So much is being said about the future of healthcare being “customer-centric” or “patient focused.” After all, in the business of healthcare, the patient is the customer, right? And if we are going to build a true retail mindset in healthcare, shouldn’t the patient come first? I think the answer is No. Those that should come first are our own employees, because you cannot build customer loyalty unless your own people have developed the passion and commitment to get you there.

In the June issue of Harvard Business Journal, a study showed that "If you invest in improving your employees' view of your firm's corporate character, those positive attitudes will rub off and boost customers' opinions of the company. That will drive growth. It sounds simple, but too many organizations focus on what customers think - to the exclusion of what employees think.”

In field interviews with 4,700 customers and employees of 63 businesses, it was determined that “service companies are on average more likely to be growing if employees' opinions of the company are better than customers." In one story, a department store refurbished at great cost, but found no impact on sales. They found that the renovation had done nothing for staff members; the restrooms were still drab and the stockrooms were smaller than before.

What does this mean for those of us in healthcare? We are doing a great job of adding valet parking and Wi-Fi to our locations and we are working diligently to improve our patient satisfaction scores. But what we should really be focused on is our own people, making sure they are satisfied and empowered and have the tools and resources to do their jobs. The customers will come.

I recently conducted a webinar for the American College of Healthcare Executives. The topic was "Maximizing Customer Service to Drive Revenue" and I joined Britt Berrett, CEO of Medical City in Dallas, to describe his customer service initiatives and the resulting increase in the hospital's bottom line. Prior to the webinar, I took the opportunity to survey the attendees to get their perceptions on several related questions. I found the results quite enlightening. I first asked them how they rated the impact of consumerism on their patient and marketing strategies. On a scale of 1-10, the average score was 7.5, indicating that the impact of consumerism is fairly substantial. I then asked these organizations to rate their senior leadership's understanding of the impact of customer service in improving financial results. The average in this case was 7.7, indicating a very high understanding of the relationship between customer service and revenue growth.

However, on the question of how they'd rate their organization's ability to track the ROI of an improvement in their customer service focus, they rated themselves a 4.9. What does that tell us? While organizations are finally realizing that customer service is a competitive advantage, we're still not good at measuring the financial impact.

At The Beryl Institute, we will be publishing only evidence-based data that illustrates the financial impact of an improvement in the customer experience. We hope you continue to find this information useful as we strive toward our mission of improving customer service in healthcare.