Good People Give Great Service

In my keynote presentation, I offer the suggestion that if you believe the person behind the counter (either in person or on the phone) is dumber than you then you'll likely go out of your way to prove it. And what if they're not?

However if you instead believe that the person behind the counter will provide you with an amusing story to tell others then you'll likely end up with a good service experience.

This is one of those amusing stories.

I was scheduled to speak after supper in Miniota, Manitoba, a small town of just several hundred citizens. My audience would be the employees of the regional cooperative, perhaps the area's largest employer. So I arrived in Miniota at about 3:30 pm to ensure the stage was set correctly, lighting would be satisfactory and so that I might resolve any sound system concerns before the attendees began to arrive. Preparation is key in anything you do if you want to do it well. And I do. My customers and clients deserve that.

Since my appointment at the hall wasn't until 4:00 pm, I drove around town a little and then decided to gas up the rental car. I pulled up to the pumps at the Co-op gas bar. No one immediately came out to serve me so I started the process myself.

When the pump got to thirty-two dollars, the front door to the gas bar swung open and the twenty-something attendant approached. He apologized for taking so long. By the time he got to my vehicle, it was full. So I handed him the hose and he shut off the pump.

"I didn't even see the self-serve sign," I joked as we both walked inside so I could pay for my gas. I knew it to be a full-serve operation. (Yes, they still do exist.)

"Again, I'm sorry I took so long," he genuinely offered. "So, that'll be thirty-two fifty," he smiled as I handed him my credit card.

After signing the credit card slip, I asked, "so the community center is over by the arena is it?"

He glanced down at the credit card. He instantly recognized my name. He had read the memo about the company meeting at the hall.

"You're the speaker tonight aren't you?"

"I am," I replied with a big smile.

"So what are you speaking about?" He asked with a smirk on his face.

"Customer service," I blurted emphatically.

His face went completely red.

"You're going to have a little fun with me being slow to the pumps aren't you?" he sheepishly grinned.

"You know it," I laughed back.

"See you tonight then," he said red-faced and head shaking.

Dallas is his name. Before I took the stage, I learned that customers love Dallas and the service he provides. I also learned that he was handling three other customers at the time I arrived as the Gas Bar. His reputation is the “get things done” guy. I mentioned that fact publicly after I good-naturedly roasted him. He got a round of applause from his co-workers.

After the presentation, Dallas approached me and said, "I enjoyed your Tim Horton's story too. And the coffee there always tastes better when it's free," at which point he handed me a Tim Horton's Gift Card.

Dallas is one nice guy.

So, if ever you're in Miniota, Manitoba, plan on gassing up at the Co-op Gas Bar and let Dallas show you how good people offer great service.

Why Companies Fail To Retain Valued Employees

Employees fall into one of three categories: valuable, satisfactory and expendable. The real question to be asked here is, “Can you honestly identify your category?”

Simply put, valued employees are valued because they are valuable. That that may seem a little, "Duh?" but the truth is that the vast majority of employees never really figure this out. They wonder why the guy in the next office or the co-worker they've been working alongside all of a sudden gets a job offer from another company and those same employees chalk it up to "luck." Those same employees fail to realize that they themselves fall into one of the two latter categories and feel helpless that they can’t seem to catch a break. Nor do they form any course of action that would move them up to the “valuable” category.

Many companies who employ valued employees never really figure it out either. They just assume that the valued employee feels valued and wouldn't really want to go anywhere else. That's short-sighted, head-in-the-sand, delusional thinking. This is the “What’s In It For Me” age. Even the Gen Y’s entering the workforce have a greater propensity for long-range planning, retirement benefits, investment strategies than Gen Xers and Baby Boomers. They are focused on the end of their work life before they even start. They are going to find a company who values their contribution (just like Mom and Dad did when they brought home their “Participant” ribbon), and are willing to accept that they view the work as something that supports their lifestyle – not the other way around. They have a healthy sense of work-life balance and those with that healthy sense often perform better – thus becoming valued employees.

Valued employees are called “valued” because they are valuable: they’re better at the job, make a bigger contribution, are engaged better, are solution-focused instead of problem-focused, are more efficient, achieve higher productivity and realize their worth to the organization. In essence, valued employees are valued because of their self-leadership abilities. What company wouldn’t want valued employees?

But companies, in this era of political-correctness, don’t want to seem to favor the valued employee for fear of resentment from the other employees. They feel they can’t play favorites for fear of causing dissension in the ranks. So they do nothing. One person’s effort ends up being celebrated as a team achievement. The rest of the team knows who did the work. The valuable employee feels cheated that they didn’t get the recognition they deserved. And guess what, dissension starts to form in the ranks. The employees, all of them, think management is out of touch with the organization.

Attitude Adjustment: As a manager, you need to publicly commend your valued employees – often. Celebrate their successes. It sets a standard to which you expect performance. Those not up to the challenge will likely just move on. That’s OK, they weren’t valued employees anyway. Others will figure out that they have the power to improve their own performance and will likely strategize a plan to do so – eventually becoming valued employees themselves.

Attitude Adjustment: As an employee, you have the power to determine your future. Right now, you’re being paid exactly what the organization thinks you’re worth. Want your pay to increase? Then become more valuable. It’s the valued employees who make the most money, get the better perks and get celebrated more often. That person could be you but then that choice is yours. Don’t tell me that you’re stuck in your job because you can’t catch a break. You’re there by your own doing. If you don’t change your attitude and become accountable for your results, well then you’ll end up getting what you’ve always gotten.

How To Move Into Management

Years ago, I sold copiers and faxes for a living. The company I worked for was a Canadian division of a worldwide copier company. Our sales training took place about every eighteen months and was facilitated by our US trainer. One two-day training session every eighteen months was far below the needs of the organization. The turnover rate of salespeople in this industry was high so training every year and a half was hugely inadequate. The Canadian brass recognized this and, over lunch one day, they (President and VP Sales) articulated that they would like to consider developing a trainer specifically for Canada.

I wanted a shot at that job and I said so.

"You have to sell more," was the response from the VP Sales. The President nodded in agreement.

"Let me ask you this," I chimed in. "Were you (meaning both the President and VP) the best salespeople this company has ever had?"

"Of course not," The President laughed.

"But you both got to be President and VP," I remarked. "You're doing a good job without being the best in sales."

Just because people have a great skill set on the job doesn't mean they're capable of leading others. And that's what managers do: they don't do the job they want done anymore, they coach and lead others to do it. Trainers train and salespeople sell. Your best salesperson is not necessarily your best trainer.

Wayne Gretzky could be considered the greatest hockey player that ever lived but as a coach, he is perhaps average - his record would indicate that.

How can you train people to be better managers?

People are bad at managing others when they are bad at managing themselves. They may be great at the job but lousy people - perhaps even a jerk to some. The best they will do is to impart their way of getting business done - and their own personalities are going to run through their training programs. Teaching people to be jerks is not necessarily good for business overall.

Your best salesman is not always your best sales manager. Your best accountant is not always your best VP Finance. Your best customer service rep may not be your best customer service manager. It's a completely different skill set to manage/train. The most important skill being - to be able to inspire others to be their very best. The person who fills a management or training position within an organization had better have "people" skills. You can't possess people skills if you yourself are not good "people."

If there's a staffer who is a high-performer but not a great human being that is being considered for management, you will need that manager to inspire and coach your team. Don't send him or her to a management course and expect that they can grasp basic "people" skills - that's just building skills on a lousy foundation. Fix the person. Make them a better person. Improve their willingness to accept that they themselves have things they need to work on. Make them want to be better people then give them the skills to be a manager. Invest first in a "personal" development course for them and then based on the outcome of that course, consider them for a promotion where handling your people is Job #1.

If they're not good at developing themselves, they'll never be any good at developing your people or inspiring your people to improve themselves. Remember, people don't quit their jobs - they quit their managers.

The self-improvement attitude is crucial for anyone who has aspirations of moving into management one day. People follow people who treat them with respect. Staff loathe jerks for managers. If the organization is ever going to improve, the people at the top (and those on their way there) need to lead by example.

We, the general public, want to do good business with good people.

What Is Leadership?

On a business networking site this morning, the following headline caught my eye and got me to thinking: What Is Leadership?

Having read the other answers, I couldn't help but notice that many believe that a leader must have a certain values traits: not necessarily personality traits. And while it may be nice for the leader to have many of these values traits, I believe that any good leader must have simply this: ownership of the philosophy that the purpose of a fruit tree is not necessarily to grow fruit but to grow another tree.

Let me explain. Leadership is not a top-down philosophy. It is a side-by-side philosophy. It is more about coaching others, bringing out ideas, encouraging others to take risks, to stretch themselves, to reach beyond their best, to help develop action plans for their people and to lead by example. Leaders are prepared to encourage people who are smarter than themselves, more capable than themselves and better at the job than the leader him or herself.

There is an attitude of trust and a resignation that the leader him or herself could be replaced by their own protégé. And that is fine with a true leader. After all, the leader's mandate is to leave the place better than he or she found it. The true leader is OK with one day being replaced by his or her own mentored student. The leader is not selfish and territorial nor is he or she power-hungry. The true leader is gracious and courteous. There are no hurt feelings regardless of what happens.

The true leader possesses grace, wisdom, a thirst for knowledge and gratitude. There is true selflessness in a real leader and a sense of peace that however things turn out, it is always for the best. That leader will always find another place to make better. And if the job came to an end, so be it. But the real purpose of a real leader is to ensure that if they themselves did depart an organization, that organization would move on to the next level and would be just fine without them.

Think about this: the real leader has true confidence - true confidence requires no proof.

This is the kind of person that we should each have the honor of following at least once in our lives. We would be so wise after an experience like that. Perhaps that person could be us. Business would change for the better.

Five Tips To Engaging Employees

Employee disengagement and unhappiness can result in lower productivity, which affects the financial side. However, lack of employee retention also can result, with its many costs for replacement: recruiting fees, overtime pay to those covering job duties, ramp-up time for replacements, as well as outplacement fees and continued benefits if termination occurs.

Here are five tips to ensure you get the best from your people:

1. Upon an employee first starting, make sure there is plenty of hands-on mentoring involved. This not only shortens the learning curve, but actually sets the attitude of the new employee positively. They feel that they belong. They feel valued from Day One. Those left to their own devices will feel as though their work doesn't matter right from the start. Their positive, gung-ho attitude will begin to decline immediately. Much work will have to be done later on to turn that perception around.
2. Make sure the employee understands that there is no job in the organization that is more important than another. The receptionist who answers the phone should be known as, "The Director Of First Impressions." Is that position any less important than management? Every job is necessary. Help your people change their attitudes about the importance of their work. Every job carries with it responsibilities for the success of the entire organization.
3. We all need to know how we're doing. Left unchecked, a problem performance behavior can turn attitudes of the other employees cancerous within the organization. Others see a behavior going un-addressed and assume that the behavior is acceptable. Supervisors are coaches. Coaches build on strengths and help turn problem areas of performance around. Like an airplane computer, supervisors must make small corrections to keep the organization moving straight ahead.
4. Balanced employees are more productive. So while attempts may be made to ensure each employee receives the proper professional training, personal training cannot be excluded. The work ethic and attitude of the employee gets better when the individual gets better. Better people offer better service, make better decisions, contribute better and overall, help better the organizations. Improve the individual within the organization and the organization must improve as a result.
5. The engaged employee can be your best spokesperson for attracting new talent to your organization. Marketing strategies, interviewing/hiring processes and recruiting firms can be beneficial, but the truth is that the attitude of an engaged employee will do more to solidify a potential employee's decision to join the organization than anything else you use. Also, the more engaged your people are, the less attrition and staff-turnover you will have (not to mention how you will reduce the number of sick-days). Engaged employees want to work and those looking for work want to go where the work is engaging.

Being engaged on the job is an attitude. The more engaged they are, the more productive they are. So how engaged are you in your work?