Brilliant Customer Service Does Not Come Without Risk
In fact, creating brilliant customer service automatically develops a whole set of new problems. That’s why organisations that are consistently excellent at delivering 5 Star Service are also excellent at dealing with these 5 barriers:
The Spotlight
The super service spotlight magnifies everything. Previously minor issues and inconsistencies that wouldn’t be spotted are now noticed and amplified.
I remember on the publication of my book 5 Star Service here, there were times when if something went wrong for a customer (normally the smallest of things) we would receive a sarcastic email titled, ‘Not exactly five star service’. Even on our small scale, that felt jarring.
The Cost
There is zero chance of creating five star service without investment. Money is important, but time is essential. The best organisations make time to teach, share and develop DAILY.
The Humans
Having a team of twenty committed professionals, who want to provide brilliant service, means nothing if your customer is ‘served’ by the one person who doesn’t care or is having an off day. Stop complaining about how difficult it is to motivate Millennials and connect to what’s important to them. Remember the Baby Boomers thought the same about Generation X and the Gen Z’s will think the same about Gen Alpha*.
Yes I used The Google and a chart to write that last sentence.
The Speed
What do we want? Brilliant service!
When do we want it? Now!
Not Monday to Friday during office hours. Not if you ‘put that in writing’. Not if your standard turnaround time is 28 days. As much as you’d like your customers to ‘chill’ they expect you to be on it like Sonic.
The Values
Or should I say the Values Clashes? It’s easy to have a warm fuzzy company value based on delivering outstanding customer service. A value normally created at a ‘Senior Team Offsite’ between an excellent lunch and a jolly team-building exercise involving a metaphorical raft, fox, chicken and a bag of corn.
Two weeks later there’s a choice between hitting this quarter’s results (short term) or doing what’s right for the customer (longer term). And the hidden ‘protect your backside and increase profit no matter what’ unpublished value wins.
Tell me I’m wrong.
In fact, tell me what you think of this whole newsletter. Do you agree or have I missed the mark? What have I missed? I’ll send a copy of my book 5 Star Service here to our favourite.
Please leave your comment below.
Be Brilliant!
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