Client Satisfaction Studies

Joyce,
I don't think you are going to find any "norms" relating to internal customer satisfaction. The truth is most companies don't even publicly publish that type of data (it sort of falls into the category of "airing the laundry" or maybe "airing the dirty laundry").

The bottom line really is "What level of satisfaction (or dissatisfaction) is acceptable to your companies management?" or maybe "How many complaints will management listen to before doing something about it?"

In my opinion, trying to determine "norms" and grading yourself on whether you meet those "norms" is really a waste of time and you end up short-changing your customers.

"I'm sorry that you are very unsatisfied with how we provide this service , but our scores exceed the "norm" for this service among companies in our business sector. Therefore, you just have to live with it!" Somehow, I don't think that would go over well.

Your time is much better spent in determining why people are unsatisfied and how to fix it (if it can be fixed).

Taking into consideration the fact that some people are going to be unhappy no matter how you operate, and the fact the some people will be happ with some services and not others, if the vast majority of your users are not happy with the services you provide (regardless of whether that might be "normal" elsewhere), you need to do something about it.

I know this isn't the answer you were looking for, but I hope it helps anyway.

I would second the sentiment of Answer #1. Satisfaction is a sliding scale sort of thing, and what really is "normal", anyway? I think probably every IT department worth it's weight would strive to achieve 100% satisfaction, and yet know that not everyone is going to be happy 100% of the time, they may never get to that level. Someone's always going to have an axe to grind about something.

Perhaps the better benchmark would be to set a level. Pick one - 90%, 85%, 95%, whatever. Set out to see if you can meet that level. Then do what you can to improve from there for the next period of reveiew (3 months, 6 months, whatever). And so on. That way, you're really only holding yourself accountable to your own users and management. Which is what's really important in an intangible environment anyway - it's not like you're measuring the output of machinery, finished goods, etc... But if you can show your management that you attained xx% satisfaction to begin with, and improved that to xx% satisfaction in the next reporting period, then to xx% the one after that, you can show progress.

Hope this helps.