their communities. Others were those that impacted respondents’ future personal well-being, such as medical services and emergency responses.

"Overall our ratings were very strong," Jones says. "We found that many of the areas of concern could be addressed not with extraordinary measures such as adding more staff, but simply by educating our residents more fully and improving communication with them."

Jones says the Senior Campus Living Management team prioritized areas of concern, devised action plans and developed specific strategies to make improvements. He is now focusing on defining best practices among the company’s communities and standardizing some procedures while still allowing for creativity and uniqueness among the operational teams.

Senior Campus Living also is using an employee survey to secure feedback from its internal customers, which Jones says is equally critical to the company’s future and to residents’ satisfaction with the facilities. Both surveys will be repeated regularly, every 24 months.

"Initial surveys give us useful benchmarks to measure against," Jones says. "Repeating the surveys will help us develop a history and know where we need to focus our efforts for change. We want to know at all times where we perform well and where we don’t."

The goal: A world-class rating

Glen-Gery is a brick manufacturer with 13 factories in the Northeastern and Midwestern regions of the U.S. whose customers are architects, commercial and residential builders, mason contractors and individual consumers. The company has adopted a philosophy of continuous improvement that recognizes the benefits of a customer-driven organization in increased profitability and market share.

Lynn Silan, Glen-Gery’s director of continuous improvement, says the company had sought customer feedback in the past, but more recently has conducted comprehensive research to identify and measure customer satisfaction. "We had asked customers about their complaints in the areas of production and service and we would make changes to address those complaints," Silan says. "Our systematic process now lets us examine specific aspects of service or production and know exactly where we need to improve."

A research firm helped Glen-Gery first define customer satisfaction in its industry. The company then surveyed customers representing 80 percent of its sales volume, measuring performance against 12 different factors related to service and satisfaction. Those factors included promptness in notifying customers about changes in the order, providing correct samples in the required time, honesty and openness, and response to complaints.

Silan says that, from the pure service standpoint, "going the extra mile" stood out as a real customer-pleaser. "Now we train our front-line staff to go beyond what the customer expects, like offering alternatives if a product isn’t available and finding solutions as promptly as possible," Silan says.

On the architectural and commercial building side of the business, Silan says one of the top satisfaction factors is "promptness in notifying customers about changes in the order," because an entire construction schedule can be thrown off if the brick isn’t ready when planned. "Brick is made from clay and shale and when you deal with a raw material that’s not absolutely homogeneous, you sometimes have unpredictable outcomes," she says. "We are extremely diligent about informing our customers of delays."

One area in which Glen-Gery has made significant improvement and, in fact, set a new industry standard, is in the response time to produce samples for customers. In the brick industry, an inventory of samples is not typically available for customers. Samples are made to order and involve a manufacturing process; faces of the requested brick are cut off and affixed to board with mortar. "We started collecting data that included the date the sample request came in and the date the sample went out, and were dismayed to find that in many cases the process was taking over 20 days," Silan says. "So we worked with the sample-making teams at all sites to improve the process and also began to stockpile a small inventory of brick faces and samples. Now samples go out in two days, on average, and many go out the same day the request comes in."

Measuring factors specific to its customers and its industry has proved to be invaluable for Glen-Gery and enabled the company to target quality improvement efforts. Silan says the company has repeated its customer satisfaction survey every year since 1994 and developed corporate improvement goals and training programs each year based on the survey results. Each year gets better.

"In 1994, 88 percent of surveyed customers were satisfied overall with Glen-Gery," she says. "In 1995, we hit 90 percent and in 1996, our overall rating was 93.8 percent."

The company’s goal is a world-class rating of 95 percent, Silan says. Why not 100 percent? Because there will always be customers who select product based on price. "We pride ourselves on providing total value of the product and service we provide," Silan says, "and that’s more than just low price. It’s quality and service and a lack of problems with an order…the whole experience of buying from Glen-Gery. And that’s what we want to be measured on."

Listen carefully

Customer satisfaction research can provide you with essential information about not only your products and service, but also about what you need to be doing differently or better. All you need to do is listen carefully and respond accordingly. Then use this vital feedback to target your quality improvement efforts for maximum benefit.