Feedback: More complete offerings not in focus

According to the focal firm interviewees in all the cases studied, firms did not get much customer feedback that focused on the completeness of their offerings. The interviewees did not highlight that feedback from customers had an important role in developing more complete offerings. The participating customers, in contrast, were able to provide moderately versatile feedback that covered, for example, contracts with the focal firms, management and coordination of more complete offerings, standardization of services, third party involvement, partnerships, and outsourcing. However, the total amount of feedback was fairly limited and the emerged feedback was fragmented by nature: the key issues were found to vary between the cases and individual customers, and the individual customers only indicated certain issues.

In all cases, some of the participating customers were able to provide feedback regarding the extensiveness of the available contracts as well as how well the contracts had been managed.

As for the contract management (…) they have complied to our contract well and we’ve been able to reach consensus on matters. Also, the cooperation between upper management and those responsible for the contract is good (vice president, indirect procurement, CC3, FLOW).

In addition to positive feedback, negative feedback emerged across cases. Within SCALE and DEVICE, some customers gave feedback on the expensiveness of the

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proposed or implemented contracts, especially of the full-service contracts, which were considered as very expensive. Moreover, the management and coordination of the bigger deliveries in comparison with individual services was pointed out by around half of the participating customers across cases. The supplier’s ability to handle bigger deliveries was pointed out especially by the customers in the cases of SCALE and FLOW.

We have been satisfied with those [extensive deliveries]. We get a total package (…) [covering] all these supporting functions as well as maintenance and planning solutions.

So, you get a total package (development director, AC3, SCALE).

In the case of DEVICE, however, the feedback on the comprehensiveness of the offering was focused on how the supplier coordinated its work across the different organizational units that were involved in the service delivery.

Standardization of services was an issue that was brought up in all cases to some extent. Within the case of FLOW, where the focal firm emphasized customization of services over standardization as a firm strategy, one customer gave feedback that the focal firms could develop their service portfolio toward more standardized service concepts and that this would make it easier for customers to both assimilate what they can offer and manage the cooperation in practice. However, another customer noted that the focal firm had some standardized elements that have worked well in their opinion.

They have their own certain concepts. They have ready-made contract frameworks for many [things], templates like that (…) which is a good thing (vice president, CC2, FLOW).

Furthermore, one customer remarked that the entire concept of the focal firm is more customized, whereas some competitors have more standardized approaches.

In the case of SCALE, the issue of standardization was not strongly addressed by the customers. However, it was remarked by a customer that the maintenance services of the focal firm are not as well standardized as those of some of the competitors.

Other actors have productized their service a bit better (…) those are very customized services that they offer in fact (…) the [operation] model should probably be more productized (manager, production development, AC5, SCALE).

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The participating customers in the case of DEVICE, in contrast, did not emphasize the standardization of the delivered services. This is noteworthy as the focal firm in the case of DEVICE put a lot of emphasis on service standardization, as discussed above (see, 4.1.2).

In addition, the use of third parties in the focal firm portfolios was an issue that a few customers commented upon. The focal firms of DEVICE and FLOW bundled services from other companies with their own services and offered them as an integrated package to customers. A few focal firm interviewees pondered if there is a risk in merging services from third parties into their portfolio. For example, the interviewees were afraid of decreasing service quality. Nevertheless, negative feedback from the customers regarding the use of third parties did not emerge.

And the operation [by third parties] too has looked quite like them (…) nothing to remark in that sense (maintenance manager, BC6, DEVICE).

At best, customers were actually quite satisfied with the focal firms when they took the responsibility over the third parties because it reduced management and coordination work on their side.

Furthermore, feedback regarding partnerships emerged as a salient issue for a few customers in the case of SCALE.

They're struggling with it because they are an organization which is (…) not used to (...) develop[ing] the systems on and on (…) it should be more like a constant development [partnership] (R&D director, AC7, SCALE).

In particular, one customer (AC7) gave explicit feedback regarding the readiness of the focal firm to move on to partnership-based cooperation based on continuous cooperation. How well the focal firm succeeded in cooperation that transcended individual projects and service transactions was a significant issue for the customer.

In the case of FLOW, the focal firm took over customer functions through a transfer of business. Consequently, outsourcing-related feedback was brought out as a central issue. Within two customer companies that participated in the study, some customer employees had become focal firm employees as the result of the arrangement. This had caused resentment and even strikes among the transferred employees. The situation had been difficult for the focal firm, and it was acknowledged by the interviewees of the customer companies when providing feedback.

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