Who is responsible for the success of clients?
The easiest answer is that the entire team is responsible for the success of our clients.
The harder question to ask is: who is building the processes of accountability and feedback for the organization to prepare for scaling?
These past six months, I have been heading the first and second iteration of Recruiting Experiences’ Client Success Journey with a team of five of my colleagues. Our CEO and Founder, Amy, gave me this chance to show off my project management skills only 3 months into my professional career which is a chance that very few have so early on. This was the perfect opportunity for me to exercise the side of my brain that loves putting order to chaos. This project consists of many moving parts such as problem-solving, innovation, data collection, documentation, and implementation.
Defining our Goals
After a long brainstorming session, I identified three categories needing the most attention to build the foundation for our client journey.
These categories were documentation, data collection, and internal data tracking. Each category was two-sided, spanning both internal and external facing aspects to be created. From there, I broke down what should be created in our first iteration based on the gaps seen by our CEO, our Director of Talent, and various client-facing team members.
By the end of brainstorming and creation with the rest of our Client Journey team, we had managed to create 10 documents for our expanding internal document library. This consists of 5 surveys for feedback on our services under data collection, 4 new internal data points for internal tracking and business development conversations, and 1 presentation summarizing it all.
First Results
Some of the identifiable ways that these new deliverables have changed how we operate as an organization include:
- Receiving our first formal client feedback on our various services – feedback which allowed us to pivot for future client work
- Documenting processes to change common conversations with clients into an opportunity for growth
- Involving all team members in the client success feedback process grew a level of excitement surrounding what comes next
An example of a piece of feedback we received after the release of our first version was that our last offering of our Talent Acquisition Certification Course lacked information on a specific topic that we covered. Also, other topics were said to give too much information. From there we were able to edit the course materials to focus on topics that customers identified as those that they needed more time on. We also gained time back by decreasing the amount of material on topics where too much time was spent. This will help us improve the next offering of our course starting next month.
Why focus on Client Success?
There are many things that can come out of a client success plan depending on what your organization is focusing on at the time. Our plan focused on two key pieces: Feedback and Accountability. Our organization specifically needed to focus here in order to shape our processes as a service partner. Recruiting Experiences works as an extension of our client’s brand to provide great experiences for our candidates, our vision shapes the way we gather data.
Feedback is necessary for our work to pivot and change as it is a relationship-based service. By asking for a client’s feedback, you are showing them that their voice is valued in deciding your organizational processes. You are also gaining insight into what their needs and expectations may be for future services.
Accountability is more internal facing. Team accountability to standards for customer interactions is critical to creating manageable milestones for each client and project. This allows for proper expectation-setting and sets the stage for what our clients can expect during our time working together. Accountability and documentation create the dual effect of solidifying a process for our recruiters to follow as well as creating a process to onboard new team members.
So, What’s Next?
As we move forward, we will be editing our processes as we find hiccups and or pivots based on our client’s feedback each quarter. We will also be starting the process of integrating our sales and client success data as each rely on one another as a continuous cycle.
Want More Info?
If you are thinking about building a client success program for your start-up, please feel free to reach out to us at Recruiting Experiences, and we can connect you with those that were instrumental in helping us shape our first version!
If you enjoyed this blog, you might like another blog we have about the recruiters influence on the hiring process : https://www.recruitingexperiences.com/what-is-the-recruiters-influence-on-the-hiring-process/
