Session 106: This Isn't What We Meant! Setting and Managing Expectations
Wednesday, November 18 at 10:00 AM
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One of the biggest challenges service providers face is in setting and then managing customer. When delivery fails to meet expectations, customers can become frustrated and angry, leading to strained relationships, eroded trust, escalating demands, and calls for discounts or penalty payments. And what about our suppliers, end users, and even our own colleagues?
Without properly set expectations, customers and colleagues may have an unrealistic view of what should be delivered and how. They will make demands that cannot, or sometimes even should not, be met. So what can be done? In this session, we will discuss the sources of expectations and how to discover them, assumptions versus contracted commitments, and service level management versus service level agreement. Attendees will come away from this session with an understanding of:
• The nature and sources of expectations, both real and perceived
• How to discover customer expectations
• How to apply the principle of mutually beneficial relationships
• The difference between assumptions and contracted commitments