Once upon a time I worked for an organization where my primary responsibility was ‘customer service’. As an employee, I was rewarded monetarily for cross selling additional products. Here’s how it worked: We filled out forms with the number of customers we encouraged to accept additional services, and then went to meetings. The intent of the required meetings was to motivate employees. How? By giving more money to those who were the best at cross selling. That’s not an Ultimate Customer Experience™ — that’s not even ‘customer service’ in my book. Customers weren’t in the equation, just sales.
So I got the printed paper certificate and commission for leading the pack most every month I was employed there; but I also took a lot of flack from those I worked with. These motivational meetings didn’t encourage teamwork, but instead pitted colleagues against one another. I will admit that I’m competitive, and I wanted to win. But what about my customers? I know that I offered them my best advice insofar as which of our products would benefit them most — but did everyone?
If you have a Twitter account, you no doubt have heard of Twaxed — it’s the site that warns you to beware of what you share (because it will get Twaxed). I found the following post there:
So that post is what took me for a ride in the way-back machine, and I just brought you along to ride shotgun. I didn’t count ceiling tiles during meetings at my former place of employment, but I remember looking at cat hair on the sweaters of others, and thinking about why someone would wear scuffed high heels to a business meeting. It’s no wonder that as customers we feel that we aren’t appreciated — there are so many organizations that simply don’t “get it”. It’s not likely those who represent them — their employees — are going to do any better. They are simply too busy focusing on the rules (don’t chew gum, no shoes that show your toes, and you’ll be fired if you share your base salary with anyone), pushing a product and pretending to care.
Until that business philosophy changes everywhere, you’re going to have disgruntled employees providing poor experiences to unhappy customers who could care less that cookies and coffee are free in the lobby.