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National Guard
Black Belt Training

Module 13

Voice of the Customer

(VOC)

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CPI Roadmap – Define

8-STEP PROCESS
6. See
1.Validate 2. Identify 3. Set 4. Determine 5. Develop 7. Confirm 8. Standardize
Counter-
the Performance Improvement Root Counter- Results Successful
Measures
Problem Gaps Targets Cause Measures & Process Processes
Through

Define Measure Analyze Improve Control

ACTIVITIES TOOLS
• Identify Problem •Project Charter
• Validate Problem Statement •Project Selection Tools
• Establish Strategic Alignment •Value Stream Map
• Gather Voice of the Customer & Business •Various Financial Analysis
• Create Goal Statement •Effective Meeting Skills
• Validate Business Case •Stakeholder Analysis
• Determine Project Scope •Communication Plan
• Select and Launch Team •SIPOC Map
• Develop Project Timeline •High-Level Process Map
• Create Communication Plan •Project Management Tools
• Prepare High-Level Process Map / SIPOC •VOC and Kano Analysis
• Complete Define Tollgate •RACI and Quad Charts
•Strategic Alignment
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Learning Objectives
 Know the source and type of process/service
requirements
 Know why Voice of the Customer is important
 Apply the four steps for gathering Voice of the
Customer

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Process Output Requirements

 Where do process output requirements come from?
 Customers (Voice of the Customer – VOC)
 Business (Voice of the Business – VOB)
 Stakeholders
 Regulations
 Suppliers
 Others

Process/Service
Supplier Customer External
Product/
A B C Service Those who receive/use the
product/service outside your
Supplier Consumer organization
Internal
Stakeholders “The Next Process is Your Those who may be affected
Bystander by production use of the
Those who have some “stake” in Customer”
the product/service process product/service (e.g.
success or failure pollution)
Management
Dealers
Shareholder
Regulatory Agency
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VOC vs. VOB

 Voice of the customer involves understanding both upstream and
downstream process requirements
 Often referred to as VOC and VOB
 Performance Needs (VOC): Define how the process must perform
downstream (Examples: Cycle time, defect free, low cost)
 These primarily come from our Customers
 Do not be confused by ‘features’ asked for by our Customers. Features are often,
though not always, just solutions to Performance Needs. Validate the need for the
feature or, better yet, gather the base need. Avoid solutions until the Improve phase.
 Business Requirements (VOB): Define limitations involved with
performing the process upstream of the output (Examples: Capital
expenditure limits, space limitations, supplier capability)
 These primarily come from the business and suppliers

 Both are important – Performance needs define how the revised

process must perform within the framework of the business
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VOC vs. VOB

 Voice of the Business (VOB) is often best obtained from the
Process Owner
 Tends to be very specific. Example: Lead time of 2 hrs, labor efficiency of
85% of standard
 Very little need to validate this information
 Voice of the Customer (VOC) is obtained from the downstream
customer, the direct recipient of the process/service. This can be
internal (Process Partner) or external.
 When obtained from an internal Process Partner, it tends to be very
specific, but might need to be validated with information from the ultimate
external customer (as external requirements flow backwards through the
broader process steps)
 When obtained from an ultimate external customer, the needs must often
be translated into something meaningful for the process/service developer

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A Customer Is...
 Any person or organization that receives a product or
service (Output) from our work activities (Process)

Supplier Process Customer

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What Is “Voice of the Customer”?

 ―Voice of the Customer‖ (VOC) is the expression of
customer needs and desires
 May be specific – ―I need delivery on Tuesday‖
 May be ambiguous – ―Deliver faster‖
 Can be compared to internal data (―Voice of the
Business‖) to assess our current process performance
or process capability

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Customers Define “Quality” ...

Flexibility
Who are your & Options
customers?
Timeliness Accuracy
What do the
customers related Customer
to your process
care about? Ease
Aesthetics
of Use

Cost
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Primary Performance Need Categories

Product or Service Features, Attributes, Dimensions,

Characteristics Relating to the Function of the Product or
Quality Service, Reliability, Availability, Taste, Effectiveness - Also
Freedom from Defects, Rework or Scrap (Derived Primarily
from the Customer - VOC)

Process Cost Efficiency, Costs to Consumer (Initial Plus Life

Cost Cycle), Repair Costs, etc. (Derived Primarily from the
Business - VOB)

Lead Times, Delivery Times, Turnaround Times, Setup Times,

Speed Cycle Times, Delays (Derived equally from the Customer
or the Business – VOC/VOB)
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The Kano Model

 Kano model helps us categorize and prioritize performance
features of a product or service into three types

 Dissatisfiers (Must haves): fulfills a basic customer requirement

(assumes they will be present) BASIC NEEDS

 Satisfiers (More is better): fulfills a performance requirement

(the more you provide the more satisfied the customer)
PERFORMANCE NEEDS

 Delighters: features that provide a ―wow‖ factor (really delight

the customer) EXCITEMENT NEEDS

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The Kano Model

Excitement Need
Delighted
Customer Satisfaction

Performance Need
Dissatisfied

Basic Need

Missing Present
Feature
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Steps to Gathering VOC

1. Identify and Segment Customers
2. Gather VOC
3. Analyze VOC
4. Determine Primary Y

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Step 1. Who Is the Customer?

 What is a customer?
 Defined as: ―Any person or organization that receives
a product or service (Output) from our work activities
(Process)‖
 Types of ―customers‖:
 End-User – Personally uses (consumes) the product. Product does not go
on in the same form
 Broker – Transfers product or product given to another in same form
 Fixer – Corrects or repairs product, often after end-user receipt

 Customers can often be logically aggregated into

groups or segments
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Internal vs. External

 External Customers
 Those persons or organizations
which purchase your products or
services.

 Internal Customers
 Whomever is a user of your
process output is an internal
customer.

 Regulatory Agencies
 Internal and external
organizations which develop
requirements for the safety and
protection of the customer

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Customer Identification

Internal External

Who are the Customers?

Primary
(Directly receive output)

Secondary
(Indirectly receive output)

Indirect
(Set regulatory requirements)

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Identify Your Customer Segments

 Transactional
 Frequency House Other
 Size of Customer
 Cost Senate DoE Transactional
 Demand Volume
DoD FDA

 Descriptive
 Geographic
 Demographic
Geographic
 Product feature
 Industry

 Attitudinal
 Cost
# of customers

 Value
 Service Service
Month
Price Service

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Customer Segmentation
 Customer segmentation is vital for analyzing VOC data
 Are all customers of equal importance?

 If customers are not segmented, it might prove impossible to get a

single ―voice,‖ and the multiple voices may lead in opposite directions
 Customers should be segmented or grouped according to their similar
need for products and services
 Identify and focus on the most important segments
The Greatest Importance Can Come From a
Small Portion of Your Customer Base

Customers (count) Total Importance 18

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Step 2. Collecting VOC Data

 Getting ―unbiased‖ VOC data is… Direct Methods
 Never easy or fast • Focus groups
 Key to CPI methodology • Interviews
 Crucial to interpreting your existing VOC data • Be a customer

 Applying VOC to projects: Indirect Methods

• Surveys
 Projects will each obtain VOC as part of their
• Customer observation
Define and Measure phases
• Market research
 CPI will test our assumptions about customer
• Customer complaints
needs and behavior
 The perception of who our customer is might
change as we understand more about our
customer base and processes

The goal is to obtain the right information to establish good design

requirements - so that process performance will satisfy your customers
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Collecting VOC Data

 Typical Existing VOC Data Sources
 Customer satisfaction survey responses
 Call center logs
 Customer interface personnel
 Interagency memos and agreements

 Other VOC Data Sources

 Industry surveys / research
 Focus groups
 Compare to other states
 Interviews / specific surveys
 Trade shows / conventions
 Pilot testing of product / service
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Information Already Available

Customers are already providing much information
about products and services:
 Complaints  Web Page Hits
 Compliments  Problem or Service Hot
 Contract Cancellations Lines
 Comment Cards  Media
 Customer Defections/  Others in Your
Acquisitions Organization

How do you get customer feedback?

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Other Sources of Available Data

 Additional sources of relevant customer/industry
information are likely available
 Some possible information you might have:
 Market research reports
 Completed customer surveys or evaluations
 Industry reports (Benchmarking)
 Available literature
 Competitor assessments

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Customer Needs Example

Example: Defining customer wants and needs for a Loan Process

Primary Secondary
• Willing to answer questions
Friendly Staff
• Treats me nicely
• Knows loan procedure
Knowledgeable
• Knows market
Staff
• Understands my situation
• Money when I need it
Speed
• Application is fast to fill out
• Doesn‘t make mistakes
Accuracy
• Gives me the right rate 23

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Interviews
 Purpose
 Learn about a specific customer‘s point of view on service
issues, product/service attributes, and performance
indicators/measures

 Interviews are useful at several points during the

process of gathering customer needs
 At the beginning: to learn what is important to customers
 In the middle: to clarify points or to better understand why a
particular issue is important to customers
 At the end: to clarify findings, to get ideas and suggestions, or
to test ideas with customers

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Types of Interviews
Types of Interviews Characteristics of Information Needed

• Unique perspectives
Individual
• Senior-level participation
• Input from large-volume customer
• Information from customers with similar product and
Group service needs
• Mid- to lower-level participation
• Information from many people from a single segment
• Input from customers who are widely dispersed
geographically
Telephone/Mail • Information on basic or simple issues
• Quick turnaround of information collection

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Focus Groups
 Purpose
 Organize information from the collective point of view of a group of
customers that represents a segment

 Uses
 To clarify and define customer needs
 To gain insights into the prioritization of needs
 To test concepts and get feedback
 Sometimes as a next step after customer interviews or a preliminary
step in a survey process

 Typically composed of 7 to 13 participants who share

characteristics that relate to the focus group topic
 Participants will be asked to thoroughly discuss very few
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Focus Group Process

 Plan the focus group session
 Determine why you are conducting the study
 Determine who the participants should be
 Write the research questions—keep the list short
 Draft the structure and flow of the session
 Select focus group location and schedule groups
 Develop a plan and estimate resources needed
 Test the questions
 Finalize the questions and the flow of the session
 Lead the focus group
 Analyze the focus group findings
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Focus Groups Summary

 Strengths
 Accommodate face-to-face free flowing dialogue between
small groups of customers
 They are typically video recorded to spread the information
more broadly within the company
 Concerns
 Moderately expensive
 Short sessions might not allow for clarification or ‗deep dives‘
 Number of participants is limited
 The ‗Loudest Voice‘ can bias interpretations

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Surveys
 Purpose
 Measure the importance of performance against an attribute or
customer characteristic

 Uses
 To efficiently gather a considerable amount of information from a
large population
 To measure ‗as is‘ conditions and drivers
 To measure change and causality

 Dissimilar populations may require different surveys

 Budget time to include:
 Develop the survey
 Perform data analysis
 Integrate results 29

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Exercise: VOC Class Survey

1. Using the Kirkpatrick Evaluation model, what type of learning assessment would you prefer?
a. Level One
b. Level Two
c. Level Three
d. Level Four

2. On a scale of 1-3, please rate these CPI tools:

a. TOC
b. QFD
c. DOE
d. C&E

3. Is the room temperature and classroom set-up acceptable?

4. What is your estimation of the appropriateness of the frequency and duration of periodic
cessations for students physical and mental accommodations?

5. Don‘t you agree that this NG CPI black belt class is the best classes you‘ve ever taken?

Thank you.

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VOC Survey Checklist

 Explain the purpose of the survey and how the results will be used.
 Include clear instructions.
 Keep the survey short.
 Allow adequate time for completion.
 Include a mix of both open-ended and close-ended questions.
- Close-ended responses are easier to quantify and record.
- Open-ended questions allow respondents more freedom of expression.
 Avoid questions that are too broad. Ask for feedback on specific items or areas of particular interest.
 Avoid slang and jargon.
 Avoid complex and ambiguous phrasing. Do not use double-negatives.
 Avoid leading questions.
 Don‘t ask for feedback on more than one item in the same question. Ask separate questions for each
item.
 Balance positive and negative questions. If you ask what they like best, then also ask what they liked
least.
 Define the measurement scale used and make sure the measurement scale matches the question.
 Pre-test the survey to see if it elicits the type of feedback you really want.
 Collect appropriate demographic information, as needed, to sort and analyze survey data.
 Always thank the respondents for completing the survey
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Use a Combination of Techniques

Telephone Interviews to Focus Groups to Obtain Survey to Verify

Identify Baseline Issues Deeper Understanding and Quantify
and Opinions

Increasing Level of Knowledge about our Customer

• How much certainty do you need?

• How much certainty can you afford?
• How much certainty can you risk?
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Ask The Right Questions

 Ask, ―A satisfying [product/output] is one which has
what?‖ to find features – often only nice-to-haves
 Ask ―A satisfying [product/output] is one which is
what?‖ to find functions – getting closer to required
customer outcomes
 Ask ―A satisfying [product/output] is one which
results in what?‖ to find customer required outcomes

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Step 3: Analyzing VOC

Voice of After Clarifying, Customer

the Customer the Key Issue Is... Requirements

―I hate filling out this The form takes too The form takes less
form!‖ long to fill out than five minutes to
complete

Good customer requirements:

 Are specific and measurable (and the method of measurement is specific)
 Are related directly to an attribute of the product or service
 Do not have alternatives and do not bias the design toward a particular
approach or technology
 Are complete and unambiguous
 Describe the "what," not the "how"

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Translate VOC to Requirements

Voice of Customer Input Key Customer Issue Customer Requirement

Actual Customer Statements The Real Customer Concerns, The Specific, Precise and
and Comments Values or Expectations Measurable Characteristic
• ―This mower should be easy to • Wants the mower to start • Mower starts within two pulls on
start‖ quickly and painlessly the cord
• ―The cord shouldn‘t be too hard • Mower starts with an effortless
to pull‖ pull on the cord
• ―I want to talk to the right • Wants to talk to the right • No additional menu items on
person and don‘t want to wait person quickly voice system
on hold too long‖ • Customer reaches correct
person the first time within 30
seconds
• ―This software package doesn‘t • The software does what the • Every design feature needed is
do squat‖ vendor said it would do built into the package
• The software is fully operational
on the customer‘s existing
system

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Organizing VOC Input

 Making sense of qualitative data is an iterative

process
 It involves interpretation and prioritization
 Often requires follow-up with additional research
 Useful tools:
 Affinity Analysis
 Tree Diagrams

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Affinity Diagrams
 The first step in getting value
from customer data is organizing Theme 1

it in a way that will reveal themes Need 1 Need 2 Theme 3

 An affinity diagram is a good tool

for this purpose since it organizes
language data into related groups
 Gather ideas from interview
transcripts, surveys, etc. Theme 2
Need 7

 Generate customer need

statements on cards or sticky
Need 3 Need 4
Need 8

notes (in the customer‘s own

language if at all possible)
 Group the cards to find the
―affinity‖ Need 5

 Label the groups of cards

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Tree Diagrams
 Moves team from high-level customer needs to
greater detail in order to define requirements
 A tool for breaking broad process steps or
product features into greater detail
 Helps organize needs by level of detail
Tree Diagram
Affinity Diagrams

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Tree Diagrams
Product/Service
Tertiary Need Customer
Requirement

Secondary Need
Customer
Requirement

Primary Need

Customer
Requirement

Customer
Requirement

The goal is to determine customer requirements

based on Voice of the Customer input
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Tree Diagrams – Key Steps

 Choose need/process/product to be detailed
 Ask:
 ―What are the components or sub-sets represented by
this need?‖
 ―Is this part of a larger category of
need/requirement?‖
 Add detail and organize components – building
branches and/or trunk of the tree by category and
level of detail
 State the requirements in measurable terms
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Tree Diagram Example: Anthony’s Pizza

Whole wheat
Crust
Unbleached flour
No cheese

Cheese Low-fat mozzarella

Customer wants
Toppings Meats
―healthy choices‖
Sauce Low-fat white cheddar
Vegetables

Additives
Other ingredients
Spices

Oil

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Exercise: Tree Diagram

 You work for AAFES Garage
 You have collected data from your
Pleasant Oil
customer base Change
Experience

 Based on your customer inputs:

 Construct a Tree Diagram
 Identify Customer Requirements

Customer Inputs
• ―No oil filter leaks‖
• ―Use quality oils and filters‖
• ―I don‘t want to wait around so long‖
• ―Your friendly employees are great‖
• ―I want to pay by Master Card ‖
®

• ―Check all my fluids‖

• ―Good price – be competitive‖
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Step 4: Determine Primary Y

 Critical-to-satisfaction (CTS) customer requirements
include Quality, Cost, Speed, Safety
 Which is the most important to improve?
 How will it be measured? What Does the Kano CTS Rank
Flight Passenger Need
Want?
Flight takes off safely Basic Safety 9

Flight takes off on time Perf Delivery 9

Ticket price is competitive Perf Cost 7

Bags are on the right plane Perf Quality 5

Fast electronic check-in Perf Delivery 3

Food service on board Wow Quality 1

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VOC / VOB Template

Critical Customer
Voice of the Key Customer Issue(s) Requirement
Customer /
What does the customer want from us? What does the customer want from us? We should summarize key issues and
We need to identify the issue(s) that translate them into specific and measurable
prevent us from satisfying our requirements
customers.

CriticalBusiness
Voice of the Key Process Issue(s)
Requirement
Business
What does the business want/need from us? What does the business want/need from We should summarize key issues and
us? We need to identify the issue(s) translate them into specific and measurable
that prevent us from meeting strategic requirements
goals/missions.

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VOC Exercise
 Using all of the information developed during this
module, interview your customers (Regional Program
Managers) to determine and prioritize the VOC for
the GGA Budget process

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Takeaways
Now you should be able to:
 Describe where process output requirements come
from
 Describe Voice of the Business (VOB)
 Describe Voice of the Customer (VOC)
 Describe why VOC is important
 Describe each of the four steps for gathering VOC
 Use the four steps for gathering and analyzing VOC
on a process

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What other comments or questions

do you have?

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