A Better Way to Measure & Value Business Relationships
White Paper Executive Summary
A recent national survey of VP level and above executives showed nearly universal agreement that relationships have a highly significant impact on business results each year. And it wasn’t just customer relationships delivering the impact, but rather a wide range of internal and external relationship types. If business relationships are having such a significant impact, how can they be better measured, managed and strengthened to drive improved performance?
The Performance Management Paradox
Effective internal and external relationships are critical to the daily performance of nearly every organizational function. Basic business performance levers such as customer loyalty, operational productivity, cross-functional collaboration, employee retention and leadership development all depend on healthy, productive relationships between people. So here’s the paradox: why don’t organizations have more insight, expertise and visibility on the key business relationships that are so clearly critical to their success? Perhaps because they’ve lacked a clear, compelling and reliable method for measuring and valuing them.
What Do We Mean by “Business Relationship” Anyway?
Some may have the perception that the words “business relationship” refer to the superfluous interpersonal aspects of conducting business. Not so according to a national survey of VP level and above executives. Rather a business relationship is defined by all the knowledge, expertise, value and reliability a person demonstrates to others, as well as their integrity, trustworthiness and likeability. Cognitive psychologists have developed and validated a universal model of how humans perceive and judge each other socially. It’s known as The Warmth & Competence Model.
The Enterprise RQ™ Assessment
The Enterprise Relational Quotient™ Assessment was created to address the relationship void that currently exists in widely used competency models and performance management systems. The Enterprise RQ™ Assessment was developed by adapting and extending the widely accepted Warmth & Competence Model to a business relationship context. Validity testing of the Enterprise RQ™ Assessment with a worldwide sample of business professionals showed a high degree of reliability and predictive accuracy in measuring business relationship strength. In addition, it revealed compelling new insights about how different types of business relationships each require unique approach.
Implications for Action & Results
The Enterprise RQ™ Assessment provides a business relationship competency framework and diagnostic metrics that can be applied to a wide variety of relationship types and performance opportunities. This innovative assessment can be deployed on a stand alone basis, or as an additional module within existing customer loyalty or performance assessment systems. For instance the Enterprise Client RQ™ Assessment provides deep, actionable insights that lead to improved account retention, penetration and acquisition. Similarly, the Enterprise Talent RQ™ Assessment provides remarkable visibility on the dynamics of internal relationships that lead to increased cross-functional collaboration, productivity and leadership development.