A Case Study of the HR Department at Swiss Bank Corporation

Abstract

Responding to the needs of customers has always been the motto of organizations seeking to do well in the marketplace. Customer com ment, however, on the quality ofgoods and services in the U.S. suggests that many organizations have not been as successful or as steadfast in living up to that motto as they might have been. This may be because doing it is so difficult, time-consuming and never-ending. It may also be due in some cases to organizations just not knowing how to do it effectively. In reality, it is probably a combination of both: a lack ofmotivation and a lack of skill. Today the call for responding to the needs of customers has never been greater for U.S. companies. Companies thatdo respond effectively are likely to be the ones most successful But responding to the needs ofcustomers is easier said than done. Responding to the customer requires attention to both process and content issues. Employees need to have both the motivation and the skill to be customer focused. Increasingly, responding effectively to the external customer also requires that units within the organization treat each other as customers. Thus, companies must be customer focused, both intern ally and externally. Only by doing both can they add value to their products, either through quality enhancement or innovation. But responding to the customer and adding value is a very complex process even for just one unit in an organization, to say nothing of the entire organization. This will be illustrated with a case study of how the Human Resource department at one company became responsive to the needs of its customers. By becoming responsive to the needs of its customers, the HR department came to be accepted as a more strategic player. What this HR department did and is doing is a microcosm of the phenomenon of customerizing that can be done by any department and any organization seeking to be customer focused and to add value for its customers.