I worked in Finance for several years before my unexpected transition into the world of Customer Experience.
In this short post I share why I’m so glad I did.
I only went to University in my early 20s
Unlike many of my peers, I only started university in my early 20s.
That’s because my father – who was in the military – was assigned to Guam – and he and my Mom invited me to come along for the experience.
And it was a marvelous experience – I ended up living there for over two years.
In Guam I worked in a dive shop – there’s great scuba diving in that region – and also as a lifeguard at the US Navy bases there.
I even enrolled in my first accounting class at the University of Guam and found I really enjoyed it.
Sadly I lost my University of Guam t-shirt long ago.
When I returned to California to enter university, I chose a major in management accounting – and after graduation, I worked in Finance for the first six years of my career.
Eventually working my way up to VP, Finance for a big US direct marketing company.
I learned more than just numbers – I learned how senior people think
Working in that discipline taught me the language of business – budgets, operational metrics, trade-offs, forecasts & financial analysis.
And I learned how senior management thinks and talks as they’re making business decisions.
When you’re in Finance you are regularly invited into closed door discussions – whether about a potential merger, a planned layoff, triage on a poor performing division and the like.
You see how decisions are made.
When I worked in accounting at the J Paul Getty Museum – the world’s richest museum – I was brought into meetings where discussions took place how to achieve certain margins, what projects needed to be reduced in order to fund other projects and how initiatives were prioritized.
I saw it even more starkly when I left the non-profit world of the Getty and moved up in Finance in the for-profit world.
Then I moved to the ‘Customer’ world
I ended up shifting from the world of Finance to the world of Customer Experience unexpectedly.
That happened in the early 90s when the CEO at Heartland Music – where I worked as VP, Finance – asked if I would take over the role of VP, Call Center & Distribution Operations when the earlier operations head resigned.
And I said yes – which changed my life.
But even in my Customer work to this day, I’m thinking about what delivers value to both the Customer and the business.
Profit, revenues, margins and the like are not bad words.
It’s been gratifying to see segments of people shift their business thinking from NPS scores and sentiment to how their work impacts their business.
I like to be described as commercial
A couple of years ago, I took it as a great compliment when a global Service Head described me in a testimonial as being commercially-minded.
Especially as he’s one of the most Employee & Customer-centric people I’ve ever met.
Question: Why do people think you can’t be Customer or Employee oriented and business oriented at the same time?
I’ve seen firsthand the kind of pressure senior people are under to deliver results. And those results manifest eventually in the financial statements and figures.
Empathy matters.
But empathy and business acumen together?
I think that’s a powerful combination.
https://www.omnitouchinternational.com/credibility-the-proof-behind-the-cx-promise/
Thank you for reading!
Thanks for reading — and for caring about the craft of CX.
If you’re working to build credibility and influence in your role, I’d love to connect.
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Daniel Ord
[email protected] / www.omnitouchinternational.com
