Former director of cleaning company now advisor of INPRC: “Data driven for cleaning”
Hans Westerveld, former director of Westerveld cleaning company (now part of Vegebo Cleaning Services) is now an advisor of technology company INPRC. In an interview with Service Management earlier this year, he explains the opportunities that technology offers to his industry to increase revenue and achieve a healthy margin.
“Although our cleaning company scored high in customer satisfaction, we were not always able to carry out the work programs we’d agreed on. The reasons were numerous: lack of attention from managers and directors, employees who did not show up for work, failure to carry out low periodic cleaning work, time loss due to late arrival or early departure, lack of professional training and on-site instruction, expert supervision, and so on. Naturally, we lost customers because of this.”
Outsourcing became a point of focus
“The relationship between the client and the contractor came under even more pressure when ‘Output control (the so-called result-oriented contract)’ became the magic word. It became something like: ‘we’re done with it’ and ‘experts are now doing the work in which we are not good ourselves’.”
Low grade in customer satisfaction? You’re in trouble!
“No matter how you carried out the service, as long as customer satisfaction scored a grade of 6.5 or 7, you were okay. Lower? Then you’re in trouble! Usually with a discount on your invoice and/or termination of the contract. In retrospect, these were all short-term reflexes.”
“Nowadays, it has become clear that business and professional contract management based on reliable and objective data is not only useful, but even necessary. The vicious circle reasoning will never be broken otherwise. The unnecessary bankruptcy of a contract based solely on output control (and therefore without knowledge of the facts about ‘how and why’) does not contribute to fruitful contract management. Let alone a sustainable relationship…”
Read the complete article here.