Over the years, the IT head has also transformed through the journey, working lockstep with the demands of the organization, providing the necessary solutions, sometimes wildly successful and sometimes challenged, delayed, or unsuccessful. Through the era, the IT leader kept moving outward from the glasshouse to the factory, warehouse, corporate office, and field and wherever the internal customer was present, and then beyond to where the external customer lived.

Over the years, as the transition occurred to the CIO, the discussion changed from the nuts and bolts, three-letter acronyms, servers, routers, hardware, software, networking, to business process, order to cash, procure to pay, customer analytics, increasing revenue, strengthening the bottom line, creating competitive differentiation, managing supply chains, collaboration with the suppliers and customers, new business opportunities, until the difference with other CXOs started blurring.

Over the years, one characteristic that has not changed is the acceptance of demands ― reasonable or otherwise, requirements ― rational or not, time pressure to deliver ― urgent or not, budget cuts ― downturn or not, accepting everything business desired, spoke about, or demanded. The IT function was expected to stay subservient to cajoling, coercion, ransom, threats, with the proverbial sword hanging inches from the neck; if you cannot do it, we will find ways outside to get it done a la shadow IT.

IT teams were not expected to challenge, they were expected to deliver; whether it is a report that no one sees, a quick fix that stays in UAT for weeks beyond the deadline, systems that saw usage drop faster than the stock market in the downturn, one liners or vague or assumptive requirement definitions, or in recent times, consumer devices to be connected to corporate networks. A challenge or denied service was sacrilegious and a pile of turn-downs could lead to “lack of alignment” to what business wants.

With increasing comfort with business, conviction, and communication, CIOs have looked the other in the eye and engage in a non-confrontational debate which has germinated into acceptance of the CIO viewpoint and its intent only to the best interest of the enterprise. It’s a newly discovered facet that boosts confidence and fuels itself; the spark is now traveling virulently. CIOs have created the freedom to say “No” to the unreasonable and ill-defined.

It was a panel discussion. The headline for the discussion said, “Business transformation”. The participants were CIOs across different consumer facing service industries, the audience, a mix of 80 odd CIOs wanting to take away some pearls of wisdom from the collective experience of over 100 years on stage; after all not too often you get to hear success stories on how business has been transformed by CIOs with a mix of people, process and technology.

It started off well; demonstrating the rich experience of the moderator who put across some sharp questions to the CIOs. Into the discussion, a couple of service incidents specific to their companies had the CIOs on the defensive in an attempt to rationalize what appeared to be process lapses. Few from the audience joined the charge and soon it appeared to be a “Consumer redressal forum” with the hapless CIOs on the dais unable to defend and afraid to rebut the moderator.

A brave soul from the audience chastised the moderator for diverting from the core subject and the personal affront to the CIOs. Sensing trouble, the organizers closed the discussion citing time constraints.

Real business issues

Later in the day, a debate set off between a few panellists and a bunch of CIOs on whether CIOs can influence service outcomes in the call center, field service, or responses received by the customers. Service exceptions are reality despite the best intentions and efforts of the enterprise. With attrition being sky high in service functions, training time has been shrinking with on the job training becoming a norm for some.

Even when process and technology has been engineered for effectiveness, the people challenge remains. So what options exist for an enterprise and what can the CIO do to create a consistent framework that the enterprise can depend to provide consistent, scalable process driven service outcomes across geographies? Is there a best practice that can help to reduce the customer pain?

A changing paradigm

Products entice a first time buy, but services create repeat customers. Irrespective of how the service is delivered, via call center, on premise break-fix, or at service center, it is important to set expectations and manage customer interaction with empathy. Sears coined the “Customer is always right” paradigm; in the current hyper competitive world and unreasonable expectations, the customer has the ability to take her business away to competition.

Enterprises need to stay connected to the customer via all channels seeking and listening to feedback that is out in the social media. It is a space to watch not just what they are saying about your company, but also competitors. I believe that every CXO including the CIO should stay aware of the pulse of the services and continuously improve on the experience with a feedback loop. After all your customers can be your best sales persons and success (or an irate customer) is only 140 characters away.

Over the last couple of decades, I watched the new leader with interest—wondering why they never had mainstream commercial success, despite having products which almost everyone loved. In the meanwhile, the displaced moved from strength to strength creating a monopolistic era. Everyone hated this practice, but continued to embrace its products as if there was no choice. Choices came and withered away like the autumn flower; a few showed promise, but could not sustain themselves in a hypercompetitive world where big brother came down guns blazing on any who dared a challenge.  All along, our new leader continued to innovate, gaining a small but steadily growing breed of followers—never big enough to raise an alarm, but shunned by IT organizations as too esoteric.

The erstwhile leader spawned many factions seeking alternatives, never really succeeding enough to threaten. Fan following and hate groups alike embrace every news, release, solution and acquisition. Corporate customers experimented, but left with no real choice, continue to grin and bear it. Governments’ attempt to leash the giant bore puny results, as the alternative movement around open source has remained just that—an alternative that few are interested in.

Did customers love this ‘choice’ of one, and the price it came at? A survey will probably show the number of naysayers touching highs on product quality, price, support, or any other parameter that you may want to explore. The challenger scores on all these parameters, but surprisingly continues to receive no traction.

With guaranteed revenues from the ever growing corporate market and almost 90% market share, the fruits of such labor remained the envy of everyone in the technology world. At least, that was the case till a couple of weeks back, when surprise, the giant was belittled. Did the CIOs suddenly realize the value of embracing the alternative and shun the “standard”? Have analysts become wiser, or did the company create a game changing product (or service) that swept the world off its feet?

We all know the answer; the new leader was created by the end consumer, not the corporate world. With the exception of a few industries that discovered its efficiencies, enterprise shops avoided these technology solutions, or allowed it at the fringes with multiple caveats, despite the pains of managing existing solutions.

With increasing consumerization of the end computing device, the future will displace the old and boring, though deemed standard and secure devices of today. Our personal choices indicate that there is a very small place for the past leader. The new hero of today has consumers raging upon every new innovation that has come from its stable.

Over the next few years, I believe that this rapidly growing mindshare will put pressure on IT organizations and the CIO to be inclusive of this trend rather than fight it. The only spanner in the works could be situations where the newfound success becomes an anchor round the neck—one which drags down the innovation pipeline or consumer connect that has become the hallmark for the industry. After all, market capitalization has limited (or null) correlation to customer satisfaction.