Futures Housing Group
Business Profile
Futures Housing Group are a regional provider of affordable homes, with a local focus that recognises the needs of communities. Futures Housing Group is made up of Amber Valley Housing and Daventry and District Housing. The group benefits from shared services in the areas of HR, IT, procurement, communications, development, regeneration and asset management, as well as finance, business improvement, governance, health, safety and the environment. These shared services enable the two housing companies to deliver effective frontline services and add capacity.
The Challenge
The historic nature of the sector meant that services and processes were designed around the housing stock as the asset of the company. Futures Housing Group recognise their tenants as the most important asset in their business and the key to their future growth. To be able to more effectively serve their customers Futures Housing Group have embarked upon a customer insight project. The big supermarkets are a good example of a sector who effectively utilise customer insight; the information gleamed from reward cards helps them to tailor their offer and how they communicate to individual customers and target groups.
FHG recognise the numerous potential benefits to the business customer insight could deliver, including:
- Personalised and more effective communication with individual and groups of tenants.
- New business opportunities to deliver services to respond to the needs of their customers.
How
Futures Housing Group recognised the various facets required for the successful integration of customer insight activity. These included addressing processes and systems such as the need for successful integration into existing IT systems and databases, and the soft skills of awareness raising and change management.
In conversation with University of Derby Corporate, it became apparent that a Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) could enable the company to achieve its goals through the recruitment of a full time person to deliver this project - the Associate. The Associate is then supported by an academic supervisor, or team of supervisors from the University with the expertise and knowledge to facilitate the project delivery.
The Result
Following approval of the application for a KTP, the collaborative team embarked on this ambitious project in November 2010, when Robert Fowles was recruited as the Associate. Futures Housing Group now have a dedicated person working on this project. Robert has already:
- Undertaken analysis of customer insight, highlighting areas of best practice from public and private sector organisation to incorporate into their own plans
- Began consultation with internal stakeholders to ensure that awareness of customer insight and its importance is fully understood.
Conclusion
The project is currently ongoing and the KTP programme will finish May 2012. Whilst some of the benefits of the project are starting to accrue, the customer insight project will leave a legacy long after its conclusion.
