Technology is changing the world but not always for the better. In 2025, there will be more machines in the workforce than human beings. There are restaurants now that literally don’t have a human being employee.
Artificial intelligence will have the ability to do nearly any job currently being done by human beings, from lawyers to judges to nurses to doctors to driving to construction.
Technology is not the enemy. Using it to eliminate the human experience is.
For all the benefits it’s bringing to business, it’s coming at a significant cost: weaker human relationships that are vital to the customer experience, employee experience, and overall personal satisfaction.
WHY BUSINESSES LOSE CUSTOMERS
Today’s illiterate are those who don’t have the inherent people skills to know how to build rapport with others through no fault of their own. In fact, the top reasons businesses lose customers are unknowledgeable employees, unfriendly service, and bad employee attitudes.
The sad news is that companies don’t spend enough time training on soft skills. It’s not because they didn’t have the right technology or because their product was inferior that they’re losing their customers.
The good news is that those things could all be fixed not by changing your employees but by training them better. We can control those things. Companies just need to make sure they have the time and energy dedicated to doing that as well as an intentional training plan behind it (i.e. creating a Relationship Economy).
THE VITAL NEED FOR A RELATIONSHIP ECONOMY
The relationship economy is where the primary currency is the emotional connections made with customers, employees, and vendors. This results in your organization becoming the brand customers can’t live without and thus price is made irrelevant.
Companies can create the Professional Relationship Report Card that allows you to evaluate where your relationships are, which are the most important, and which ones you need to dedicate a little bit more time and energy to.
For more information and resources on The Relationship Economy, check out The Customer Service Revolution podcast. If you’d like to listen, head over to Episode 046: The Relationship Economy (Part 1).
