Service is good for business too, not just people
What the Service Profit Chain can teach you about building a business
I’m still playing around with what to publish the third week of each month. The first week is a longer-form essay. The second is a list of some sort to extend and apply the ideas of the first week. My working theory for third weeks is to highlight an idea/concept/person that offers additional perspective. The fourth week is a reflection and wrap up. Would love any feedback if that cadence is working!
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Without further ado - this week, I want to introduce you to the Service Profit Chain. This idea is deceptively simple, but one of its creators took it seriously enough that he left being a professor at HBS to become CEO of Harrah’s in order to help bring the ideas to life.
We’ve talked for the last couple of weeks about why a service orientation is good for you personally. But it’s more than that, it’s actually good business.
The key insight of this article (and a book of the same name) is that great service originates in how businesses serve their employees. James Heckert and others introduced in the 1990s a model known as the Service Profit Chain.
What their research indicated was that the best way to provide excellent service to your customers (and thereby drive repeat purchase, brand loyalty, brand recommendations, etc.) was the internal service you provided to your employees. If you take care of your employees, they will be more engaged and better positioned to take better care of your customers.
The concept is deceptively simple (and maybe even sounds self-obvious). But it has critical implications. Considered thoughtfully, it should push you, whatever your role, to consider how you are taking care of your internal people as well as your external ones. This is true whether you are a supervisor, executive, or board member.
If you want to learn more - these two pieces are great and go into a lot more detail.