Strategic discussions on what matters most to our clients
Coen Huesmann shares how Voice of Our Clients (VOC) conversations and insights provide a global radar that enables upfront discussions with clients to understand their challenges and what matters most to them.
The VOC program is an opportunity to have authentic conversations with C-level client executives. These one-on-one conversations allow us to take a step back from our daily projects to discuss strategic topics that are important and relevant to our clients.?
What differentiates VOC conversations is their personalized and in-depth nature. These are open and frank conversations between leaders based on a relationship of trust, which makes them extremely valuable.?
Two-way sharing of insights?
This is not a one-way activity. Based on these discussions, we build a comprehensive view of the trends and developments in the market and the priorities that our clients are currently setting. And every year, we go back to our clients to share this aggregated view of insights gathered from all our conversations.
Our clients see a lot of value in these VOC readouts because of both the volume and quality of insights we gather from business and IT executives across industries, sub-industries and the geographies we serve. In 2022, we spoke with close to 1,700 client executives. The depth and scale of the resulting insights provide a comprehensive picture of what’s happening in the market.
Uncovering new topics and insights
On a daily basis, I work closely with the heads of operations and with the heads of operational technology (OT) within manufacturing organizations. Most of our daily conversations are on a particular topic or are project-related. As part of the VOC program, I pivot to speaking with C-suite executives to discuss their long-term strategy and the external factors influencing their priorities.
In most conversations, one of the first questions clients ask is: “How are other companies managing that, or what is their view on this topic?”
VOC helps us have strategic discussions with our clients. It’s also a starting point to have conversations on new topics that we may not have in our daily interactions. For example, I was talking to the COO of a manufacturing client about the growing shortage of skilled IT resources. While this may not be a standard topic for a COO, it prompted an open and honest discussion about the company’s lack of skilled IT talent and how they were having internal discussions about outsourcing certain activities. The COO suggested I speak to the CIO to discuss this topic further, which opened up a series of new conversations where we can help the client.?
Our clients find real value in knowing that we understand their challenges and what matters most to them.
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Macroeconomic trends and cross-industry learnings
VOC conversations help our clients pinpoint their challenges and identify gaps that may require a strategic focus. In fact, in most conversations, one of the first questions clients ask is: “How are other companies managing that, or what is their view on this topic?” This is especially true around macroeconomic trends such as the global energy crisis, a top concern for European manufacturers.?
Recently, our global manufacturing lead, Helena Jochberger and I had a very interesting conversation with one of our manufacturing clients in the Netherlands on this topic and how it’s affecting their ecosystem. This led to a discussion on environmental, social and governance (ESG) strategies and the client’s goal to ensure safe working conditions for their personnel. The challenge they face is gathering data since they work with multiple layers of subcontractors.?
Our clients find real value in knowing that we understand their challenges and what matters most to them.
We shared insights on how the defense and aerospace industries collaborate in the Catena-X program (a collaborative, open data ecosystem for the automotive industry). Our client was immediately interested in understanding how they could build such a data ecosystem to get the right kind of data to make informed decisions about the health and safety of their employees.
Similarly, another large manufacturing client wants to make significant investments in recycling concepts but is finding it difficult to get the right data to support their plans. We used our VOC findings to provide examples of how other industries are approaching this challenge, triggering a valuable discussion on the subject.
Learn more about how the VOC program can help you gain insights you can act on
Every year, CGI leaders meet with business and IT executives to gather their perspectives on the trends affecting their enterprises. These industry insights - including the attributes of digital leaders - lead to actions to best satisfy the needs of your customers and citizens.
Voice of Our Clients gathers our clients’ perspectives on the trends affecting their enterprises. Learn more about the?VOC program .
More insights from leaders around the world
Several CGI leaders and experts around the world share the value the VOC program brings to their clients in this article series:
Director of Business Capability @ Philips | Business Metrics, Process Improvement, Lean
1 年Love this Coen Huesmann. Helping leaders see the industry trends is sometime the easy (pull), however helping them to see at the gemba the key changes needed to transition is the hard (push) part. Customer needs to successful outcomes is such an important skill to help leaders navigate towards the decisions they need to take.
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