Customer-related skills

Previous research concerning individual level skills at customer interface, and/or in services, is scarce, as far as the reviewed literature for this study is concerned. The research of individual level skills in KIBS, has concentrated in formal skills, like education, which has been due to the research interest towards knowledge-intensity as such (Sjoholt, 1999).

The rare findings might be due to the fact that skills are often considered quite task-related and context-specific, and not possible to generalize.

Davenport & Prusak (2000, 110-111) propose that knowledge workers should possess two-fold skills. First, technical skills involving structured knowledge, technical abilities and professional experience, and second,

“softer” skills including cultural, political and personal skills. In similar vein, Ulrich & Smallwood (2004) discuss technical and social skills, as referring to individuals. This is also consistent with Nonaka’s (1994, 16) view of cognitive and technical elements, where cognitive refers to mental modes to perceive and define the world and technical refers to concrete context-specific skills. Furthermore, these all fit quite well on the classification of different types of knowledge by Lowendahl et al. (2001, 918). The technical skills could be paralleled to fact-based ‘know-what’ knowledge, and personal skills to i) experience-based ‘know-how’ and ii) to dispositional and identity-related skills like talents, intelligence etc.

(Lowendahl et al., 2001, 918).

The technical skills could refer to any substance skill based on the position and tasks, whether in sales, business management, marketing, customer service, project management or any other. The research of Clulow et al.

(2007) showed that the customers appreciated the most important source of value being the intellectual-based and process-based skills. Exceeding specialized technical and general socio-economic expertise, the value of intimate knowledge of a particular market is seen high. This expertise can basically be obtained only through long-term experience. (Larsen, 2001.)

Inter-personal skills of employees are of major importance in services, since they face a wide range of interpersonal situations with both internal staff and/or their inter-firm relationships, like with customers (Carter &

Gray, 2007, 392). They state that, even though one could imagine that possessing all kinds of skills (interpersonal, technical, financial, sales, marketing, etc.) would lead to the best possible performance that is not necessarily the case. Having certain skills does not guarantee that they will be applied in an appropriate manner. An employee should be able to apply to a context-specific way of responding. (Carter & Gray, 2007, 392.)

Emotional intelligence plays a central role in inter-personal skills. It refers to the “ability to carry out accurate reasoning about emotions and the ability to use emotions and emotional knowledge to enhance thought”

(Mayer et al., 2007, 507). An emotionally intelligent person can recognize, and utilize her/his or others’ emotional states to solve problems and regulate behavior (Huy, 1999, 325). Problem solving has been argued to be the most common application of tacit knowledge. It is stated that problem solving skills rely strongly on experience, which forms patterns working as a problem solving tools (Leonard & Sensiper, 1998, 112).

Antony et al. (2007, 306) have pointed out that, human characteristics, such as friendliness, eagerness to help, etc. have a significant influence on service processes that determine the quality of service provided to customers.

Individual skills are often of tacit nature. The most tacit dimensions are probably insight and intuition, decisions based on feeling. E.g. negotiation skills and artistic visions are often of tacit nature. The common characteristic is the inability to wholly articulate this skill to others.

(Leonard & Sensiper, 1998.) Physical Tacit knowledge embodied in physical skills can reside in nerves and muscles, as the tacit knowledge embodied in cognitive skills can be acquired through experience.

Garcıa-Murillo & Annabi (2002, 883) point out that tacit knowledge can be exchanged with customers through joint activities and interactions. It is important to create close relationships to be able to tap into customer’s knowledge. The employees of customer interface should have the right techniques to help the customer, and appropriate practices and training to gather knowledge from the customer. It is important to identify the relevant pieces of knowledge that the customer can provide that will help the company improve its service. The employees of service provider should have skills to listen to and synthesize what the customer is saying in order to identify appropriate items. The circumstances of knowledge sharing between an employee and a customer differ clearly from those within the firm as there exits much less opportunities for interactions. This settles challenges for individuals to be able to take advantage of these rare situations (Garcia-Murillo & Annabi, 2002).

To sum up, the individual skills can be grouped in three types of skills; 1) personal, dispositional and identity related skills, 2) personal, but cognitive and experience-based skills and 3) technical, professional, task-related skills.

3.6 Summary

According to the literature, it seems that the relation between knowledge and capability is two-fold. A capability of an individual or a firm to act, was seen as a dynamic constitution of knowledge, but still, as a part of the knowledge. Or, knowledge is seen to be more like static resource, which requires capabilities to be utilized. In this study, the very essence of knowledge-intensive business services is seen to be in processing knowledge with looser or tighter co-production or relationship with a customer. The looser or tighter co-production or relationship was seen to depend on the type of knowledge, level of knowledge intensity, level of customer involvement, level of customization, demand for customer

knowledge, demand for consultancy from service provider, and the process stage of service providing. The customer-related capabilities were related to understanding customer needs, coordinating the service from the needs, managing customer’s knowledge and role as a co-producer of service, managing customer relationship and adapting the service according to customer needs. On individual level, three groups could be formed; personal, dispositional skills, personal experience-based skills and technical skills. These key characteristics, factors, skills and capabilities are presented in Figure 9.

Figure 9: Key characteristics, key factors and key capabilities