The No Tool Zone

Boeing 757-200 takes off at Manchester Airport (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Airlines have generally been poor performers in the customer experience.  Pretty much every airline can not get it right.  I was going on a trip to Portugal and found Jet2.com and thought, “OK, budget airline . . . how much worse could it be?”  The answer is somewhere between a lot and criminal.

The website showed the really low fares, but there are fees for just about everything from breakfast, luggage and my personal favorite  . . . checking in on-line.  You see if you fail to check in on-line you have to pay about $27 for the privilege.  I had forgotten this and although I thought $27 was a bit steep, I paid it.

However, while I was waiting to pay a couple in front of me had tried to check-in on-line and the check-in failed.  I listened to the story as they spoke to a manager about the on-line issue.  The manager asked if they had written the error message and error code down (who would think to do that?).  Because the couple had failed to write down these two important pieces of information, they were out over $55 – at least if they wanted to travel that day.  I thought to myself, “who would think it is intuitive to write the error message down, besides shouldn’t the website working be the responsibility of Jet2.com?”

I made a mental note to be sure to work out something with the front desk at the hotel to print my return ticket.  When the day before leaving arrived, I went to work to “check-in” for the flight the next day.  The website asked for a series of passport information.  You have to select your country of issue (for the passport) and what country you lived in – both are the USA.  The first drop down menu had USA, but the second one did not have “USA” as a country to select.  Entrapping technology for customers is a huge problem in service, everyone wants to send customers to cheaper channels – they rarely become cheaper when you look end-to-end.  Variety in service demand sees to that.

When I arrived at the Portugal airport the next day, I knew that I would be blamed somehow for the website snafu, I just wasn’t sure how – so, I played it out.  The check-in desk told me I would have to go to a different desk to pay or plead my case.  Two other families were already there because the had hit the wrong airport during check-in and the other was confused about the selection – both wound up having to pay.

My turn, I explained to the agent about the drop down menu missing “USA” and the response was even more egregious than I had expected,  “We have had USA residents check-in on line before and they had no problem.”

Seriously!  This is a response that has nothing to do with MY problem – are you kidding?  I implored her to look on the website and see for herself, but she would have none of it.  I paid my (close to) $30 this time and decided to use the power of the internet to exact retribution.

The issue to me is that this airline can not or should not survive.  Allowing such poor service and getting away with it needs a public verdict or at least disclosure.  With all the failure demand coming into the desk at Jet2.com, it will eventually collapse under its own cost structure – it requires people to deal with these problems even if they get paid.  Add in the number of people that will swear never to fly them again and they will not last.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the Vanguard Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbitt or LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

I have been reading a lot of customer experience articles and posts.  Most of it is softball stuff, lots of syrupy language and like love your customers and think about the customer experience in all you do.  Unfortunately, as I dig deeper the traditional design and management approaches make all this stuff a real yawner.  Yet, people make a ton of money telling you obvious things with speeches and writing.

Traditional approaches still are based on incentives and having the “right” data.  One is based on the flawed thinking that performance is down to the individual.  And then – of course – data is needed to figure out ways to improve the customer experience . . . bring in the IT!

Sorry folks, dead end.

Getting a great customer experience requires a better system for front-line employees to work in.  The 25 – 75% failure demand that customers experience is pathetic.  Designing the work to customer purpose and demands.  Management learning counter-intuitive truths about how system perform and that it is not down to the individual.

The fluffy and feel good customer experience gurus need more depth to what needs to happen to change the poorly designed systems.  Just using words like “seamless” and “customer friendly” advances nothing.  Some depth . . . please!

I was talking with a colleague regarding past experiences with clients and he came up with a beautiful explanation for sales with some companies he had worked with in the past.  The “sales prevention” team was the label given.  Both a humorous and sad label.

Organizations are desperate for revenue in these economic times and push methods reign to “get the revenue.”  Some times organizations use manipulative methods to up-sell or convince the customer of an “unrealized” need.  Most of this stuff is BS and actually can work against you in raising costs.  Returns are a good way to identify some of these costs to hit revenue numbers.  When customers buy things that don’t fit their needs they return it and there is cost associated with returns including distrust from the customer that can’t be measured.

Sales departments that can’t help customers solve problems can actually prevent sales.  When non-sales calls are taken in a sales area they often get passed to customer service.  Most service organizations see this as a good design as they have sales “specialists.”  The customer, however, sees it as another barrier to overcome.  not helping a customer at point of contact creates great dissatisfaction . . . it prevents sales.

Some sales folks are more interested telling you about their knowledge than helping you solve the service problem they have whether it relates to purpose (value demand) or a problem the service organization created (failure demand).  I roll my eyes when I great detail about the features and benefits that don’t matter to me from a sales person that is working hard to convince me.  Most customers want to call to buy, but the failure demand and the salesperson get in the way . . .  more sales prevention.

Making sales is a process of discovery.  How do I enable the customer to get what they need and not more than that?  Or helping them discover new ways to get jobs they need done more effectively and efficiently.  This is sales enabling.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the Vanguard Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbitt or LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

On occasion I go back and read some old favorite books that helped shape my thinking.  Peter Scholte’s book, The Leader’s Handbook, was one such book that gave a me pause.  The history of what became known as the Quality Movement is well-described.

One such concept from the book is for whole management to move from a state of unconscious incompetence to a conscious competence.  Too many executives do not understand how poor their systems are performing.  One of the great breakthroughs in service industry (my perspective) is the John Seddon described failure demand – a failure to do something or do something right for a customer  – this measure alone begins the process of unwinding myths and legends that exist in organizations and opens a new way of thinking.  A move from unconscious incompetence to conscious INcompetence.  More ways are need for management to understand the damaging effects of poor thinking.

Once management understands they have a problem that is steeped in their thinking, with the right guidance and being empirical an organization can begin to achieve conscious competence.  It still requires work to be competent and reinforcement of new thinking to make improvement.  Unpacking old and damaging thinking takes time.  Management must learn that it takes patience, persistence, humility and a period of ineptness – something most managers are uncomfortable in doing as confidence (even wrongly achieved) is a trait embraced.

But managers are incompetent and part of competence is learning an organization as a system . . . outside-in from a customers point of view.  This requires knowledge of the work and competence in doing the work and/or the ability to defer to those that do have competence in the work.  And in service, the work is the interaction of customer and front-line employee to satisfy customer demands.

Why is being in the work so important for management?

Because this is the place the business fortunes are won and loss.  This is where you can see the effects of the unintended consequences of policies, rules, mandates, standadrdization and other management driven measures and programs.  This is the best way to move from unconscious incompetence to conscious INcompetence.  Otherwise, management tends to rationalize the situation without seeing and hearing for themselves.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the Vanguard Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbitt or LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

Whether you live in the US or not, the thinking about how to increase sales seems universal.  Hiring sales type personalities that can overcome objections and hit targets.  This thinking has been repeated so often that organizations have come to believe it . . . if it were only true.

The service that most organizations achieve for their customers is horrendous and poor service leads organizations filled with revenue targets to “hit the number.”  Incentives and training to overcome objections is the recourse.  No one addresses the main thing that prevents sales, namely, bad service.

This bad service can be measured in organizations by understanding what percentage of customer demands are in the form of failure demand (the failure to do something or do something right for a customer).  The percentage in most organizations is between 25 and 75% of all customer demands.  It is difficult to sell to someone with this much failure.

High failure demand means we have to compensate for our bad service by selling.  After all, it takes a lot of extra sugar coating to sell to someone that gets horrible service.

Service can only be improved by changing the system and the system requires new thinking about the design and management of work.  Listen to John Seddon speak about how to change thinking and Haley (client) about her normative experience in this video – How do we change thinking?

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the Vanguard Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbitt or LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

I have often lamented the poor contracting of services in government.  More specifically, the State of Indiana and the contract with IBM to “modernize” the welfare eligibility system.  Some folks believe I do this just to be a “ball buster” and have nothing to offer . . . they couldn’t be further from the truth.  When you have a good method, anything is possible.

Social services will become critical as the population ages and the healthcare system absorbs the massive Baby Boom generation.  How these folks are treated is directly proportional to how the system is managed.  The current system has proven to be poor and costly and – by the way – poor service and costly service go hand-in-hand.

John Seddon was recently on BBC radio in the UK (as this social service problem is not uniquely American) and talks indirectly about the use of the Vanguard Method in social services.  As I have said all along, the best advertisement are clients of a new and better way of doing things.  The “manage the budget” way of delivering things in both the public and private sector are having the opposite effect of their aim . . . raising end-to-end costs and worsening service.

We have a major thinking problem about the design and management of work in services – of all types. Listen for a better way (about 12 minutes):

A Better Way for Social Services

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the Vanguard Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbitt or LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

I won’t pretend to be the only one to have service problems and some are more bearable than others.  However, my experience at the Glasgow Marriott is legendary . . . in a bad way.

I have had problems with the Marriott in Glasgow previously, especially with the iBahn internet service.  I understand the problems with using WiFi in an old building with high floors (although it could be solved).  I have often suffered through the poor speed of the broadband as the substitute to the WiFi problem.

Unfortunately, the problem experienced was more egregious  . . . I was completely kicked out of the system.

The first time I had the problem, the answer was a different room (a suite).  The second time there were nor other rooms (apparently).  Being Platinum with the Marriott Hotels, usually I get taken care of in these situations.  No today or even the week I was there.

The problem started when things were working fine with the broadband connection and I was kicked off the system.  Calling down to the front desk, I was told that iBahn handles these problems – why is it when a customer has a problem no one takes responsibility in service?  This is failure demand (the failure to do something or do something right for a customer – Seddon) pure and simple.  Regardless, I was passed to iBahn customer service.

iBahn customer service wound up resetting my system and my service was restored which is fine or so I thought.  The problem became repetitive and I was continually kicked out of the connection . . . sometimes in 20 minutes, sometimes in two hours.  I had to call down to the front desk and get transferred over 20 times over 3 days and I was out during the day!

One day they tried replacing the modem, didn’t work.  The sad part is many customers get to pay for this privilege  because they don’t have Platinum or Gold status with Marriott.  A customer doesn’t want to have to fix a problem that is not theirs and to have to pay for it is ridiculous.

My problems as a customer that you create are yours to solve . . . not mine.  Passing the buck and washing your hands of the problem because its the “vendor’s problem” does not wash with customers in any service.  Marriott chose this vendor, not me.  As a customer, I should be exempt from solving problems for Marriott.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the Vanguard Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbittor LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

Being from the United States, one becomes use to the constant “push” for sales.  Car dealers are notorious for the dreaded “push” sale.  Lots of tricks to get you to buy a car.  They “hold” your keys for appraisal and don’t let you leave – I had that happen to me at a Tom Wood Volkswagen dealership in Indianapolis.  I not only left mad, but I told many other people about how ridiculous it was I had to be put through this as a customer.

Years ago, I had training from the Sandler Sales Institute that made a lot of sense.  I remember first understanding that customers don’t trust salespeople (because they lie) during the sales training.  The Sandler system was set up to not make you look like a salesperson.  The aim was to build trust.

Since, I have learned the Vanguard Method.  The Method helps eliminate failure demand (demand caused by a failure to do something or do something right for a customer).  Bad service in the form of failure demand helps undermine trust in the eyes of a customer.  Try selling to a customer that has an outstanding issue can only make them mad.  Overselling to a customer creates failure demand when they discover that they don’t need to overpay for a service that is too much for their needs or budget.  This is all “push.”  “Push” too often leads to failure demand.  Sales organizations with revenue shortfalls often rely on more “push” to hit revenue targets which in turn creates more waste in failure demand.

There are many reasons for failure demand in service organizations, standardization and “push” selling are only two.  The only way to learn what causes failure demand is to study your organization as a system.  The Vanguard Method does this (we offer a free download at www.newsystemsthinking.com or even on this blog).  No matter what the cause of failure demand, it is a barrier to greater sales.

The elimination of failure demand removes the barrier and gives customers the opportunity to “pull” for products and services.  All customers like to buy, very few like to be coerced through “push” methods.  Service organizations can build trust with their customers and that is the real winning psychology of selling.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the Vanguard Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbittor LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

“Well, here’s another nice mess you’ve gotten me into!”                                                   – Oliver Hardy

Image via Wikipedia

Will Governor Daniels have to testify or not in the IBM lawsuit?  Who knows.  However, we all should care as the $1.3 billion boat anchor (Cancelled IBM contract) continues to be the gift that keeps on giving.  The State of Indiana sues IBM and IBM sues the State of Indiana.  Costs increase and waste begets waste.

In a recent Indianapolis Star interview, Peter Rusthoven (Attorney for the State) describes IBM in this manner:

We thought we were getting the guys who were building a better planet, and we ended up with Larry the Cable Guy.”                                 – Peter Rusthoven

Wow, if that isn’t a shot across the bow.  Although it does take two to tango when you form a partnership.

“Hello partner, you are to blame.”  Doesn’t sound like either side knew what they were doing.  This is the predictable result of assumptions in management.  Modernization and automation are the key words to future waste in any organization.  Start with flawed logic and you make your own bed.

The problem is that Federal, state and local governments continue to flock to IT companies like IBM for the same flawed assumptions.  The waste is enormous and predictable.  The only loser is the taxpayer, year after disastrous year – we all pay for having leaders and vendors make bad decisions.

This is a disease of all parties – not just Republicans.  Democrats face the same issues.  There is a simpler way to design work, but it requires changing the way you think about work.  You must first get knowledge about the “what and why” of current performance.  Redesigning the work without IT, but even this can not be done unless leadership participates and changes too – something that elected leaders fail to do is change.  Ego of being elected may be partially to blame, after all . . . doesn’t every elected official have a mandate?

Elected officials are in most cases not fit to make decisions as most come with a slew of assumptions.  Most of these assumptions we don’t learn about until after they are elected.  Ability to govern apparently is a side road to the main street of politics.

Until our leaders learn how to govern properly, we – the people – need to ask better questions about things that matter.  A good place to start would be by asking. “what method” will you use to reduce the deficit?  If automation and modernization is the answer prepare to pay dearly.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the Vanguard Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbittor LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.

A classic quote from Dr. Deming was “let’s make toast the American way . . . you burn, I’ll scrape.”  This quote has so many references that you can see in manufacturing, but the same applies to management.  I see more burning and scraping in service organizations with management than I care to mention.

The most obvious is when we take the income statement and functionally separate it into revenue and expense by having sales be responsible for revenue and operations responsible for expense.  CEOs claim that we must grow the top-line and reduce the burden of expense – nothing wrong with that, except asking the question “by what method?”

Getting the sales dogs to hunt and the operations to cut is the formula most management embrace for organizations.  The problem is that revenue and costs are the two sides of the same coin.  The two are inextricably tied together.  The optimization of each as independents leads to sub-optimization and waste.    The burning of toast and scraping becomes a way of “doing business.”

We have functionally separated organizations and rely on specialists to optimize the functions.  This erases the real aim of business . . . profit!  The reward and incentive systems lock in the waste.  Too many times have I seen management make their functional targets and rewards while the organization goes down the tubes.

Profit comes from the combination of revenue and expenses together.  The next step is to manage that way.

Tripp Babbitt is a speaker, blogger and consultant to service industry (private and public).  His organization helps executives find a better way to make the work work.  Read his articles at Quality Digest and his column for CustomermanagementIQ.com.  Learn more about the Vanguard Method for service organizations.  Reach him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/TriBabbittor LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/trippbabbitt.