Customer Service That Astonishes

I read a post by Dumb Little Man that encourages people to focus on their strengths versus their weaknesses. This advice seems counter-intuitive, since we all should be striving for improvement in our lives — and our businesses.

Their point is “you’ve got the potential to go further with your natural strengths than you do with your weaknesses.”

When we build on our strengths, we continue to set ourselves apart from others who do not share the same strengths. It contributes to our uniqueness that makes us memorable — either as a person or a business.

If we spend too much time trying to shore up our weaknesses, then we become exceptional at nothing — a “Jack of all trades, master of none”.

I agree, with a minor adjustment.

Where I think this statement needs further clarification is in the area of Character. Where we have weakness in our character, we need to work on that immediately. Character issues like integrity, trustworthiness, dependability etc. must all be aligned with our personal values and if we have identified any area where we need work — it should be a critical priority.

My Perspective: Strength of character must come first. Whether, personally, in business or when hiring — strong character is essential for success.

But once those essentials are in place, then work on your strengths in your areas of competence or skills. Make sure that you are leveraging these to create an unbeatable advantage over the competition and you will become known as the person or business who is the unrivaled expert in that area. A description that is never used to describe a Jack of All Trades.

Recently we had a very poor experience with our local dry cleaners — poor enough that we have stopped using them after years of patronage.

My wife took my daughter to have a dress altered for her Grade 8 graduation formal. A little tuck on each side.

When my wife picked up the dress she was told this small alteration was $50.00 — much higher than she was led to believe when she dropped it off. The owner indicated that he would adjust the price accordingly. However, the entire time my wife was in the shop, no explanation for the increase was offered — in fact, the seamstress didn’t even acknowledge her.

When my daughter tried on the dress we discovered it was significantly too small. The zipper would no longer close by approx 4 inches.

At this point, my wife was very upset and my daughter almost in tears because she thought the dress which we had purchased in Florida during March Break for her special evening was ruined.

After my wife’s poor experience, I decided to take my daughter and the dress back to the Dry Cleaners to address the situation. When we arrived the seamstress had left for the day, but we were able to speak to the owner who apologized and assured my daughter that she would have her dress for the evening — even if it meant they had to purchase another one. He readily agreed that the alterations were incorrect and he requested that I bring my daughter back with the dress when the seamstress was there and he would personally see that the appropriate alterations would be made.

When we returned, we had the dress marked and altered by the seamstress and my daughter was able to wear the dress to her formal — however, the seams down the side were now off-centre because the material that was cut from the initial alterations needed to be “found” by pulling some of the pleating from the front of the dress.

In the end my daughter’s dress was saved, but my wife and I were not interested in returning because of the poor treatment by the seamstress and we have never been back to the Dry Cleaners.

Some key elements were;

• the owner immediately apologised and assured us that the situation would be resolved
• the seamstress did not offer a sincere apology
• there was no offer to compensate us for our inconvenience (5 visits vs. 2)
• the Owner admitted that the seamstress was not an employee (I assume she rented space) and therefore there wasn’t much he could do about her attitude
• every employee or contractor counts towards your impression

My Perspective: Because “everything counts” you must be careful about your associations. In this case the Dry Cleaner had allowed someone who didn’t share their values to impact on their customers. Resultant, her poor attitude ended a relationship the owners had worked hard to nurture. When we had such a bad experience — even when it wasn’t their core business — we never returned.

Hiring properly is one of the keys to engaged employees — making sure that the people you hire are the kind of people you want as part of your team.

I recently went to the hardware store looking for a part for a door. The first person pointed me in the right direction – no luck. I asked a second person who directed me to a third person who directed me to a fourth person.

Finally the fourth person took me directly to the appropriate section and then when they were also unable to find the correct part, looked on the computer to find it.

Everyone one in this chain had the “competence” of knowing where to look, but only 1 person had the “character” to make the time to take me there.

At Pret a Manger, they hire happy people and teach them how to make sandwiches versus trying to teach people who know how to make sandwiches how to be happy.

Be clear on the character you want and then make sure your hiring practices build in the behavioural requirements.

Cheers!

I came across an excellent post in The Insider that you should read if you haven’t already done so. It features an interview with Jay Chapman, Head of Communications at Pret a Manger (a sandwich shop chain).

The thing that struck me was the similarities between one of the key business practices between Pret a Manger and The Ritz-Carlton. They both place very high emphasis on recruitment.

Like The Ritz-Carlton, prior to formal interviews for any role, all candidates (for any position within Pret) must work on the shop floor for a day. The team who works there gets a say on whether the candidate will fit in with the team there or whether they would like the person to work for Pret. If the answer is no, the candidate isn’t hired.

In this way the shop teams make decisions on who the next Purchasing Manager, the next Customer Service Advisor and the next Property Director are. On top of that, all new recruits spend a week or two working in the shop at the start of their employment.

Pret invests a lot in their recruitment process to make sure that their business is filled with “Pret people” from top to bottom and they actively encourage employees to bring their own personalities to work.

Jay believes this investment pays off one hundredfold — 60% of staff at Pret’s head office began life on the shop floor — and they know the business inside out.

Incidentally, ‘head office’ is described by Pret people as, ‘Hudsons Place’. This is because the people at Hudsons Place truly don’t believe they are any more important than the people on the shop floor – they’re just fulfilling a different function. This attitude of respect, treating everyone the same seems to run throughout Pret.

That kind of attitude comes from the top and sets the tone for the entire organizational culture.

So regardless of what kind of business you are in there is a lesson to be learned about hiring. Determine the culture you want and then design your recruitment to find those people.

At Pret, there is one quality which is an absolute must if you want to join the team – happiness. “You can’t hire someone who can make sandwiches and teach them to be happy,” says Jay, “So we hire happy people and teach them to make sandwiches”. This is hiring based on character versus competence, which you then train.

What are the key qualities you need to hire for — and importantly, how have you designed your recruitment process to find those people.

Cheers!

Wow, what a run of bad luck Tim’s is having these days.

First, firing an employee for giving a child a FREE TimBit, and now, not allowing a pregnant homeless women to eat her breakfast in the restaurant.

The important learning is that it doesn’t matter that Tim Hortons has a basis for either of these actions. What matters is that customers across Canada are not happy with the corporate behavior.

But in neither case, was this corporate behaviour — it was a specific individual acting in what they felt was a totally appropriate manner. Can these be any louder warnings for us about the critical importance of working with our employees on the customer service experience they are providing.

Tim Hortons has been a good corporate citizen. They are a big sponsor of local community activities in sports, culture and the arts — yet all of that money is being totally over shadowed by “unpaid media” that suggests the company is uncaring. Plus, I would guess, considerable time and money are now being spent to minimize and undo the damage created by there 2 recent situations.

How much better to have spent this time and money making sure employees understand and internalize the corporate culture.

So when the value of spending funds to create a customer-focus culture in the organization is questioned — remember these examples.

It doesn’t matter how well the head office gets it or how much you spend on training “what to do”, if your employees don’t embrace your customer service experience and understand how to interpret the policies in the context of the brand values you have developed, you will continually be fighting fires likes these.

It’s the difference between hiring and training for competence versus character.

Cheers!