img(height="1" width="1" style="display:none" src="https://www.facebook.com/tr?id=2939831959404383&ev=PageView&noscript=1")

How Stride Treglown has been improving its customer experience

Words:
Rachel Bell

Practice director Rachel Bell on how the firm used a customer experience consultant to help it engage more effectively with its clients

Stride Treglown’s grade II* listed Bristol headquarters, refurbished by the practice in 2018.
Stride Treglown’s grade II* listed Bristol headquarters, refurbished by the practice in 2018.

Stride Treglown has collected feedback for years, but we felt that there was an opportunity to engage more effectively with clients – including consultants, contractors and building users – to improve how we work and the places we create. 

We considered different approaches taken by businesses we know. One operated an in-house team while another used a third party, which we felt elicited more open discussion and honesty. A law firm referred us to Insight 6, a customer experience consultant, which helped us to develop our Engage programme. Eighteen months on from our initial pilot, it is part of everyday life, embedded in the workflow of all projects.

Our customer experience consultant conducts detailed surveys on select projects, including those that are challenging. We want the negative feedback – and have had some

Client listening takes several forms. We send out short questionnaires and schedule check-in calls at key moments, such as six weeks after appointment. One aim is to identify small aggravations early so they don’t get worse. Insight 6 conducts more detailed surveys on select projects, including those that are challenging. We want the negative feedback – and have had some – though most is positive. It’s revealed useful things we can quickly address, such as pressures within certain teams or inconsistencies between them. A ‘secret shopper’ exercise investigated whether clients receive a friendly, consistent welcome. 

Playing this back internally is so important. Insight 6 helps us run studio reviews and CPDs on the importance of the client relationship and ways of reaching out – including how to have difficult conversations. This helps to embed the ideas in the culture of the business. We are 350 people across nine studios but all practices could learn from looking at the customer focus found in other sectors, from professional services to retail.

Latest

Checking in with four architects on both sides of the pond who have gone through the application process

Checking in with four architects on both sides of the pond who have gone through the application process

In west London, Maccreanor Lavington’s MacFarlane Place scheme for Peabody salutes Victorian blocks while offering satisfying points of difference and tenant-friendly touches such as heat-regulating shutters

MacFarlane Place salutes Victorian blocks while offering tenant-friendly touches such as heat-regulating shutters

Bid for a spot on a construction consultancy services framework, create a motor-free square in the capital, lead the restoration of four war memorial sites - some of the latest architecture contracts and competitions from across the industry

Latest: Construction consultancy services DPS

Sir John Burnet, Tait and Lorne's 1936 Hospital for Infectious Diseases in Paisley, now flats, followed the firm's renowned Royal Masonic Hospital in London

Sir John Burnet, Tait and Lorne's Hospital for Infectious Diseases in Paisley followed the firm's renowned Royal Masonic Hospital in London

'We're not just a roomful of architects,' say IDK's members, as they discuss designing the V&A's David Bowie Centre and working with communities from London to Paris to Devon

The practice's work spans from the V&A's David Bowie Centre to working with communities in London and Devon