Introduction


This article is about non-verbal communication, understanding the nonverbal cues and signs such as face expression, gestures, eye contact and so on on the consumers. Each of this little nonverbal cue and sign on the consumers has its own meaning and by understand this meaning help us a lot in marketing and sales process. In this assignment, we were required to show a video of consumer purchasing process and define what nonverbal cues and sign that we could find from the video.


As a consumer behavior consultant, it is important to understand the consumer nonverbal cues and signs because different consumers have different behaviors, expectations and perception, and based on their nonverbal cues we could easily understand the consumer’s internal feelings whether are they mad, dislike, disagree, telling truth or others more expression and feelings either are internal or externally so that we could service the consumers well and understand the needs and wants of the consumer and this help to retain the consumers and gain their loyalty.


Face Expression





From this screen shot above (scene 1), we could observe that the eyes of Mr. Bean were open wide, his eyes are staring and focusing on something, his eyes brow and cheek were pulled upward, lip were pulled downward and with a smiling mouth on his face. This face expression shows that he was look on something that interesting to him and he was very excited about it. In the movie, Mr. Bean was actually holding his credit card perhaps for the first time he has a credit card in his life and he was excited and can’t wait to show off his credit card on his shopping day. As a consumer behavior consultant, when you were selling a products or approaching a customers and the customers are having this face expression and looking toward your products that mean the customers were have a great interest on your products and the probability of the customers purchase your products are very high thus you should spend more time to explain more details about the products. In the other hand, if the customers were having this face expression and look toward you but not the products that you were try to sell to them, this mean that the customers were having great interest on you not the products so you have to convince or try to make the customers eyes to look toward the products.





From screen shot above (Scene 2), we could observe that Mr. Bean eyes and mouth were lowered; it shows anger on his face. His eyes were partially opened, chic and cheeks were pulled downward. This face expression shows that he is dislikes, saw something unwanted or something that make him mad. This screens shot was taken, when Mr. Bean was passing by the perfume section and he dislike the smell of the perfume and make him discomfort. As a consumer behavior consultant, when your customers were having these face expressions, this mean that the customers do not have interest on your products or towards you or even feel annoying. Thus, you should not spend more time on him or her promoting or explain about the products, perhaps just leave a contact number for him or her for future enquiry if needed because the longer the times you spend on the customers, you are just making the customers angrier and discomfort and the probability of the customers purchase your products are very low.





From the screen shot above (scene 3), Mr. Bean’s eyes brow were band downward, chicks and chin pulled downward, his eyes was partially close and staring on something and his down lip is flipped out. This expression shows that he is doubting, feeling curious, unbelief or uncertainly toward the product he was look at. This screen shot was taken, when Mr. Bean was trying to purchase a toothbrush, he was doubt with the performance of the toothbrush whether it suits him or not and in the movie, he opened the toothbrush and try to brush his teeth on the spot. As a consumer behavior consultant, when you are promoting or explain a product toward a customer, his or her face expression is showing as above, this mean that he or she is doubting or unbelief on the product that your are promoting whether it is able to perform as what you mention thus you should make the customers more confident and believe on your product by letting he or she to try on the product, let them hold and feel the product and performance of the product and this help to convince more to customer rather than just explaining. When the customers are confident with it, the second step is to discussing the prices and if the prices is fine with them, they will purchase.





From the screen shot above (scene 4), we could observe that Mr. Bean face is neutralization or we could say that there is no expression on his face, it also look like there is no soul in his body, his eyes was looking blur. This expression shows that, he was boredom or day dreaming. Mr. Bean was standing on the escalators and waiting it to reach the second floor from the first floor and he was day dreaming while stand and waiting to reach second floor. When your customers were having this expression toward you while you are promoting your product, this means that your speech, conversion or your product are not interesting to the customers or make them bored. Thus, you should change your strategic immediately by change the topic or saying others things or things that interesting to the customers rather than keep explaining the product or continue with the action and after the customers start feel interest, then only you continue with your product or else at the end, the customers will just reject your offer and walk away.


Forehead






We could observe that Mr. Bean eyes are wide open, mouth was partially open, forehead and eyebrows are furrowed from the screen shot above (Scene 5). His eyes were moving up right, this mean that he is using imaginative construction of picture to deceive others. This overall expression shows that he is anxious, sad, concerned or bewildered. From the movie, Mr. Bean was actually looking around whether is there anyone beside him because he would like to do something that is not allowed or unethical by opening the display toothbrush and brush his teeth without purchasing it and trying to change a new one after opened. As a consumer behavior consultant, when your customers are having this face expression, this means that you had making him feel uncomfortable or shock with your sudden existing. Thus, you should not sudden approach your customers, you should soft and friendly approach the customers and let them realize your existing only you start promoting your product. Besides that, the customers maybe are discomfort with you around him or her so you should cut short your conversion or else the probability that he or she will purchase is very low.





From the screen shot above (Scene 6), we could observe that, Mr. Bean’s eyes are partially open, his head are band down, and the important one is his torque is out and licking his lips, this gesture show that he was doing something that not allowed or he is not telling the truth. As a consumer behavior consultant, when you are asking your customers a question and your customers are having this gesture, torque out and licking his or her lip, this mean that he or she is not telling the truth regarding the question that you asked thus you should ignore the answer that answered and try to change the way of asking that question. For example, you want to know whether the person has already eaten his or her meal or not, you could ask him or her, “Have you eaten your meal yet?” or the other way like “What you eat just now?”. Both of the questions direct to the same answer but from a different way.


References


Chee Seng, Leow, Vincent Leong and Atikah Adom (2013); Body language exposed. Find out how your body can betray you.

How you conduct an Organization's Health Check for your Organization.

by Tan Houng Chien

Organization’s Health Check

An organization is like a human body. To be alive, a human body requires all of the important organs to be functional, performable and in good condition. So do organizations, organization have their “organs” too, all of the departments in an organization are the organs of an organization and all these departments are key factors that enabling the organization to be “alive” or we called it as sustainable. When either one of the organs is not functioning, performing or in a good condition, for human such as us, our body will fall into sick and sometimes serious will lead to death. Organization as well, for example, when departments are not performing what should be performed or targeted, it will also leaded the organization to fall into sickness. Organization’s sickness are not similar as human sickness such as flu, fever, cancer and etc but the effect were the same, sickness of organization are deficient, low productivity, ineffectiveness, lack of ideas to move forward, less profits, low sales, not motivated and etc and  these will also lead to an organization to be bankrupt if all of these are not solved properly.

Human like we went for health check from time to time to make sure that there is no sickness, illness or diseases and all the organs in our body are in good condition. Organizations does require a health check from time to time as we do too, to make sure that all the departments are in good condition. The real purpose of getting health check doesn’t only able us to identify sickness, illness, diseases or etc but the true meaning behind is to letting us to get early detection so that we are able to mediate it, resolve it, cure it and most important is to stay alive.

In today’s rapid change economics, conducting health check for the organization is becoming a must strategy. When health check is conducted in an organization, organization is able to identify the “sickness” of their organization such as performance gaps, competence level, deficient and root causes of the problems. And by knowing all these problems, organization is able to mediate it through training, rewards, coaching and many more ways to improve the organization. Thus, organization’s health check is an important business strategy which not only enable organization to get early detection of their problems to resolve or improve it early but also indirectly helping the organization to prepares the organization’s human resource for unavoidable change and also provides opportunity to improve technology, systems, structures, the nature of work itself and to be sustainable in the market.

Organization’s health check is a comprehensive study comprising two phases. The first, diagnostic phase identifies inconsistencies in performance and current competence level, and the second phase maps these performance gaps and competencies by prioritising them in order of role and business requirements. And various of benefits able to gain by conducting an organization’s health check. First, able to clarify crucial organization issues. Second, formulating strategies for sustainability. Third, providing the right solutions and ideas indirectly saving cost and eliminate waste. And fourth, better return of investment (ROI) and providing the best use of limited resources by providing the right solution.

Steps of Conducting Organization’s Health Check

There are  9 steps to conduct an Organization’s Health Check

by Tan Houng Chien

Technique of Kaizen: 5s Housekeeping

One of the most popular and widely used techniques of Kaizen management is 5s housekeeping. 5s is considered a foundation of lean concepts and also a fundamental principle of Kaizen, as it establishes the operational stability required for making and sustaining continuous improvements.

5S is a set of five Japanese words that start with a sound of “se” or “shi”, that are Seiri, Seiton, Seiso, Seiketsu and Shitsuke. Each of these Japanese words has its own meaning. Shari means sorting, Seiton means straighten or set in order, Seiso is means sweeping or cleaning, Seiketsu is means standardizing and lastly Shitsuke is means sustaining the discipline.

5S emphasizes the importance of working hygiene. It is based on Japanese housekeeping practice. 5S is necessary to ensure a clean and orderly working environment with a highly visible management, it helps focus employees to maintain a clean and efficient workplace and also helps them to be aware of their working environment and the state of the tools and machinery they use.

5S is not a one short practice but is a continuous process. The actual methodology of 5S is shown in figure 1. Firstly, it is required to complete from stage 1 till stage 5 and it does not end at stage 5, but it repeats the stage all over again infinitely.




Stage one is Seiri, it also translated as “Sorting”. Seiri means going through all the tools and materials in the plant work areas and only keeping the items that are essential and all others tools and items are stored or discarded.

Stage two is Seiso, it also translated as “Shine”, “Shining” or “Sweeping”. This is simply the need to keep the workplace clean and neat.

Stage three is Seiton, it also translated as “Straighten” or “Set in order”. Seiton is a process that focuses on efficiency. The goal is to arrange tools, equipment, and parts so that they encourage workflow.

Stage four is Seiketsu. It also translated as “Standardizing”. This simply means that work practices operate consistently and in a standardized manner.

Stage five or the last stage is Shitsuke, it also translated as “Sustain” which refers to maintaining high standards and reviewing those standards. It is a way to maintain focus on the this system of operation and not allowing people or processes to slip back into old habits.

by Tan Houng Chien 

Three characteristics of Kaizen: Continuous support, Incremental and Participative.

Kaizen can be summarized into three key characteristics that are continuous support, incremental and participative, without either one of these characteristics Kaizen will not be successful. Kaizen required continuous support because it is viewed as a never-ending journey towards quality and efficiency and it is a long-term orientation but one of the most common misunderstandings of Kaizen is when times goes by there is little room left for improvement (Singh & Singh, 2010; Netland & Aspelund, 2014). Companies in China even claimed to have completed the lean transformation years ago, and so have no need to engage in any kaizen activities (Zhao, 2007).

Secondly, Kaizen is also required incremental, incremental in improvement such organization or technological innovation (Bessant et al., 2001; Imai, 2012). And lastly, Kaizen to be said required participative because it required the involvement and intelligence of the all the workforce. Good kaizen activities need to involve everyone, the top management, managers, or workers (James et al., 2014). 

by Tan Houng Chien

Introduction of Kaizen

What is KAIZEN?

The word Kaizen can be separate into 2 parts: KAI and ZEN.  KAI (改) is defined as Improvement. Everything can be improved, any product, technology, work activity and production system, all can be improved as it mean. ZEN (善) is defined as Constantly improving, responds to each new opportunity, changing conditions, new information and can participate in it every worker (Kovacova,2012). Another definition of the Japanese meaning of Kaizen is "to take apart and put back together in a better way" (Mintion, 1998, p.19). It is a practice or philosophy that focuses on the continuous improvement of engineering, business management and manufacturing processes whilst reducing costs. For example, Kaizen is like Lean Manufacturing, during the improving standard tasks and activities in the production processes, it focuses on eliminating waste. 

by Tan Houng Chien

History of KAIZEN

Kaizen originated after the World War 2 (WWII) in Japan in 1950 when management and the government acknowledge that there was a problem in the current confrontation management system and a pending labour shortage. Japan sought to resolve this problem in cooperation with the workforce. The story of Kaizen miracle started in year 1930s where the founder of Toyota, Sakichi Toyoda which manufactured automatic looms at the time, liked to tell his co-workers: “Open the window; It is a big world out there”.

In the year 1950, Toyota implemented quality circles leading to the development of Toyota’s unique “Toyota Production System”. This Toyota system is a system of continuous improvement in quality, technology, processes, company culture, productivity, safety and leadership.

In 1986 Masaaki Imai only introduced to the Western world the Japanese term Kaizen and made it famous through his book, Kaizen: The Key to Japan's Competitive Success. Translated in fourteen languages, Kaizen became a fad the world over.

The 1993 edition of the New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary recognized the word Kaizen as an English word. The dictionary defines Kaizen as “continuous improvement of working practices, personal efficiency, etc., as a business philosophy.”

In year 1997, Imai introduced an evolved form of Kaizen in his book Gemba Kaizen: A Commonsense, Low-Cost Approach to Management, to reassert the importance of the shop floor in bringing about continual improvement in an organization. In essence, that translates into something of a corporate 'back to basics' philosophy. Gemba is where the product is actually manufactured, which could mean the assembly line in a manufacturing plant or the place where employees interact with customers in the service sector. It is "the place where the real work is done", as Imai likes to put it.

by Tan Houng Chien