The 2009 Net Promoter Conference is just 3 weeks away, and I wanted to highlight a couple of the sessions that were added during December.
With all the recent news of corporate restructuring and expense controls, many employees and managers feel pretty beaten up. These sessions provide a dose of good medicine for what ails us...they are about keeping your employees engaged and motivated in the task of delivering excellent customer experiences.
For those of you in the telecommunications sector, we are pleased to have Lindsay Notwell of Verizon Wireless joining us. Lindsay is responsible for NPS at Verizon, and when I discussed his session with him, he was passionate about the impact Net Promoter has had on their employees. He pointed out that when customers start to describe why they love a particular service rep, and that feedback actually makes it back to the employee, it has a huge motivational impact. I'm sure Lindsay will have many more suggestions to share about how they are making this work at Verizon.
Verizon has earned a reputation in its industry as a loyalty leader. Dr. Vince Nowinski will touch on Verizon's strong performance in his presentation about WOM economics. Vince and his team are completing a whitepaper that will be available soon on WOM in the cellular phone industry, to add to their recent publications on the same topic for computer hardware and credit cards.
Another session I'm looking forward to is the panel discussion on Day 2 on "Making a Habit of Customer-Focused Behaviors." Dr. Laura Brooks will host this discussion with three companies that are pushing the envelope in the area of cultural transformation. The companies are from different industries, but all are highlighted as case studies in Dr. Brook's new book with Richard Owen called Answering the Ultimate Question.
Laura will be joined by Aisling Hassell of Symantec, who has been using Net Promoter for several years now across a global organization with both B2B and B2C customer relationships. Symantec is now actively measuring employee NPS and using a broad range of engagement strategies with its employees and management team. We will also hear from Diana Dykstra of San Francisco Fire Credit Union, whose focus on service and culture change has earned them Net Promoter Scores in the 75%+ range. The panel is rounded out by Laura DeSoto of Experian, who delivered the opening keynote at our first Net Promoter Conference in New York back in January of 2007. Experian has used many innovative engagement and training strategies to improve the employees' "line of sight" to the customer in their daily work.
Finally, I should remind everyone that Fred Reichheld will answer questions from the audience on Day 1. If you are registered, watch for an email this week to submit your questions for Fred.
