ABSTRACT
The starting point for a customer satisfaction measurement (CSM) project must be to set objectives. There are a number of generic objectives that can be applied to virtually any CSM project. Projects carried out in-house by people who also have other responsibilities usually take much longer, probably twice as long. First, supplier has to identify customers' requirements - those things that are important to customers and determine whether or not they are satisfied. Second, supplier has to measure satisfaction - how satisfied customers are with their organisation's performance on that same list of customer requirements. If suppliers are going to focus on resources it clearly makes sense to focus on the areas that are likely to bring the greatest gain in customer satisfaction. If suppliers want to measure customer satisfaction they need a very clear definition of exactly what they are measuring.
