Employees need to see the fundamental connection between the work they do every day and its impact on customers. They must experience firsthand the deep satisfaction of earning their customers' heartfelt gratitude and loyalty. If they don't, then their jobs are just jobs—they may do as they're told, but they won't bring much energy, enthusiasm, or creativity to the workplace.

Building an employee and team environment focused on loyalty starts with selecting the right people to fill key customer-facing and customer-impacting positions. With the addition of formal training for customer-centric behaviors combined with regular, formal coaching, employees are put in a position to succeed in the mission of earning customer advocacy.

Regular customer feedback matched with the appropriate recognition* reinforces this culture and allows a company to earn not just employee satisfaction or engagement, but true employee advocacy and an inspired workforce.

*Based on Bain's experience, financial incentives for frontline employees often result in poor behavior; instead, consider non-financial benefits such as awards for service.