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Janelle Barlow and her co-authors always write well: the message is generally clear and the language is simple. As with her earlier book, The Complaint is a Gift, I got a great deal out of this book, Emotional Value. Very early on I was convinced that, indeed, American businesses do not adequately embrace the Emotional Value concept, at least not sufficiently to use it as a critical operational underpinning. I was also convinced that the narrower notion of Emotional Value very effectively requires the reader to look more closely at the broader notion of the experience economy. (Which I did, to my great satisfaction.) Like The Complaint is a Gift, Emotional Value is a starting place that simply makes sense. To have these ideas so clearly spelled out is a boon for all who are ready to buy into it. But it is of great interest to me that neither of these books - or their central ideas - are being adopted or even considered on any large scale by the one industry that needs them the most: the American Health Care Delivery System. These books, on their own, are simply not compelling to those who would resist. Part of the problem has to do with oversimplification, for example, seeing "unconscious reactions" only as having a negative impact: on page 34, the authors want to "reduce the impact of unconscious reactions ... let us live consciously." In reality, the appeal is to establish an alternative set of unconscious (as well as conscious) reactions that add to rather than detract from the sales or service situation. In reality, we want to shape, not abrogate our unconscious motivations. Further, the relationship of emotional value as a strategy to the experience economy as a concept is not always clear. Part of the message seems to be that since the emotional value approach focuses on the experiences of the customer, that emotional value, inter alia, is a manifestation of the experience economy concept. Emotional value is rather simply a nicely crafted and smart approach to the service economy. And the book does this task well: It convinced me that there is something beyond simply commodities, products and services that current and future business enterprises will be able to offer consumers. I am ready to make the experience economy part of the health care industry. Thank you Janelle and Diana.

just needed it for school saved a lot of dollars for a book that I really didn't want to buy.

Great

Since Howard Gardner first popularized the idea of multiple intelligences, thinkers and authors have been noticing that there is a vast difference in the "emotional intelligence" that people have for noticing others and responding appropriately to them. Daniel Goleman wrote a wonderful book developing that theme. He argues that emotional intelligence can be learned. In Emotional Value, Janelle Barlow and Dianna Maul take that one step further and identify what needs to be learned and how it should be learned.
Their point is simple and profound. "Both staff and customers tend to stay with organizations that enable them to experience positive, meaningful, and personally important feelings, even if the organizations cannot always provide everything they want or solve all their problems." Few will disagree. The conclusion builds on the work of Jeffrey Pfeffer in The Human Equation.
There are many important consequences to that observation. First, it costs a lot of money to get customers. It's much more profitable to keep the ones you have than to get new ones (see The Loyalty Effect). Second, if you can deal with the same customers and employees, the results usually are better. Third, with lower staff turnover, costs of hiring and training are lower . . . and operating costs are lower, too. Fourth, bonding can be created among customers and employees that will allow them to derive more value from being involved with the company. Fifth, these improvements are critical in many industries. Most people shift from one supplier to another because dissatisfaction with service, not price or produce offerings. (See The Customer-Driven Company). Sixth, in this stock-market-driven economy, the economic advantages will translate into a higher stock price which can be used to add more and lower-cost resources for the company.
Basically, improving emotional value can be the start of creating a virtuous cycle of self-reinforcing improvement for an enterprise.
I would be remiss if I did not point out that those who emphasize the importance of values and corporate culture are dealing with some facets of emotional value. What is brilliant about this work is that it transcends this earlier excellent work to take it to a higher plane. You can have great values and a wonderful corporate culture, and still have an emotionally damaging work environment for many of your people and customers.
The authors identify five key elements for making this virtuous cycle a reality:
(1) Build an Emotion-Friendly Service Culture
(2) Choose to Develop Emotional Competence
(3) Maximize Customer Experience (see The Experience Economy -- "positive, emotional, and memorable impact") and Empathy
(4) View Complaints as Emotional Opportunities
(5) Use Emotional Communications to Increase Customer Loyalty
As you can tell from my references to many other works, this book builds on excellent studies done by others. Yet, the synthesis here is new and improved. Essentially the book is "a call for civility, empathy, and authenticity in dealing with customers." That goes well beyond the familiar concept of "The customer is always right." That concept usually is applied to mean that the employee who works with the customer must be downtrodden and suffer. Burnout is a major problem among frontline service employees, as a result.
Ms. Barlow and Ms. Maul see beyond that current stalemate. They realize that the interaction between company and customer can be uplifting for both. Mother Teresa drew great pleasure from helping poor people die with dignity. Doing our work with civility, empathy, and authenticity can add a similar sense of worth to our labors, as well as providing a wonderful, emotionally-rewarding experience for customers.
I especially liked the call to action: "It is the service providers' responsibility to manage the emotions in service exhanges." How many CEOs, executives, and managers are thinking about that? Wow! Before you leave that point, consider that 80 percent of all U.S. jobs are expected to soon be service jobs.
The appendices and notes are unusually good in this book. Be sure to take time to review them.
The primary weakness of the book is that the sections that allow you to assess where your company or organization is today could be more detailed and specific.
When you have finished the book, take some time to imagine the ideal emotional exchanges that could be occurring in your business and organization every day. Then start to design them and teach others how to make them easy, authentic, memorable, and enjoyable to provide. Have a ball!

Janelle Barlow and Dianna Maul go a step beyond most consultants (those who write business books to drum up customers). Instead, they offer a wealth of scholarly research and sources in their in-depth, colorfully written book, which successfully tackles the enormous role that emotions play in business and customer behavior. They explain and document it, and provide practical applications. We at getAbstract recommend this important book to all business people, whether they offer a product or a service, from CEOs through every level of staff.