“Your customers cannot be more happy than your employees” continues to be my all-time favourite quote. Another version of the same quote is “if your employees are happy, your customers will be happy”. However, I don’t see many business leader focussed on building an employee-centric organization, building a culture which focus on the well-being and growth of the employees, especially in the small and mid-sized businesses. That “employees are our biggest assets” remains more in words than in actions.

If your objective as a business leader is to build a customer-centric organization, you should first look to build an employee-centric organization. Do your employees relate to the organization purpose ? Do they believe that they are part of something worthwhile ? Have you built a “shared vision” with them ? Do they understand the strategy fully, to the extent that it helps them make ground level decisions fast and with clarity to serve the customers ? Do they have a clear understanding of the expectations management has from them ? Do they have the necessary tools for executing their jobs effectively and efficiently ? Are their goals clearly defined ? Do they feel as if they belong to the organization ? Has someone mapped their talent and competencies to the best opportunities available within the organization ? Do they get recognized and praised for the contributions they make, not once a year but regularly ? Does the organization invest in their training and development ? Are they being assigned more challenging and bigger assignments as their skills improve or they learn new skills ? Are they also growing as the organization grows ? Do their opinions count, or they have to do what the boss tells them to do ? And many more such questions.

If the answer to majority of these questions is yes in your organization, then you can be very sure that you have a productive, engaged and motivated workforce which will keep your customers happy who will keep coming back to the organization for more.

– Avinash Bhandari