Dr Jochen Wirtz, Professor of Marketing at National University of Singapore, is one of the speakers at CTF 30th Anniversary held on October 6th at Karlstad University in Sweden.
What will you talk about on October 6th?
- The talk will focus on how to turn around a failing service organization, something I call a ”Service Revolution”. I will cover four important thrusts that have to be done right topics on (1) Service Leadership, and Values, Purpose and Vision; (2) Service Culture and Training; (3) Service Innovation & Differentiation; and (4) Measurement, Incentive & Feedback.
In addition, I will discuss four rules for an effective service revolution that many organizations get wrong; they are: Rule #1: Don’t start with customer-facing employees. Instead, involve everyone, with a special focus on internal service providers. Rule #2: Don’t start by training people on specific service skills, scripts and procedures. Instead, educate them first to a better understanding of what service excellence really means. Rule #3: Don’t pilot the change. Instead, go big and go fast to build momentum for the new culture. Rule #4: Don’t focus on traditional KPIs during the service revolution. Instead, focus on leading “revolution indicators” (to generate value-adding ideas and new service actions.
What does CTF mean to you?
- I have been a proud International Fellow at CTF since 2011. CTF’s service research has always been more creative, innovative, and more holistic in scope than much of the main-stream academic research. It is important for the service research community to have CTF ask these important but difficult questions and encourage research on them. CTF has made great contributions in this field! It is great to see CTF to be so closely aligned with industry and public sector organizations. It makes its research not just rigorous from an academic perspective, but also highly relevant for management practice.
What type of research, do you think, CTF should focus on in the future?
- CTF is already focusing on this field, but I think service innovation in the broadest sense will be critical for any organization at the micro level, and for entire economies from the macro level. We need to understand better how to work with these many emerging revolutionary technologies and platforms, ranging from robotics, sensors, Internet of Things, artificial intelligence, mobile technology, geo tagging, big data, analytics, autonomous driving, many new types of platform-based business models, and many more. I feel that we are reaching an inflection point where new services and productivity gains start the service revolution where we will be able to deliver quality service at scale, low cost and enabled through new technology and innovation.
Time and place for CTF 30th Anniversary
Thursday October 6. All seminars will be held between 10-17 in Aula Magna at Karlstad University, Sweden. Parts of the Program will be held in Swedish. The day is free och charge but registration is required.
Read the program and register for the event here
Prof. Jochen Wirtz, a Professor of Marketing at the National University of Singapore (NUS). Dr Wirtz holds a Ph.D. in services marketing from the London Business School. His research focuses on service marketing and management, and he has published over 200 academic articles, book chapters and industry reports (incl. five features in Harvard Business Review). His over 10 books include Services Marketing – People, Technology, Strategy (World Scientific, 8th edition, 2016) and Essentials of Services Marketing (Pearson Education, 3rd edition, 2016), both co-authored with Professor Lovelock. With translations and adaptations for over 26 countries and regions, and combined sales of some 800,000 copies, they have become globally leading services marketing text books. His other books include Winning in Service Markets: Success Through People, Technology and Strategy (World Scientific, 2016), and Flying High in a Competitive Industry: Secrets of the World’s Leading Airline (co-authored with Heracleous and Pangarkar, McGraw Hill, 2009).
