There are a few companies who have figured out how to provide truly great customer service. They hire rigorously at every level, they train like mad, and they use massive databases to both orchestrate processes and anticipate customer needs.
Last week, on vacation, my resort knew my dinner had been a bit slow one night… before we said anything. The next day, the dining manager sought me out at my lounge chair, greeted me by name, and explained that my upcoming dinner rez was smack during a rush and that dinner could very likely be slow again. He then gave me two different options (dif time, dif restaurant) when he could guarantee me faster service. And he apologized for any inconvenience from the night before.
Think this one guy was something special? What if I told you that employees at the resort acted like that universally? For instance:
- Everyone—everyone—said hello to us, all the time. If you think it gets tedious hearing people say “Buenos tardes!” all the time, rest assured, it does not.
- Everyone could help with any problem. When my shuttle was late picking me up, I asked a passing maid if she could help me. She called the dispatcher for me from her walkie-talkie. No questions asked.
- Managers of the various resort areas knew me by name by the second day. So did restaurant hostesses and pool runners.
- Housekeeping timed turn down service to coincide with when we were at dinner.
- As the resort was spread out, the staff used golf carts extensively to get around. (1) Guests were encouraged to hitch rides, and (2) in a “traffic jam,” pedestrians came first, carts with guests came second, carts with staff came third. Always.
Where does flawless customer service start? A few things to get you rolling:
- You, as a leader, treat every living soul with respect. This is important; am I being clear?
- Fire the next person who acts as if laborers are less important than strategists… and the next person after that.
- Make customer service your top priority. Not that customers are always right, they just come first.
- Explicitly show linkages between departments, projects, and customer service.
- Make data transparent. (Give housekeeping access to the restaurant’s reservation system.)
- Don’t let your customers ever know how hard you have to work to meet a request.
- Set service levels that have nothing to do with industry standards, and everything to do with what you would want as a customer.
- Get to work early.
- Instill a culture of “find a way or make one.” You should have a zero-tolerance policy for saying “that’s not my job.”
- Manage appearances; presentation matters. Ensure your style matches your vibe.
- Unused upgrades cost you nothing, but mean a lot to your customers. Give them away.
These steps are all manageable, and lead to premium service that can command premium prices. So if you think you need to settle for offering poor customer service where you work, I’ve just called bullshit on you.
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We used to say, “Find a way to say yes, instead of a reason to say no.” It can be brutally difficult to wean service staff away from dependence on “But our policy is….” Customers don’t care what your policy is, nor do they like to be reminded that they’re just another client-widget in a fungible pile of client-widgets — which is precisely happens when you try to apply a blanket rule to the customer’s unique request/complaint.
Customers — like all of us — need most of all to feel heard and understood, and service organizations need to think outside the policy binder to do this. Critical thinking skills can be incredibly tough to find (and even harder to develop), but it sounds like your resort has built the recruiting, selection, training and leadership culture to make it happen every day.
Nordstrom’s and Stew Leonard’s were famous for this; as is Zingerman’s Deli in Ann Arbor. So, are you going to tell us donde esta este paraiso del servicio?
Great post…and how many of us feel. Just had similar resort stay at Beaches in Turks & Caicos where people went out of their way to be sure we were taken care of.
And bad experience with Disney…yes, Disney. I went to return an item in Disney World which had been bought at a mall store…it was Christmastime, the gift given my daughter didn’t fit, we wanted to get the right size for under the tree for the 25th. Nope – can’t do it – that store and this store are different…no exchanges…I could rent a car and go to the mall about 20 minutes away to take care of the exchange but not on property. Result – no gift under tree for Christmas and me = bullsh**
What resort were you guys at…sounds like we may want to try it some day.
@Ken—Policy (in the way we’re talking about it) is the blanket under which cowardice sleeps.
@Leanne—Have you written a letter yet to Disney? You never know what kind of response you’ll get… just ask HR Bartender: http://www.hrbartender.com/2009/strategic/the-red-purse-story/
The resort was the epitome of fantastic. It’s a well-known brand, but my concern in sharing its name is that people will be tempted to say, “Oh, yeah, sure… *they* could do it, that’s their culture!” when my point is, *every one of us* can provide better service, regardless of the names on the doors of our companies. As managers, each of us has the power to turn our department into ground zero for a shift to better service. All it takes is YOU.
Before service can be a cultural thing, it’s got to be a personal responsibility thing.
Great story and post. Its unfortunately often a surprise when an experience as a customer exceeds our expectations, and not so surprising when service fails. It often seems companies, even huge iconic brands, want to fail when we have to go out of our way to give them our money. (Insert H2SD tie-in here. . .)
I have to disagree with you slightly on point #7. Yes, “Best in Class” and “Industry Best Practices” are BS if implemented as is. The focus, however, should be on what the customer wants as a customer. Otherwise, the average customer will mirror the employees — it should be the other way around.
On the policy thread – policies absolve from initiative, and excuse inaction.
@Michael—great points. I was comparing my hotel experience to my airline experience when I wrote #7… airlines could come up with all the industry bps they want, the industry would still suck. (You listening, airlines? Little red mats do not make me forget the fees, the discomfort, the asinine policies…) I should have been more clear.