Nearly 200 employees of more than 35 Allianz companies worldwide gathered in Frankfurt on June 26-28 to tackle a number of important issues surrounding the company's group-wide Customer Focus Initiative.The Customer Focus Initiative (CFI) is a systematic effort to learn more about Allianz's customers needs and expectations and convert this learning to tangible product, service and process improvements. The global program, launched in 2005, is a part of Allianz's overall aim to achieve sustainable profitable growth for the Allianz Group. One important metric for gauging improvement is customer loyalty.

Allianz uses Net Promoter Score (NPS) to measure customer loyalty by asking them if they are willing to recommend Allianz to friends and colleagues.NPS entails not only surveying customers immediately after the customer has had contact with an Allianz representative, but also following-up with a second in-depth interview to find out just why a customer would or would not recommend Allianz. The feedback is then used to improve the customer experience.

By the end of 2006, over 30 Allianz subsidiaries worldwide were using the top-down approach of the Net Promoter Score for external benchmarking against market peers. These Allianz companies represent approximately 80 percent of Allianz Group's gross written premiums.

Opening the conference, Allianz SE board member and CFI sponsor, Jan Carendi clearly stated that Allianz must improve its customer loyalty rating (NPS) in many markets. "Being as good as your peer or market average simply isn't good enough. I can have one foot in the refrigerator and one foot in the oven and that would make the result average. But it's not a nice state to be in!", he reinforced with participants. "But seriously, if your customers are not willing to recommend your company, you simply will not grow sustainably compared to overall market growth.

Carendi continued, "Loyal customers stay with Allianz longer, buy more than one product and recommend our company to others." Yet, Carendi also pointed out, every company must find a balance between profitability and meeting customers' needs. The solution, he said, is to bring about "value innovation". This is achieved by increasing the value of a product or service for the customer at a lower expense to the company. "We have to add value where our customers want value, and eliminate features that are not wanted or needed."

CFI global program leader Chuck Kavitsky, who is President of Allianz of America, underlined another common business misconception surrounding efficiency targets. "Efficiency cannot be the first and only objective. The 'voice of business' and the 'voice of the customer' must be in balance. The voice of business is the voice heard most. Yet, if you are purely rational, you can't make an emotional connection with the customer which, without a doubt, determines a company's success over the long-term," Kavitsky said.

To illustrate his point, he cited a typical call center routing example. This is when a customer dials a service number and an automated operator leads him through a menu of choices. The "business voice" says to list each menu choice based on the frequency of that kind of call. For example, if notifying the company about a customer's change of address is most frequent, then that choice should be first on the menu. On the other hand, calls to report an accident are less frequent. The "business voice" says to put that choice at the bottom of the menu.

Kavitsky: "Now imagine how a customer would feel, if he just had a car accident and wants to report it, but first he must go through the entire menu before he can speak to a company representative?" He concluded, "Customer focus is all about seeing the people as well as the numbers."

Vicente Tardío, chairman and CEO of Allianz's Spanish subsidiary Allianz Seguros, demonstrated in his presentation that efficiency and customer satisfaction really can go hand-in-hand. Between 1998 and 2006, Allianz Seguros managed to cut its internal expenses by roughly fifty percent while significantly increasing its total number of customers. "We are convinced that efficiency and customer focus are complementary. An inefficient company cannot be customer focused. Inefficiency in itself means a lot of red tape, which is never in the interest of the customer," he said.

Over the last years, Allianz Seguros introduced several ways to simplify processes, many of them technology-based. "For example, we are working on a number of SMS services to inform our customers, via mobile phone, of important transactions, such as when a loss adjustment has been completed and the repair shop can begin repairing the car." The company also grants customers, agents and other business partners access to some applications that Allianz Seguros employees work with. This way, all stakeholders have fast, online access to contract and other important information.

The notion that automation inevitably leads to less customer satisfaction is a myth, according to Tardío. As a result of such services, the company's NPS has increased continuously over the last years. Tardío commented: "Automation is not the key – simplicity is the key. The IT department is a means, not a reason. IT just makes things more simple in many parts of an organization."

As another key part of the conference, participants attended a selection of more than 40 internal workshops dedicated to various aspects of customer focus, from the human resources angle to the economics of customer focus, to complaint management, service recovery and beyond.

"The workshops, led by participants from Allianz companies using the CFI tools, are a key means of translating the customer focus framework into concrete actions that our companies can use to improve service and customer satisfaction," explained Markus Schroeder, head of CFI global program management. 

Michael Diekmann, CEO of Allianz SE, said to conference participants: "CFI gives Allianz a common language and holistic framework for understanding the customer and implementing action to address their needs. It is more than data in a table. It is a change process designed to shift the organization towards the customer. You are our change agents, responsible for driving the concrete initiatives that ensure Allianz becomes Loyalty Leader in our peer markets by 2010. This is our challenge, and I will only be pleased when we achieve it."


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