Oxthink

Over the last few years, there has been a trend to give people fancier job titles. The job role will not have changed; only the job title will change.

Salespeople have become Sales Executives.

Cleaners have become Cleaning Operatives.

Receptionists have become Front Desk Executives.

Sandwich makers have become Sandwich Artists.

The reason is that certain jobs have acquired a poor reputation. They are not considered attractive, or they have become associated with roles performed by less able employees.

Even those people doing these jobs do not always have a very high opinion of them. An indication of this is that, too often, when asked what their job is, they will precede their answer with “only” or “just”:

“I’m only the cleaner.”

“I just fill shelves.”

“I only work in the back office.”

The aim of job title changes – making them more flamboyant and polished – has generally been to make the employee feel more important and valued than they would otherwise be. If the role sounds important, then it must be important.

From the employer’s point of view, the change may also attract a more able, more qualified and more ambitious applicant. By glamming up the role, they hope to attract a better calibre of employee.

Unfortunately, such endeavours are an example of something full of hot air rather than substance. It does nothing to enhance performance, motivation or commitment. It’s a façade, and most people will see through the change, recognising its superficial, meaningless nature.

This is apparent from the fact that outside the workplace, workers with these fancy titles do not tend to describe their jobs in these terms. Do cleaners ever call themselves ‘Cleaning Operatives’? They are more likely to be embarrassed by this official title and to shy away from using it because of the risk of mockery.

As an exercise to better engage employees, giving them imaginative job titles is ineffective.

Instead of trying to fancy jobs up by renaming them, a far more fruitful change would be to ensure that these employees better understand their real role in the organisation.

Too often, employees see their position purely in terms of the job they do: administrator, cleaner, security guard… When asked about their role, they can accurately describe what they do, but too often they do not put themselves in the bigger picture.

They may recognise themselves as being a cog in the organisation’s workings, but they do not see how that cog fits into the larger machine. They do not think about or see the wider impact of their role. Without such insight, there can be no understanding of their importance, necessity or value.

This learning begins with a fundamental message: every employee has a singular purpose – to deliver on the customer experience.

All employees should be aware that although they may work for their employer, who will pay their wages, at the end of the day, it is the customer who keeps them in a job.

Even employees who do not have direct customer interface are a vital component in delivering that customer experience. They enable others – those with direct customer contact – to do their jobs. They become facilitators, enabling others to deliver on an end product.

Organisations therefore need to foster a customer focus attitude amongst all their employees, not just those with direct customer contact. They need to ensure that no employee feels too removed or isolated from the real world of customer relations.

This is achieved in two ways:

Firstly, by constantly impressing on all employees how they fit into the organisation and the customer experience.

Secondly, by fostering and promoting attitudes and behaviours that encourage employees to see their fellow colleagues as customers.

In practical terms:

The IT helpdesk may not have any direct end-user customer contact, but they still have customers, that is, all those users who need their help. Those users – with IT support – are then able to deliver a quality experience to the organisation’s external customers.

A secretary working for a manager will have a direct impact on that manager’s performance (letters produced and sent correctly, reports delivered on time, appointments properly diarised…). The manager becomes the secretary’s customer. Indirectly, farther down the line, that secretary’s actions – through the manager’s work – will then go on to impact the overall customer service delivered by an organisation.

This attitudinal and behavioural change may not be as quick a fix as changing someone’s job title, but it is the key to improving customer experience and driving organisational performance.

The manner by which an employee fulfils their occupational duties cannot be defined or enhanced by their job title. It is much more closely related to an employee’s perception of their significance within an organisation, which is bound up with their understanding of customer relations.