Kevin W. McCarthy

The Professor of On-Purpose

Business Services

Are You Line or Staff?

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Think Inc! is Pillar 2 in The On-Purpose Business Person: The Mindset.

 

Being a line manager or staff person defines the role of one’s job, but it need not define your attitude and approach to your job.

In this On-Purpose® Business Minute, let’s explore a structural reality that affects on-the-job performance, often negatively. It need not be so if one is simply willing to see the job differently and Think Inc!—the mindset of being a line leader even if you have a staff job.

The absence of leadership is often cited.

When you’ve had a lousy customer service experience it is most often because someone wasn’t willing to make a decision or someone else away from the situation had created a broad, inflexible policy. There’s little worse than having a customer service person (staff person) cite you the limitations of their job and why they can’t help you.

When the overarching cloud of their superior’s policies outweighs the frontline person’s inherent common sense and desire to do right for their customer, everyone suffers.

Here’s an example from a few years ago. Judith and I were flying from Washington, DC, back to Orlando on a 6:00 PM flight. I discovered there was an earlier flight to Orlando at 3:00. We showed up at the airport at 1:30 to see if we could catch a ride on the early flight with US Airways. Good news—they had plenty of seats and would be happy to change our seats for $75 each. Being a travel veteran over the decades, I said, “What if we fly standby and take open seats on an as-available basis?” It seemed like a straight-forward logical win-win request.

Stupid me! I was told that we couldn’t get on the earlier flight because “US Airways needed to generate revenue on those seats.” Pardon me, I thought I had paid for two seats and they were already generating revenue from our business. Under the logic of airline seats being a “perishable product” my practical argument was, “Hey, if the empty seats haven’t filled within 90 minutes of flight time, don’t you have a higher probability of selling seats on the later flight that is almost full?”

What was I thinking? “Why should US Airways want to take care of the passengers standing at the gate while increasing their own odds with getting some yet-to-show-up new passenger to pay for the later flight?” But that’s the way my mind works.

US Airways, however, has a scarcity mindset … the customer wants something we have, we already have their money, so let’s gouge them for some extra revenue instead of accommodating their request. Even the ticket agents and customer service person were visibly unhappy about having to enforce a logical customer request that was thwarted by policies called, “We need to earn revenue on that seat.” I was given that as an excuse by multiple people over numerous times. Wow, how degrading and transactional to quote policy like that to the customer.

By the way, we decided to hang on to our $150 and took our scheduled flight.

US Airways gets my nomination for being off-purpose with this matter. Not surprisingly, a Google search for their corporate purpose, vision, mission, or values reveals none.

To the credit of US Airways, their front line counter agent and supervisor tried to be helpful within their limitations. We traveled home safely and for that, I’m thankful to US Airways.

Be On-Purpose!

Kevin

 

Creating Customer Service Excellence?

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Customer service is first an attitude before it is a behavior. Too often we focus on creating excellent customer service skills but we neglect the well-being and perspective of the person delivering it. How a customer is treated makes all the difference to their impression, experience, and promotion—yes, promotion—of your business.

Treat your customers right—first, because it is the right thing to do in a civil society. Second, treat them right because it is really smart business.

Do you have a concerted effort to improve the customer experience? If not, why not?

Customer service would appear to rest mostly on the shoulders of the front-line person interacting with the customer.

But does it really? Long before the customer relationship begins the top leaders of the organization hire the employees, set the standards, make investments, train managers, and create training programs.

The front-line employee is an easy target when things go wrong with customer service complaints. Admittedly, the front-line person does have a high responsibility. The fact is customer service improvement is a joint effort unified and girded by the strength of personal leadership across the entire team.

If your customer service levels have plateaued below your standards, then consider that you might have a systemic problem rather than a people challenge. Look to your business strategy, departmental cooperation, hiring, technology, training, or any number of issues under the purview of the “Customer Service” department.

Customer service skills training may provide a quick fix, but it is rarely a long-term improvement in the customer experience.

Watch this On-Purpose Minute, “Do Good Manners Matter?” about the importance of manners and the Ritz-Carlton approach to serving “ladies and gentlemen.” Having recently stayed at the Ritz-Carlton in Buckhead, GA I can tell you that this approach remains alive and well.

How On-Purpose Partners can help you

If you lead the company, you may need an assessment and recommendation to shift your corporate culture toward customer service excellence. We also offer one-on-one executive coaching as well as training and development programs designed to help your team members become TOP Performers and excellent in their customer service. Email us to arrange an appointment.

Two Views of Human Nature and Work

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The On-Purpose Approach attempts many things.  One of the most significant is the meaningful integration of life and work.  The On-Purpose Business Person opens with the quote below by Bill O’Brien, former CEO of Hanover Insurance Company, a pioneer in creating learning organizations with a moral core.

Two ViewsMake no mistake about it, we are in the midst of this transformation.  The tough shift from industrial age command and control management to the knowledge age of employee engagement has begun.  I believe O’Brien understood that when a person’s heart is in their work miracles can happen.

The problem is rarely at the personal level, however.   People want to engage meaningfully in their work and they want their work to make a difference or contribute to the well-being of others.  Sadly, on far too many jobs, the ability to connect the dots between the work and difference making has too much distance between dots.  The big picture and greater vision is lost in the efficiency of a time motion study expert’s standard measures of physical output and production.

Leaders are emerging who recognize the power to be found in systematically being organized around “the effects of work on the person,” including the employees, customers, shareholders, and community.   This added dimension is messy because it doesn’t lend itself to the left brained measures of industrial engineering nor is this about social justice or welfare.  A business must create value and capture profit or it ceases to exist.  Business is not about the “objective view” or “subjective view” but the “integrated view”.  Rather than an either/or, this is a both/and approach.

The burden of business design falls upon the leaders of organizations to find the appropriate blend for their business.  Many people are hungry to engage in meaningful work that profits society and shareholders alike. It all begins with an awareness of one’s point of view.

The On-Purpose Business attempts to provide four simple “Pillars” to usher in the next generation in business design and organizational development.

Personally, should you come across an organization that is about creating “the wholeness of their people,” then run to that organization.

I’ve posted the above slide at the request of several leaders who saw my presentation, “Minding Your Business, On-Purpose” at the Take Shape For Life (now Optavia) Go Global Leadership Conference.  For two years I had the honor to be a keynote speaker and influence with their health coaches.

I know why.  In my decades of being a business owner and business advisory, TSFL gets the “wholeness of people” concept head and shoulders better than any business I’ve witnessed.  Their stock price reflects their integrated approach.  Dr. Wayne Andersen, Dan Bell, and Brad McDonald have created something truly special when they laid the foundations of this business… and it keeps getter better with time and growth.

When people and profits are aligned with synergy and meaning, growth is inevitable.  Are you prepared to step boldly into the twenty-first century Bill O’Brien predicted?  Are you ready to be on-purpose?

Be On-Purpose!

Kevin