A model for customer-focused culture change in the speculative house-building industry: Executive summary

The UK house-building industry is increasingly criticised for the quality of its products. Its business drivers are less focused on the needs of customers compared with much of the manufacturing sector. Recent surveys have revealed considerable dissatisfaction among buyers of newly built homes, particularly with the finished product and after-sales service quality. However, this cannot be viewed in isolation from the general business culture that prevails. In light of increasing calls for industry-wide changes, this research uses Westbury Homes as a typical example to examine existing practices in the industry that act as barriers to a change in culture. In determining a way forward, a review of extant change management models including Total Quality Management, Business Process Re-engineering, Balanced Scorecard and Hoshin Kanri provides new insight into the relative strengths of each and the role they can play in the formation of a holistic approach to successful customer-focused culture change. A four stage Strategy Deployment Maturity Journey for culture change is proffered that guides the deployment of policy through the introduction of i) a balanced set of headline performance measures, ii) operational performance indicators as drivers for change, iii) a participative programme for change, and iv) mechanisms for development, feedback and review of strategy. Early results indicate that implementation will lead to successful deployment of long-term objectives; specifically, a customer-focused culture that views service and product quality as contributing to future sales and profitability, instead of simply in terms of costs.