Focusing on our customers

“Building good service relationships with customers is not that hard – but it’s something Vestas has historically not been very good at,” admits Flemming Ougaard, Senior Vice President Service with Vestas Offshore.

In his ten years with Vestas, Ougaard has worked hard to change this situation, and he believes that a new series of focused customer workshops is the right way to manage expectations from the beginning of a project.

“We are taking care of our customers’ assets, and if they are successful, then so are we. So we have been sitting down with companies like Vattenfall and E.ON, and asking what are their success criteria for each project. Each side has its own key performance indicators (KPIs), and then there are some KPIs – health and safety, for instance – which we share.”

“In the past, we didn’t do this. We took our customers more for granted, and we needed a change in mentality. I tell people: ‘Remember that at the other end of the phone are people with jobs exactly like yours. If we don’t give them the information they need to report to their managers, we make their lives miserable. Treat the customer as you would like to be treated.’ It’s not that difficult!”

The high visibility of offshore projects has made it easier to throw off the old “closed” Vestas culture, Ougaard says: “It’s hard to hide things offshore. With an onshore wind power plant the customer may not know that you have visited a turbine. Offshore, it’s pretty obvious when you are out on the water.”

“Even when you have to convey a bad message, that’s better than doing nothing. Good news or bad news, the customer needs to know.”
“It’s been a long road, and we are not there yet. With each customer it’s not just one meeting, and within Vestas it’s a continuous learning process.”