Here in Toronto, our public transit system — the TTC (Toronto Transit Commission) is currently the focus of considerable negative attention by the public. The public is lashing out at the union as well as management — pointing fingers and making suggestions about how they should each do things differently.

General discontentment was smouldering because of a fare increase earlier this year, but their outrage escalated when a picture was posted on Twitter which showed a ticket agent sleeping in their ticket booth.

The public was rightly outraged.

The senior union official chastised the public for assuming the person was sleeping and not having medical difficulties (he was sleeping). His focus is on protecting his members — regardless of the issue.

Management is focused on having trains running on time, on budget. Noble objectives — but only part of delivering customer service.

No one seems to be focused on understanding or delivering good, consistent customer service.

The issues here are complex, but one fundamental truth is at work. People within the organization are not aligned with a focus on the customer.

The problem isn’t with either the unions or the management. This organization needs a complete change in culture and no one seems to be willing to work together and make the hard decisions to change the current culture.

They need to start by getting aligned around a common goal — defining and delivering an exceptional customer experience.

Once that happens, the various combative elements can begin to start focusing on the common goal instead of their individual goals.

My Perspective: Regardless of our business, we too often get caught up focusing on our department goals and forgetting the overall organizational goal which is serving customers.

By creating this common focus we break down our silos and start working together towards a common goal.

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Bill is recognized as the Performance Excelerator™ because of his uncanny ability to create profound change and deliver extraordinary results with the most demanding organizations.

For additional information please visit www.billhogg.ca or email: bill [at] billhogg [dot] ca

Recently Disney introduced their program Give a Day, Get a Disney Day. This is a program where Disney offers a free ticket to one of their theme parks in exchange for volunteering a day to a local organization.

A great idea that has the ability to generate tremendous goodwill for Disney and make a positive impact within local communities.

However, I wonder if they realized the torrent of volunteers they would unleash on unprepared volunteer organizations.

My daughter noticed the ads for this program and immediately wanted to participate. This program will help her earn her required volunteer hours for high school (a requirement here in Ontario), plus, when we travel to Florida for March Break, she would have a free ticket to a theme park

However, when we tried to participate, the following issues arose;

• The website did not function properly making it difficult to access volunteer opportunities
• When we were able to access the volunteer sign-up section, they all didn’t work properly and email responses were not received to confirm that you had registered
• When a couple of the volunteer organizations were contacted directly, they indicated they had been overwhelmed by volunteers — hundreds each day beginning the first week of January. Possibly this is why the website wasn’t working properly
• When talking to the volunteer organizations, we discovered we were not the only people having difficulty getting connected through the website. They were receiving numerous calls, further increasing their workload.
• Very few opportunities were early enough in the year to qualify people to have a confirmed voucher to use during the Canadian March Break — a key time of year for Canadian visitors to Florida. This desire to qualify before March Break is possibly a reason for the overwhelming response to the program so early.

My Perspective: It is not my intention to criticize this wonderful program, but to remind us of 3 things;

1. When evaluating any program, make sure you look at issues from all your customer segments — not just the most obvious. Canadians make up a small percentage of North American visitors, but they are still a large group of unsatisfied consumers.
2. Bullet-proof your systems. Need we I say more!
3. Even the best organizations drop the ball from time to time — so don’t beat yourself up, just take the necessary steps to recover

Footnote: I received a prompt email response from the Canadian organization when I sent an email earlier today asking for help. However, this help was simply to provide an email address for the US administrators. It will be interesting to see how Disney handles this situation. I’ll keep you informed.

Sign-up for my Monthly Newsletter to have 1 article with tools & techniques for excelerating high-performance cultures delivered to your inbox each month.

Bill is recognized as the Performance Excelerator™ because of his uncanny ability to create profound change and deliver extraordinary results with the most demanding organizations.

For additional information please visit www.billhogg.ca or email: bill [at] billhogg [dot] ca

I trust everyone had a restful holiday season and are energized about the coming year. I know I am. New Years is traditionally a time for reflection and planning and today’s post is about exactly that.

Over the holiday’s I had breakfast at Chez Cora’s – a franchise restaurant that specializes in breakfast. It has an excellent reputation locally for appetizing breakfasts that are presented well.

 On this particular morning I felt like an omelette, but wanted one that wasn’t listed on the menu — a Western with no onions. I was told “no”, all the ingredients for the omelettes are pre-made and no variation was allowed.

Resultant, I ordered a ham and cheese omelette and went about my day.

However, a few days later I happened on their website and noticed a section called “History of our Plates”. In it were 4 stories about how specific dishes came to be. Of interest, was how all 4 of these stories focused on how someone had requested something that was not on the standard menu that led to the new signature dish.

Interesting.

Their website/brand heralds back to the early days of fresh ingredients and personalized family service, however, the reality is that the franchise has become a “chain” no longer aligned to their historical values and culture. Success has eroded the values of this organization and brand and they have become a quick serve business dressed up to look like a family restaurant.

Business is still good, but one has to wonder, as they get further away from the values that made them successful, will another restaurant step in and take their business and Cora’s won’t ever understand why.

My Perspective: Today’s question is has your success or business caused you to lose sight of what your fundamental values are? Are your values and your actions aligned?

 In your desire to become efficient and profitable, is it possible some of the values that made you special or unique — or exceptional — have gotten lost.

Take the time in the New Year to re-examine what makes you unique from your competitors and make sure that edge hasn’t gotten lost.

Sign-up for my Monthly Newsletter to have 1 article with tools & techniques for excelerating high-performance cultures delivered to your inbox each month.

Bill is recognized as the Performance Excelerator™ because of his uncanny ability to create profound change and deliver extraordinary results with the most demanding organizations.

For additional information please visit www.billhogg.ca or email: bill [at] billhogg [dot] ca