It’s true that each company has unique CX needs. It’s equally true that CX needs change over time. If you’ve discovered gaps in your CX team, what can you do to fill them?
It’s been said that nothing stands still – it either moves forward or is left behind. When it comes to keeping CX skills sharp, the same idea applies. You can grow, or your can fall behind. Naturally, human-centric organizations want their customer experience to meet customer needs. But how can organizations sustainably increase their CX skills?
For CX practitioners, increasing your professional skills requires perseverance and prioritization. The process is a little more complex for organizations, but there are several ways you can temporarily or permanently boost your CX capabilities:
- Hire a freelancer.
- Onboard a new employee.
- Train or reskill current employees.
- Lease a CX team.
- Partner with CX consultants.
We’ll talk about the pros and cons of each of these options. But before you even think about hiring anyone, it’s important to clarify your organization’s CX needs.
Take Stock: What Do You Need?
Before you make any decisions on growing your company’s CX skills, we recommend doing a quick inventory of your current CX capabilities, goals, and objectives. Ask questions like:
- What problems are you having?
- What problems do you expect the new person/team to solve?
- What do you want this person/team to do for your CX?
- What organizational goals will they support?
- Who will they work with? Who will they report to?
- What will CX success look like?
This is also a good time to think about how you connect with customers. Start with questions like these …
- What channels do you use to interact with customers?
- What software/platforms/tools do you use?
- What data do you have available?
… and fill in the details of your organization’s CX environment as you go.
Knowing the answers to both sets of questions will help you clarify your expectations for the incoming CX talent. You’ll be in a better position to understand what CX growth options to pursue and any candidates you interview will be better informed about your CX landscape.
Now that you have an understanding of your needs, let’s explore the options you have for filling them.
5 Ways to Grow Your Organization’s CX Capabilities
1. Hire a Freelancer
Freelance CX experts are a great and cost-effective way to quickly fill a need in your company – especially if you only need help in one area or for a limited time. Depending on your locality, freelancers can save you money compared to traditional hires; the freelancer may be responsible for their own insurance, equipment costs, taxes, etc. (Always check your local regulations to determine what constitutes freelance work and what your company is responsible for.)
On the other hand, it can be time-consuming and frustrating to find a reliable freelancer that understands your needs. A freelancer’s availability may also be limited; most freelancers have multiple clients at any given time.
Overall, we’d recommend hiring a freelancer when you need temporary help on a large initiative. A freelancer can also be great if you only need their skills a few hours per week or in one very specific area.
2. Onboard a New Employee
Traditionally, this has been the path most businesses take to expand their CX skills. It makes sense if you want someone to really buy into your team and its success. It’s also a great way to quickly add strategic insight, research and analysis capabilities, or whatever your CX team needs.
The downside is that hiring a new employee is notoriously expensive. And while it’s a faster route to expertise than upskilling or re-skilling current employees, there’s no guarantee that the new hire will fit into your organization – or stick around for long.
Let’s have a quick reality check. If you have a long list of CX needs, it’s unlikely that one person will fill them all; you may need to hire multiple people.
A new hire can be the right path if you understand what skills you need and how you’ll fit the newcomer into your current team. However, new hires are expensive. Don’t forget the time you’ll need to search out and onboard the new employee.
3. Train or Reskill Current Employees
It’s no surprise that successful enterprises tend to hire and promote from inside their organization. They know this employee understands their organization and its culture. They also know how motivated the employee is to grow professionally.
Training employees in CX isn’t a quick fix, though. It can be expensive and time-consuming, often requiring expert-led programs and learning sessions. But if you’re looking towards the future and you don’t mind playing a longer game, upskilling employees can be very effective.
This option comes with an option of its own. You can train one person or team in CX as discussed. Or you can make various teams responsible for aspects of CX, with one department taking the lead in overall CX management. Check out our case study Developing A Company-Wide CX Mindset – Without a CX Team to see how one company accomplished this.
If your company CX is too much for one person to handle – yet not enough to support a full team – CX training across teams can be the right solution.
4. Lease a CX Team
In team leasing, you can effectively hire a complete CX team from another company. Depending on the service agreement, you may even manage them in-house for the duration of your contract.
This can be an effective way to quickly acquire CX capabilities. However, it’s also quite expensive. And once the team lease is up, you’re still left with running the day-to-day CX; post-project support may or may not be part of the contract.
We’d recommend team leasing only for time-limited projects where CX is a major part of the strategy.
5. Partner with CX Consultants
If you know you need to grow CX skills but you’re unsure what needs to be done – or how to do it – CX consultants can be your guides. They offer more services than your average solo freelancer, and you can engage them for as long a time (or as big a project) as you need.
Often, businesses turn to CX consultants to build a new CX team or refine their current team. Consultants are ideally placed to lead CX training initiatives.
As a rule, CX consultants have a lot of industry experience; this means they’re more expensive than hiring an individual freelancer or onboarding a new employee.
The value of CX consultants really shines when you need to implement larger projects that involve multiple stakeholders and departments. The effects of hiring a competent CX consultant can be felt throughout the organization; see our case study on A Roadmap for Omnichannel Transformation Using Near Term Strategy for an example.
Moving Forward with CX Growth
There’s a reason that we use the phrase “growing pains”. Growth takes work! And it’s not always a linear, tidy process. We hope these ideas on growing your CX powers as an organization can help you figure out the next steps in your company’s CX path. If you’d like some expert assistance, contact CX by Design for a free, 30-minute consultation. There’s no obligation, and we’re always happy to share our insight!
