SGEi: Integrating Leadership for Better Customer Experiences

According to well-known research, 70 percent of company culture is directly linked to good managers. In turn, great company culture creates a solid foundation for a stronger brand and a seamless customer experience. This makes managerial roles ever so important for client-focused organizations that seek to create a high-performing company culture in order to achieve better business outcomes.

Recognizing the importance of managers in shaping company culture, SGEi takes a different approach to defining a manager's role in an organization. The company acknowledges that management and leadership are two sides of the same coin and that focusing on people is as important for managers as focusing on work processes. It aims to develop leaders who can be great managers for their people to ensure cultural transformation within service-based organizations.

"Developing your managers as leaders is not just a nicety but a business necessity," says Shane Green, president of SGEi.

Coming from the hospitality industry, SGEi leverages its experience in the service-oriented space to offer custom leadership programs that help organizations deliver excellent customer experiences. SGEi conducts research and development on leadership to ensure relevance and supports its offerings with real-world data. The service-oriented company helps organizations from all verticals take better care of their customers, patients, or guests.

Its process starts with the Culture Hacker Survey, a study designed by Green that assesses company culture and provides insights into employee experiences. Through the Culture Hacker Assessment, SGEi collects insights on a client’s company culture, identifies their strengths and weaknesses, and develops a curriculum to help them close the gap.

Unlike generalized training, the company looks at the individual needs of each organization and prioritizes significantly lacking skills. By focusing on the low-hanging fruit, SGEi succeeds in making the biggest impact during the first month of the program. It aims to be memorable, motivating, and effective with its training and avoids elongated processes by keeping things simple, offering practical tips that can be implemented straight away.

SGEi makes managers its primary focus, whether it’s working with smaller companies or larger organizations with thousands of employees. When clients approach it seeking to enhance employee customer service, the team begins by developing leadership skills in managers, which serves as the foundation for improving all aspects of the client's business. SGEi's surveys reinforce the idea that employees consider a respectful and caring manager to be their top priority, second only to compensation. This directly influences their motivation to come to work, their dedication to customer service, and ultimately, the company's turnover.

Following the COVID-19 pandemic, SGEi took steps to address the increased demand for transforming leadership skills, including the need to manage a hybrid and remote workforce. It has launched the Leadership Performance Program, offering a 12-month agenda for SMB managers who didn’t receive much development attention before. The program makes a difference for clients and is already delivering remarkable results, making it SGEi's key offering over the years for businesses of all sizes.

The company believes in measurable results and that training has to have an ROI. Whether it is customer loyalty, bottom-line revenues, customer service, or performance, SGEi applies a practical methodology to develop the necessary metrics. The team connects all of its training to real numbers and outcomes for its clients, ensuring it meets their expectations.