Introduction

Service excellence is about taking an integrated approach to business that puts the customer at the centre of everything it does. Making it happen is as this book demonstrates about managing a number of different processes within the organisation. However, the task is not simply to manage them on a stand-alone basis but instead to embrace the fact that they are interrelated and will impact on each other. Each of them plays a unique role in enabling the organisation to deliver customer service excellence and together they can elevate an organisation above its peers in the marketplace. Every year the judges in the Awards scheme look to find best practice examples across a range of categories retail and consumer, financial services, manufacturing/engineering, business-to-business and public services. And every year there is stiff competition for the coveted awards. The Overall Winner s Award is given to the one organisation that impresses the entire team of judges with its service excellence practice. In 2002, it was the Nationwide Building Society that stood out from the platform of sector winners and it is this organisation that provides the final case study.

However, before introducing Nationwide s story and revealing why it won, the first part of this chapter reflects on the general lessons to be learned from the Awards scheme. Here the Unisys/ Management Today Service Excellence Award is reprised and briefly explored through its constituent elements, customer intelligence, operational effectiveness, engaging people, leadership and values and organisational agility.

Customer intelligence...