First, not all of your employees are superheroes. Most companies have a continuum on the payroll, from the exceptionally talented to the should-definitely-be-doing-something-else- with-their-lives. This isn't easy to acknowledge. Any number of things can get in the way of doing so, from the role you played in hiring someone to good, old-fashioned conflict aversion. Here's a safe assumption: unless you have the resources and capacity to systematically attract, reward, and unleash the very best in your industry, some of the people now reporting to you cannot be objectively characterized as outstanding. Second, you're probably making your employees' job harder. The hunt for new sources of revenue within organizations often leads to an increase in operational complexity. New products and services — or even new variations on old ones — lead to new processes, policies, and regulations; new organizational structures and technologies; new customers with new needs being channeled toward new touch points. In one quick-service restaurant we studied, the menu had grown from twenty-five items to more than a hundred in just a few years.

Ready to take on system-wide complexity? We suggest starting with back-end complexity that's adding little to the customer experience. Reduce those fifty-five ways your employees can ring up the same drink, since numbers 2 through 55 do nothing to make the drink experience more enjoyable.

Managing the Chaos of Customers

In other words, variability is a fact of life with customer-operators. Here are the different forms it can take:

• Arrival: Your customers don't all want service at the same time or at times that are necessarily convenient for you. Grocery stores find themselves swamped during the evening rush hour, while the lines at Dunkin' Donuts can extend for half a block at

8:00 a.m.

• Request: Not everybody orders the same thing. Each client of an advertising agency is executing a unique marketing strategy, and vacationers at a resort want different amenities. Even customers of a single-service business like Jiffy Lube show up in different makes and models of cars.

• Capability: Customers have different knowledge, skill, physical abilities, and resources, which means that some customers perform tasks easily while others need hand-holding. In a medical setting, the ability of a patient to describe symptoms can greatly affect the quality of care. But so can the person's ability to negotiate the medical bureaucracy.

• Effort: Customer-operators decide for themselves how much effort to invest in production tasks. Company controllers don't always hand over well organized files to independent auditors, and shoppers don't always return their shopping carts to the store.

• Preference: Even customers who want the same service may have very different definitions of quality. One diner appreciates the servers' introducing themselves by name; another resents the presumption of intimacy. Some clients of a law firm might construe a top partner's attention to detail as reflecting the importance of their case; others might complain that those expensive billable hours could be doled out more Judiciously to less costly associates. Subjective preference adds a multiplier effect to all other forms of customer variability.

First, not all of your employees are superheroes. Most companies have a continuum on the payroll, from the exceptionally talented to the should-definitely-be-doing-something-else- with-their-lives. This isn't easy to acknowledge. Any number of things can get in the way of doing so, from the role you played in hiring someone to good, old-fashioned conflict aversion. Here's a safe assumption: unless you have the resources and capacity to systematically attract, reward, and unleash the very best in your industry, some of the people now reporting to you cannot be objectively characterized as outstanding. Second, you're probably making your employees' job harder. The hunt for new sources of revenue within organizations often leads to an increase in operational complexity. New products and services — or even new variations on old ones — lead to new processes, policies, and regulations; new organizational structures and technologies; new customers with new needs being channeled toward new touch points. In one quick-service restaurant we studied, the menu had grown from twenty-five items to more than a hundred in just a few years.

Managing the Chaos of Customers

In other words, variability is a fact of life with customer-operators. Here are the different forms it can take:

• Arrival: Your customers don't all want service at the same time or at times that are necessarily convenient for you. Grocery stores find themselves swamped during the evening rush hour, while the lines at Dunkin' Donuts can extend for half a block at

8:00 a.m.

• Request: Not everybody orders the same thing. Each client of an advertising agency is executing a unique marketing strategy, and vacationers at a resort want different amenities. Even customers of a single-service business like Jiffy Lube show up in different makes and models of cars.

• Capability: Customers have different knowledge, skill, physical abilities, and resources, which means that some customers perform tasks easily while others need hand-holding. In a medical setting, the ability of a patient to describe symptoms can greatly affect the quality of care. But so can the person's ability to negotiate the medical bureaucracy.

• Effort: Customer-operators decide for themselves how much effort to invest in production tasks. Company controllers don't always hand over well organized files to independent auditors, and shoppers don't always return their shopping carts to the store.

• Preference: Even customers who want the same service may have very different definitions of quality. One diner appreciates the servers' introducing themselves by name; another resents the presumption of intimacy. Some clients of a law firm might construe a top partner's attention to detail as reflecting the importance of their case; others might complain that those expensive billable hours could be doled out more Judiciously to less costly associates. Subjective preference adds a multiplier effect to all other forms of customer variability.