5 ms·

Happy employees leads to happy customers leads to happy share holders.

by jrs235 9y ago

TeMPOraL 9y ago
If that was only true... For "happy employees leads to happy customers", consider almost every company in existence, of any kind, in any sector. Do customers in general mind that the people making their electronics are underpaid, abused and unhappy? That the people serving them food in the restaurants are underpaid, abused and unhappy? That their doctors are overworked and unhappy? No. The happiness of employees starts and ends with "suck it up, smile nicely, or else lose your job and/or career prospects". The more difficult to debunk is "happy customers leads to happy share holders". It is true in some cases, but it's also false in many more. Consider telcos or ISPs as a pretty stark example of companies doing totally fine with very unhappy customers.
- fauigerzigerk 9y ago
  Customers care about the quality of the product, which is arguably influenced by how happy workers are. But of course this link is very indirect and very different for different types of workers.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    I'd say this link is very indirect; in fact, a lot of structure in companies exist solely to decouple the two. On the one hand this is sound - you want the end result to be independent of moods and dramas, both internal and those of lives of individual employees. On the other hand, this decoupling is what makes consumers totally unaware of whether and how much employees are abused in the process.
    - fauigerzigerk 9y ago
      This has been studied before of course. For instance: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022435908000456 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022435908... A Meta-Analysis of Relationships Linking Employee Satisfaction to Customer Responses "The authors report a meta-analysis of relationships linking employee job satisfaction to customer satisfaction and perceived service quality in studies that correlate employee data with customer data. Overall, both relationships are positive and statistically and substantively significant."
      - TeMPOraL 9y ago
        Interesting. I skimmed the paper (thanks, SciHub!); as far as I understand it, the topic is restricted to employees dealing with customers directly - e.g. shop clerks, salesmen, service providers (e.g. people coming to your house to do something), etc. The meta-analysis reports a positive correlation of ~0.3 there. This seems to weakens my example with restaurant workers, and also possibly with the doctors (as much as people can shop around in this area). I do stand by the manufacturing example though, which represents the cases where a customer doesn't interact with an employee. Anyway, thanks for referencing an actual paper! I learned something today :).
- jrs235 9y ago
  > Do customers in general mind that the people making their electronics are underpaid, abused and unhappy? happy employees -> happy customers does not imply: happy customers -> happy employees Likewise: >Consider telcos or ISPs as a pretty stark example of companies doing totally fine with very unhappy customers. happy customers -> happy share holders does not imply happy share holders -> happy customers. * replace '->' with one 'leads to'
grogenaut 9y ago
There's been a few links lately on hacker news about unhappy or dissatisfied folks using retail therapy. A google search revealed nothing though... just links about how facebook is making us unhappy or how veganisms means you consume less. Probbably all true but unrelated.

Happy employees leads to happy customers leads to happy share holders.

by jrs235 9y ago

Happy employees leads to happy customers leads to happy share holders.

If that was only true... For "happy employees leads to happy customers", consider almost every company in existence, of any kind, in any sector. Do customers in general mind that the people making their electronics are underpaid, abused and unhappy? That the people serving them food in the restaurants are underpaid, abused and unhappy? That their doctors are overworked and unhappy? No. The happiness of employees starts and ends with "suck it up, smile nicely, or else lose your job and/or career prospects". The more difficult to debunk is "happy customers leads to happy share holders". It is true in some cases, but it's also false in many more. Consider telcos or ISPs as a pretty stark example of companies doing totally fine with very unhappy customers.

fauigerzigerk 9y ago
Customers care about the quality of the product, which is arguably influenced by how happy workers are. But of course this link is very indirect and very different for different types of workers.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  I'd say this link is very indirect; in fact, a lot of structure in companies exist solely to decouple the two. On the one hand this is sound - you want the end result to be independent of moods and dramas, both internal and those of lives of individual employees. On the other hand, this decoupling is what makes consumers totally unaware of whether and how much employees are abused in the process.
  - fauigerzigerk 9y ago
    This has been studied before of course. For instance: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022435908000456 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022435908... A Meta-Analysis of Relationships Linking Employee Satisfaction to Customer Responses "The authors report a meta-analysis of relationships linking employee job satisfaction to customer satisfaction and perceived service quality in studies that correlate employee data with customer data. Overall, both relationships are positive and statistically and substantively significant."
    - TeMPOraL 9y ago
      Interesting. I skimmed the paper (thanks, SciHub!); as far as I understand it, the topic is restricted to employees dealing with customers directly - e.g. shop clerks, salesmen, service providers (e.g. people coming to your house to do something), etc. The meta-analysis reports a positive correlation of ~0.3 there. This seems to weakens my example with restaurant workers, and also possibly with the doctors (as much as people can shop around in this area). I do stand by the manufacturing example though, which represents the cases where a customer doesn't interact with an employee. Anyway, thanks for referencing an actual paper! I learned something today :).
jrs235 9y ago
> Do customers in general mind that the people making their electronics are underpaid, abused and unhappy? happy employees -> happy customers does not imply: happy customers -> happy employees Likewise: >Consider telcos or ISPs as a pretty stark example of companies doing totally fine with very unhappy customers. happy customers -> happy share holders does not imply happy share holders -> happy customers. * replace '->' with one 'leads to'

grogenaut 9y ago

There's been a few links lately on hacker news about unhappy or dissatisfied folks using retail therapy. A google search revealed nothing though... just links about how facebook is making us unhappy or how veganisms means you consume less. Probbably all true but unrelated.