The perception of technological progress is very ambivalent in different cultures. Ultimately, this also has an influence on the acceptance of service technologies. Internationally positioned companies should be aware of this.
New technologies influence our everyday lives and the professional world in many different ways. They are often both a blessing and a curse. In most cases, they make our lives easier or ensure that we can organize our work more efficiently. At the same time, however, this relationship also results in ever greater dependency. For example, advancing digitalization in industry is unfortunately also creating a greater risk of cybercrime in the form of industrial espionage or sabotage. In addition, digitalization projects can also worsen the efficiency of processes if they are not managed properly.
Nevertheless, tech innovations must not be overlooked in service!
The biggest enemy of progress, apart from some justified concerns, is in most cases human inertia. Why go to the trouble of testing new technologies and learning how to use them when everything is fine at the moment and sales are good? The answer is simple: the competition never sleeps! In addition to other machine and plant manufacturers, increasing digitalization means that more and more IT companies can compete with OEMs in this country and grab market share. If tech innovations are planned and implemented correctly, they therefore represent an indispensable competitive advantage in service.
The The future of service will be characterized by fundamentally changing customer needs. Find out how you can adapt to this.
Germany brings up the rear
With this in mind, we should perhaps look at our domestic service landscape with some concern. After all, Germany is in last place when it comes to technology acceptance compared to other countries (see chart below). In this country, people tend to prefer the evolutionary development of machines rather than being inspired by revolutionary innovations. To a certain extent, this is understandable. After all, Germany is a country with a strong economy and excellent mechanical engineering. Much has already been done right in the past. However, we should not allow ourselves to be blinded by past success and miss out on decisive developments.
Incidentally, Switzerland is also difficult to impress with advanced technologies in the service sector. If your company operates exclusively in the DACH region, you may therefore want to consider testing technological innovations in Austria first. Things look a little better here.
In the ServiceLobby there are already articles on the results for Service culture in Germany, Austria and the Switzerland. All of the data discussed relates to the survey I conducted as part of my doctoral thesis in 2018. Around 1600 service customers from 30 different countries were asked about their attitudes towards new service technologies such as smart glasses, cloud-based services and video technologies. - Dr. Simon Tonat
Sweden and the Netherlands are innovation leaders in Europe
The most open-minded service customers on this continent can be found in Sweden and the Netherlands. This is not surprising, as these countries are also considered to be rather progressive in other areas. Despite its small population, Sweden is one of the leading scientific countries in the world and the Netherlands is not known for its excessive conservatism.
China and Brazil achieve the best result
Service customers in China and Brazil have the least reservations about new technologies worldwide. While the Chinese are generally known for their enthusiasm for progress, Brazil is perhaps the surprise winner of our ranking. The Brazilian population is comparatively young and therefore probably already very tech-savvy in general. This open attitude was also reflected in the service sector during the survey.
Test service innovations in countries with high technology acceptance!
Based on the results presented, you can see which nations have proven to be particularly tech-savvy in terms of service in the survey. You can use this information to switch to locations in countries that have a more positive attitude towards such innovations when testing new service technologies. In this way, you can prevent profitable approaches from being discarded too quickly due to a fundamental defensive attitude. As soon as innovations have already established themselves somewhere else, such defense mechanisms are often weakened.
In some nations, a little more educational work needs to be done!
In some countries, the implementation of service innovation projects requires additional communication efforts. There is often a feeling that new technologies are introduced for their own sake and do not actually bring any significant benefits. Of course, sometimes there really are such service hipsters, where everything has to be cyber-big-data-and-digitalized on principle, without a close examination of the economic efficiency and process effectiveness taking place. This is why you should perhaps communicate the benefits of your project to customers a little more intensively and at greater length in some places so that you are not mistaken for such a yuppie. In the end, you will often achieve an appropriate level of acceptance here too.
Source: Dr. Simon Tonat: The influence of national culture on customers' attitude towards product accompanying services (2018)
