A prime example of facing the competition
While we work primarily within public sector organizations, we also work with public purpose organizations. For example, we have been in a two-year work relationship with a community foundation. For those of you who are not familiar with community foundations, they traditionally have these goals:
- To build permanent funds for the broad charitable needs of the community, and
- To provide donors with options that fulfill their financial and charitable interests. (Source: The Council on Foundations)
Community foundations as a concept has grown rapidly. The Council on Foundations reports that there are now more than 500 community foundations across the United States. Their assets increased more than four-fold in the 1990s to over $27.6 billion. Most importantly, in 1999, they made over $2.2 billion in grants to charitable organizations. (For more info, see www.cof.org.) To qualify as a legitimate community foundation under the US Tax Code, they must bring in 5% of their asset base each year in new donations. Thus, they are judged on the basis of their level of continued public support.
Fearlessly face your competitors to win ongoing public support.
The community foundation we are working with is strongly supported in its community. Yet, this foundation, like others across the country, was under increasing competition from banking and financial service firms eager to attract or retain assets whose owners wish to use for philanthropy.
As a result of their strategy work with us, this foundation's leaders believed they were at a crossroads. They had to decide whether to compete with the competition head on - trying to match or out-perform their transaction processing offerings on the basis of cost or speed - or develop a different competitive advantage of their own making.
This client chose to distinguish itself via exemplary services. These include regular personal contact, Internet access to information, convening discussions about local needs, and grant-making assistance, including research on potential grantees. As my partner, Peter Hutchinson, says about them, "They knew they didn't have a competitive advantage in transaction processing. Their competitive advantage is in personal service. There they can't and won't be matched."
What's cool to me is the up-front manner in which this client used knowledge of their competition to set a course for winning continued public support.
We don't have competitors, you say.
In our public sector work, we sometimes hear this pushback. But, you know what? We reject it.
To our way of thinking, just like this community foundation, public services every day, every hour, compete to keep continued public support. You all know what happens when you lose. Bad things happen. Audits are called for. The public demands tax cuts. Oversight commissions are formed. Worse, public complacency about 'government' sets in.
But, what must be done to win the competition for public support? It goes way beyond being a good, responsible public steward.
Sometimes, our company helps our clients decide to directly compete for customer dollars. Customer choice puts the buying public in the drivers' seat. It creates immediate and ongoing performance incentives stronger than any internal exhortations. Our friend Anne Kinney has extensive experience in using market mechanisms to improve government. She says her main learnings from her tenure as an administrative leader for the City of Milwaukee are around this topic. In her words, "A competitive environment (as opposed to a traditional governmental "monopoly" environment) immediately changes the dynamics. Behaviors change because people know they have to meet customer needs for their agency or work unit to survive and thrive. Simply recognizing that residents are customers and treating them that way benefits both the public and employees. Residents develop a better attitude about their government and employees are happier because they know that they're doing the work not because they were the only choice but because they provide good service at a good price."
But not all public activities can be put into competitive markets. In those, we sometimes help clients earn public support by meeting or exceeding the expectations that the public holds. What expectations? Here's one little tool you might like to use to jump-start the conversation. In one client engagement with a government monopoly on the East Coast, we taped and replayed all the commercials that had aired during the recent Olympics. We then asked our client team - "Based on these commercials alone, how have the public's expectations about your services just been affected?" They didn't see the connection at first, but then one person talked about a 'competitor' advertising that they were there for their customers 24/7. Another saw instant access to information regardless of where the customer was on the planet. ("Can you hear me now?") They saw speed, and choice, and Web-based access, and many other factors that were setting the bar for what the public does or will expect - in other words, setting new standards they would have to meet.
How about you?
By directly facing their competitors, both these organizations were able to chart a better course to keep public support. What would it do for yours?
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