Zain Kuwait's Chief Executive Officer Eaman Al-Roudhan during the panel discussion.

KUWAIT: For the eighth time, Zain - the leading digital service provider in Kuwait - was ranked first in the 'Best Mobile Operator' and 'Best Internet Service Provider' categories in Kuwait for the year 2019 by Service Hero, the Arab World's only 100 percent consumer powered customer satisfaction index. The awards ceremony, supported by the Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Sciences (KFAS), was held in Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad Cultural Center (JACC) with the attendance of private sector leaders from across various fields.

The awards ceremony, which commemorated Service Hero's 10th anniversary, also witnessed a panel discussion titled 'Foundation for a Culture of Excellence' that featured Zain Kuwait's Chief Executive Officer Eaman Al-Roudhan, KFAS Director General Dr Adnan Shihab Eldin, and Service Hero President Faten Abu Ghazaleh.

Zain ranked first in the telecommunications sector within two categories for achieving the highest customer satisfaction scores by providing the best quality service standards in the Kuwaiti market. The awards came after an in-depth evaluation by Service Hero's independent advisory council, which recognized Zain's leadership in offering the best innovative digital services, as well as its relentless pursuit of excellence and innovation with the aim of achieving superior digital lifestyle transformation for its customer base, considered the biggest in Kuwait.

During the panel discussion, Zain Kuwait's CEO Eaman Al-Roudhan said: "first, I would like to express my appreciation and gratitude to Service Hero for their efficient role in highlighting and recognizing service provider excellence in the Kuwaiti private sector. Their vision goes in line with our vision at Zain, through which we continuously strive to achieve excellence in serving our customer base, the biggest in Kuwait."

Roudhan added: "achieving excellence requires consistency, which makes it a challenge that many companies face. Being a technology leader, we at Zain have to adapt to the constant evolution of this fast-paced sector. This is both challenging and a privilege for us at the same time."

Roudhan continued: "traditional and physical channels, most importantly stores, are still important and require constant investments and enhancements to elevate the procedures though which we directly interact with our customers. We also have a number of growing digital channels, which give us bigger challenges and need more education and investments to sustain them and make them effective."

Roudhan explained: "when we speak about customer service excellence and what Service Hero does, we usually talk about two faces of the same coin; the first being customer experience excellence through scientific research and data analytics, and the second being how this excellence impacts industries and service providers like Zain."

Roudhan added: "when we started measuring our customer satisfaction levels long ago, we started with traditional tools such as management meetings, surveys, case studies, and so on. Today, we rely on completely different ways to achieve this through our main channels, such as phone calls and SMSs, as well as our online channels like the Zain App. Through our app, we can simply send push notifications to our customers and put their feedback at the core of our decision-making process."

Roudhan continued: "today we also have the luxury of advanced tech tools, such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Deep Analytics, where we are able to process huge amounts of data to measure customer feedback, know how satisfied they are with our services, and find out what we need to improve the most. For example, today we can target a single customer's feedback instead of relying on feedback from an entire segment of 50,000 customers like we used to do five years ago. This adds a human touch, which greatly and positively affects our customer experience process, whether from the employee's side or the customer's side."

Roudhan concluded: "the private sector relies on innovation to achieve sustainable growth, and that is why we regard innovation as an essential tool for achieving excellence in all business areas, especially customer service. This year we celebrate the 10th anniversary of our innovative Zain Great Idea (ZGI) tech startup accelerator program, which started out as a simple CSR initiative, and have grown in the past few years into an innovation-centered engine that is now essential to achieving our sustainable goals."

Zain received the 'Best Mobile Operator' and 'Best Internet Service Provider' awards for achieving high rates of customer satisfaction. The recognition from Service Hero for the eighth time demonstrates Zain's commitment in providing its customers with the highest levels of service, further reinforcing its efforts in maintaining the values of its brand. The company is motivated to continue its pledge in providing innovative services to meet the needs of its customers as well as to facilitate their personal, professional, and business needs.

Service Hero appoints an Independent Advisory Council comprised of academic institutions as well as leading business professionals. As a neutral panel of experts, the Council's function is to supervise the assessment and ensure fair and empirical results that adhere to all procedures and norms.

Service Hero was established by a team of professionals keen on identifying companies that are service leaders in their market. This team is backed by an advisory council that is academic and independent, which assures results that are impartial, objective and accurately reflect people's preference. Service Hero's main goal is to measure the satisfaction level in the market by real consumers in order to help and empower companies to improve their service levels.