The Business Case for Actually Caring
by Bruce Kasanoff
Are you fed up with what passes for compassion in business? Too often, companies only pretend to care as long as there is a chance you might give them money.
I spent almost 20 years working on customer-focused business strategies, from one-to-one marketing and CRM to customer experience. As anyone who works in these spaces knows, much of what leaders say about their devotion to customers is empty words.
The same goes for employee engagement. Some companies simultaneously declare record profits, have employee engagement programs, and lay off thousands of employees. How’s this for an effective business strategy? “If we don’t decide to fire you this quarter, we’d love you to be more motivated than ever.”
So excuse me if this sounds absolutely wild and crazy, but let’s explore what might happen if leaders actually cared about their customers, employees, employee families, and local communities…
I’m not talking about the sort of caring that involves a CEO getting up at a meeting and tossing out some platitudes. I’m talking about caring in the form of true empathy and concern. Think: give up your Sunday to help a neighbor build their barn. Even better: forego your bonus so you can avoid firing co-workers.
Instead of launching sales forces at prospects like missiles at a target, companies could deploy sales professionals who actually care as much about helping as they do about selling. Would this result in fewer sales? No, in the long run it would generate more revenues.
Instead of moving sales staff around like interchangeable checkers, what if companies recognized the value of human relationships and allowed sales professionals to continue covering the accounts with whom they have built the strongest ties?
Many companies are obsessed with “customer satisfaction” surveys. If you’ve ever bought a new car, you’ve probably endured a lecture from your salesperson saying that in a few weeks you would be receiving a call from the manufacturer about your experience and that anything less than a perfect rating would cause his dealership to be embarrassed. What this really means is: we don’t really want to know how you feel, we just want to look good.
If you actually cared about a customer, you wouldn’t hire a call center in Omaha to call that person. You’d stay in touch yourself. This applies not just to the sales rep, but also to the general manager.
I’d like to suggest that our business world has become so cynical and disassociated from reality that actually caring sounds like a radical strategy. It’s not; it’s common sense.
In an interesting paper, “Compassion in Organizational Life,” the authors observe that “organizational compassion involves a set of social processes in which noticing, feeling, and responding to pain among a set of organizational members. To be shared, and so become collective within an organization, each of these processes must be legitimated and propagated, responding must also coordinated.”
To translate this into simpler English, it means:
Notice when something is wrong, or someone is in pain.
Be empathetic. Feel for them. Understand what they are going through.
Do something about it. Respond in a positive and proactive manner.
The authors are talking about pain within an organization, but I’d argue this same approach can be harnessed to drive compassion for any type of stakeholder. But compassion won’t become a powerful force in an organization’s culture unless it becomes a driving force behind the leaders’ strategy.
Many leaders will argue they already do care, and that such caring is already part of their culture. 80% of the time, that’s nonsense… just ask anyone who works there.
Caring means being there for someone when times are tough. It means making sacrifices for a relationship that matters to you.
Caring does not mean: trying to be nice unless that becomes inconvenient or expensive.
I’m trying to stress the incredible power of leading a company that is passionate about others. Yes, you can generate profits from being selfish and self-obsessed. But you can generate more profits by actually caring about others.
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