HumanSigma

Distributors sell your products and services like employees, yet have needs and demands like customers. It's a complex relationship -- but the best suppliers treat them like partners.

The airline is asking fliers to pay more for preferred status. Will this cause customer engagement to take off? Or leave regular fliers feeling stranded?

Bank products and services are nearly identical all over the world. Krungsri Bank decided to stand out by making things simpler for customers -- and making that change was no easy task.

Only engaged workers can engage customers, Gallup has found. But they can't do it if they don't know how to become "ambassadors" for the company's brand.

Distributors aren't really employees. Nor are they customers -- they're more like partners. Gallup has found that companies can get the most out of these crucial relationships. Here's how.

Fostering the deep -- and potentially profitable -- emotional connection between a company's employees and its customers must be central to what every leader thinks about every single day.

"Sometimes change requires an earth-shattering or disruptive act." So say the authors of Human Sigma. But the kind of organizational change they are calling for -- however disruptive it might feel while it is happening -- is ultimately positive for employees and customers.

In the past year alone, more than 100 American banks have been taken over by the FDIC. But not WSFS, a regional, 41-office financial services company. In fact, while other banks are selling off assets, WSFS is gaining market share. Here's how.

There's one number executives need to know -- one figure leaders should focus on -- that can greatly improve their organization's financial performance. It's the HumanSigma metric, and it measures the interaction between employees and their customers at the local business unit level.

Cost curtailment and downsizing aren't the only approaches to remaining viable in this relentlessly sluggish economy, according to Gallup research. Companies can focus on optimizing the human element of their business by engaging their staff and customers, says the coauthor of Human Sigma.

"Think globally, act locally." Microbiologist Rene Dubos' famous quote applies directly to Gallup's HumanSigma science: A business can achieve consistent performance improvement and sustainable growth when it focuses its energy on managing the employee-customer interactions at the local level.

Emotion frames the employee-customer encounter. This is the second rule of HumanSigma management, and Alegent Health applied it to create a culture that emotionally engages its employees and customers. The result has been greater performance in the metrics that matter most.

All companies do things like pay close attention to standard business measures and train their employees. But this luxury brand watches things that most companies ignore, then uses what it learns to create ongoing, top-to-bottom learning.

Organizations can't measure and manage employee and customer experiences as separate entities. This is the first rule of HumanSigma. Here's how two very different companies -- ASB Bank and Waste Management, Inc. -- applied the rule to make their businesses more productive and profitable.

Nova Southeastern University in Florida has gone to vast lengths to build its brand, in much the same way a successful business would. Here's how the school applied management practices commonly used in corporations and governmental organizations to its brand-building effort.

Employee and customer engagement are leading indicators of financial performance. The authors of Human Sigma: Managing the Employee-Customer Encounter explain.

The authors of Human Sigma: Managing the Employee-Customer Encounter tell why people are the fulcrum of profitability and why it's tempting to replace workers with machines -- and why you really, really shouldn't.

When evaluating and developing employees, managers must distinguish what’s innate in them (talent) from what can be changed or acquired (knowledge and skills). The authors of Human Sigma: Managing the Employee-Customer Encounter dig deeper into this crucial distinction.

Executives cannot legislate a high-performing work environment with just mission statements. Engagement must grow organically, one workgroup at a time.