Movieclips Monday: How well do you know your customer?

Posted by: Brent Conklin

As the proud father of two young boys, my movie options have been limited lately. It’s usually “Toy Story” or “Cars,” but one of my favorites is “How to Train Your Dragon.” The main character, Hiccup, is a young Viking who was born to be a dragon-slaying warrior. He has no interest in this lifestyle, but reluctantly tries to embrace it. The clip below shows Hiccup when he faces his first opportunity to slay a dragon. Hiccup is unable to harm the creatures and instead he makes a remarkable discovery.

This scene reminds me of the relationships we have with our customers and how imperative it is to truly understand these organizations.

At Yoh, we have many long-standing relationships with our RPO customers. In several of these partnerships, our recruiters are embedded within the company that they support. Integration is vital to understanding the culture and values of these organizations. However, being embedded with these customers is not enough. We have to continually push our organization to become more like the customer organization.

For example, we were having difficulty filling a role for one of our customers that had been lumped into the low-hanging fruit category. Historically, filling this role was always quick and painless. Realizing that we were off the mark, we decided to interview our client’s top performers in the roles that we were having difficulty filling. These interviews were carefully designed to identify the core competencies of these individuals that made them successful.

We then compiled and translated the results into a more strategic sourcing strategy. Not only did these discovery interviews help us recruit more effectively, they also created a stronger alignment and partnership between our organizations.

Hiccup might not have been a high-performing dragon slayer, but he was certainly onto something. Taking time to understand the situation more fully can make all the difference.