Many corporations make the mistake of focusing money and time only on improving their operations. Their focus is the bottom target. But unfortunately, they don’t see that such an approach is not conducive to positive business-customer relations. A happy customer is an essential part of success. The same holds true with business analysts.

As a business analysts focuses on finding the problem in a business, he automatically becomes a production manager. Regardless of the type of approach used, customer satisfaction is going to play a huge part in keeping the business afloat. One of the first steps to take is to improve customer-business relations by finding out what the customer wants. If the business analysts doesn’t factor in customer satisfaction, the plan will not be a successful one.

Feedback should be welcome and highly sought by the business analyst. He or she must understand just what the customer is wanting, even if they do not know themselves. The customer might be aware of what they would like to see in the end. They may know how they want something to run. The customer just may not know how to say it. He or she may collect data imperative to the project program. It is the business analyst’s job to determine if the data is even relevant. He or she is the facilitator of this process. He or she must have good customer relations skills. The business analyst must be able to relate to the customer in a way that the customer understands.

Putting the customer relationship first can be a daunting task at times. The bottom line is critical to success on any project. In cases when costs must be kept reasonable, the relationship with the customer will be a fine line. But customers can be kept happy with just a little extra in the budget dedicated to them.

Running reports and dedicating part of the spending to IT operations can seem easier and more profitable than spending money on customer satisfaction. The price any company could pay for this is a high one. The business analyst is no different. Customer satisfaction means keeping them informed of progress. Get on their same level. Ask customers to share with you what they feel you are doing wrong. No matter what approach you use, keeping open the line of communication with your customers will lead to successful growth. Those customers will continue to come back. This is the best thing you can do to increase the success of your business.

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If you have 90 minutes to spare, I have something that’s a great use of your time when it comes to expanding your understanding of the payoff of employee engagement and workplace team building activities.

Below is a video of our President’s presentation last month at an Entrepreneurial Roundtable hosted by the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

If you can’t see the video in your RSS reader, Cheap Accutane click here.

The presentation kicks off with our own Gaye van den Hombergh explaining why companies should care about creating great workplaces (starting at 7:30) and the qualities we see as critical to Winning Workplaces, along with some of the people practices used by winners of our 2010 Top Small Company Workplaces award, which were featured in the June issue of Inc. Magazine (starting at 29:00).

Starting at 44:00, Gaye led a panel featuring leaders of this year’s two Chicago area winners: Marvin Klein, Founder, PortionPac Chemical Corporation; and Tom Walter, President & CEO and Tasty Catering.  As you absorb the lessons learned and insights of these two leaders, consider their workplace culture practices, which I’ve listed below respectively, that have led them to success – even in this tough economy:

PortionPac

Selected workplace best practices:

• Offers personal and financial support for employees on a case by case basis
• "Front to Back Day"
• Offers experience to improve personal confidence and communication skills
• Employees have a high degree of autonomy

Business results:

• 2009 revenue up 7% from 2008
• Over the same period their competitors suffered double digit losses

Tasty Catering

Selected workplace best practices:

• Personal financial crisis fund fed into by employees
• Healthy free meals provided to staff on a daily basis
• If an employee comes up with idea and is willing to put in the effort, the company will help finance and support the endeavor

Business results:

• While sales fell in 2009 vs. 2008, it experienced only half the decrease of its industry and remains profitable
• High average employee tenure of 7.5 years

What are your takeaways from watching this video?

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