Forrester builds all its research around customer obsession because we know that it is the critical success driver for our clients. I have yet to meet a client who says that customer demands are easing. On the contrary, with some fear, they express the challenge of customer demands relentlessly outpacing their organization’s ability to keep up. To help guide and inspire our clients, we supplement our extensive research with an annual Customer-Obsessed Enterprise Award in each major global region. We received more nominations in APAC than any other part of the world, showing the enthusiasm and momentum in our massive neck of the woods. After careful and difficult deliberation, we are proud to announce our winner.
IHH Healthcare Singapore Wins Forrester’s 2024 APAC Customer-Obsessed Enterprise Award
IHH Healthcare Singapore is part of a global healthcare network with more than 80 hospitals and 70,000 employees around the world. Its customer obsession ethos is summarized in its “Care. For Good.” mission that aspires to put the care back into healthcare for patients, people, public, and the planet (the 4 P’s). It is an ambitious vision that almost sounds too lofty, but our judges — including yours truly — saw that it really isn’t. Here are some parts of IHH’s customer obsession journey that we found especially interesting:
- Studying hotels — not other hospitals — for inspiration. IHH Healthcare believes that other hospitals set too low of a customer obsession standard for its liking. As such, rather than benchmarking against this peer group, IHH has set customer experience (CX) standards seen in the hospitality sector as targets.
- Everyday gracious gestures (EGGs), rituals, and a staff “empowerment fund” for embedding customer obsession into day-to-day operations. Internally branding everyday gracious gestures (or EGGs) and embedding them into daily operations ensures consistency in the service experience across touchpoints. Rituals such as service-themed roll calls help to create a culture of constant reflection on the voice of customers. Finally, an empowerment fund provides confidence for service professionals to go the extra mile for customers when they see fit.
- A patient experience steering committee to drive partnerships across the ecosystem. A multidisciplinary team, including nurses, allied-health professionals, corporate departments, specialists, and others, meets frequently to understand responsibilities, goals, and alignment expectations. As one example of the ecosystem contributions — and benchmarking against hotels rather than hospitals — the food, beverage, and dietetics department plays its part with innovations like meal orders through iPads, celebrity chef menus, and traditional Chinese medicine-inspired dishes for maternity patients.
We were inspired by the IHH journey and encouraged to see the company bring world-class customer obsession to the healthcare segment, which is all too often cold and mechanistic. Congratulations to the team for winning Forrester’s 2024 APAC Customer-Obsessed Enterpirse Award but, more importantly, for the excellent work they are doing for their 4 P’s.
To hear more about IHH Healthcare Singapore’s inspiring work directly from its leaders during a keynote session, be sure to attend Forrester’s CX Summit APAC in Sydney, Australia, on May 28, 2024.
