Today, we are going to look at one of the three key operations fundamentals you need to master. These fundamentals drive how well you run operations, which has significant impacts on customer service, the brand, and profit margin.
This first fundamental is clear business outcomes.
Business outcomes are crucial to operations because you need to know why you are doing the work.
For example, customer service is about getting satisfied customers.
Now, customer service has many dimensions. The business outcome for the call centre is to tackle customer problems quickly. A business outcome for the after-sales support team is to handle defects expediently.
The more specific you define the business outcome, the better. Clear business outcomes keep you grounded.
When you share the business outcome with the teams involved in the work, they understand the “why”. That understanding serves to steer them away from what not to do.
Beware that business outcomes will change over time, so it is important to revisit, refine, and remind employees about them.
With clear business outcomes, it is easier to define, with focus, what needs to get done.
Without clear outcomes, you could be doing work that doesn’t contribute any value. So, keep this operations fundamental in mind as you modify your operations.
We’ll look at the second operations fundamental in part 2 of the series. Stay tuned.
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