Not Being Sarkari

 Usually, operating lockers in banks involves processes which banks dread to skip. They ask you a couple of question regarding the locker, make you sign few registers and then escort you to locker room. The process is neither long nor painful. It is just a number of steps followed in a particular sequence which bores me a lot.  But this time it was different. Bank had just opened. I was first (or maybe second) customer in the bank. I did not remember my locker number. The lady could not locate the details register, and asked me if I knew the location of my locker. Yes, was my reply. The lady took me to the vault. I located my locker, put in my key and lady put her key and opened the locker. 'Sir, please operate and we will do formalities afterward' said the lady and went out. I am mighty impressed by lady. Processes can wait and customers should not. This attitude is so cooooool. I wish, while doing my transactions, I encounter more such cool places.

Your competitors know your future. Unfortunately, you do not. 

As an owner of a business, if I listen to this sales representative, I will be forced to commit suicide. It is not because it has something to do with lady. It is because I will realize that my hard-earned money is going down the drain. I will be convinced that such sales rep will never be able to close any sales for me. I will be convinced that if I chuck these sales rep, business will not deteriorate. They should be called as sales preventive and not sales representative.

Why it is not very often that business owners do a dipstick on service provided at customer contact points? Why cannot business owners go through what their customers go through regularly?

Found a list of ten things that business owners should do to gauge the customer frustration at various customer contact points.

Change this before customers change you.

My friend experienced a bad service from one of the leading telecom players in India. He had an internet connection which he wanted to disconnect. He paid bills and cleared all his dues. But the company forgot to disconnect his services.

They kept sending him bills. He responded them by writing mails to customer service to clarify issues. But he continued to receive bills. Then he started receiving threatening calls from their collection agencies. He clarified again to everyone and showed them necessary documents.

Nothing happened. Threats continued followed by a legal notice. Frustrated by all this treatment, he decided to bypass the whole system. He already knows that employees are against customers. He observed that departments inside the company are working in silos and do not communicate with each other. To resolve his issue, he wrote a complaint to the company CEO (yours truly's advise).

Thankfully after three days,  he received a call from the CEO's office. The guy apologized and closed the issue. My friend heaved a big sigh of relief.

Moral of the story - Do not believe in company's customer service. Do not believe that company's processes are designed to help customer's cause. Do not believe in assurances given by employees. Hit at the top. Nobody bothers more than the boss.

I experience it lot. I, being in customer service department for the last three years, have observed that complaints coming from our Chairman's office receive highest attention. We forget everything else and go all out to please that complaining customer.

Letter from the top just helps us to shrug off our chalta hai attitude and remind us that customer is still the king. I know this is wrong on our parts but unfortunately that's how the whole thing works.

Usually, hit at the top works.

Hit at the top = complaint resolution.
Hit at the top = employee attention.
Hit at the top = peace of mind.

Next time when you receive poor customer service, you know what to do.

• Out-read the other guys. Tom Peters also suggests the same.
• Out-see the other guys. Ted is great place to watch some videos about future technologies, passion shaping businesses and ordinary people doing some amazing things.
• Out-blog the other guys. Gather information (first two steps will help you), analyze it and put it on social media (for me, blogging works best).

Sounds simple. Right?

 With some of my ordinary experiences with so called organized players, my faith is back in local businesses. My mindset is changing because with the advent of organized retail, local businesses have also pulled their socks and raised their standards (service, hygiene etc.) to decent levels. And organized retailers are unable to compete with these resurgent small businesses. For the next four weeks, every Friday I intend to cover one small business to which I am sold because they offer me great service.   First in line is a restaurant, Sip and Bite in Gurgaon which is run by an old Uncle and Aunty. Couple of months back, I developed an allergy to red chilly powder and doctor has asked me to avoid it. One evening, I went to this restaurant asking what all is available without red chilly. Steward suggested a couple of dishes, and I ordered as per that. True to his advice it was without any red chilly.  After a few days, I again went to this place. Steward came to me with a menu and asked me, "Sir, you want without red chilly?". I was floored because he remembered me and my choices. After that moment, I knew I was going to be a regular at this place. After all, you do not find such places very often where people remember you very often.  Place is clean and kitchen is open and is visible to everyone. This exudes confidence in the diner as he can see that everything is cooked in a place which is spic and span. It also shows that owners have full faith in their facility.
 I am sold to this place because of their thoughtfulness and openness.

Passives, as the name implies, are satisfied but unenthusiastic customers who are easily wooed by the competition. These customers are disloyal, tending to make buying decisions based on convenience and price considerations—as opposed to brand loyalty.

Promoters are the least price-sensitive, have the highest repurchase rates, and are responsible for between 80 and 90 percent of positive referrals to a company or brand.

Here are some more tips which can help in delivering customer service a little better....

Know your product. Know your your store. Know your menu. etc. etc. A simple approach which can produce some startling results.

Do not ignore a customer. Even if it is not your department, customer is yours.

Do not blame others for problem. It is always easy to point fingers. Looking for solutions is difficult but very fruitful. If immediate solution is not available, give an appropriate timeline and proactively inform customer about the status.

Help customers in making decision, if it is necessary. Do not try to sell your highest margin product or costliest product or product which provides maximum employee incentive. Provide genuine help. Customers appreciate that.

Do not disappear. Customer asked for some help and you promised to come back with solution. And you never came back. This is bad.

Do not hover long enough. Do not make customers feel they are being watched. Let customers figure out themselves. If they require any help, they will come to you.

Do not show frustration. Customer service job is full of stress. But it would be more fun, if you serve your customers patiently.

1. Show respect.
2. Show more respect.
3. Show more respect when in good mood.
4. Show (even) more respect when in bad mood.
5. Show respect everyday
6. Show respect to elders
7. Show respect to kids
8. Show respect to all customers
9. Show respect all day
10. Feel proud when you show respect

Weekend was fruitful. It was busy, little hectic but full of meaningful conversations. Listened to one of India's most revered speaker, met some interesting people, got insights from some entrepreneurs and made some new friends. On Saturday, I got a chance to listen to Former President of India, Dr APJ Kalam. To me, He is an intelligent man who accomplished many great things without compromising on integrity and values (Dr Manmohan Singh is another such rare Indian). I always dreamt of listening to his speech and having some cool conversations with him. First half of the dream is fulfilled.  As usual speech was inspiring. It was full of stories and conversations which Dr Kalam had with great visionaries and personalities during his lifetime. From his speech it was evident that he has a great vision for our country. He passionately shares that vision with everyone, especially students. He ended his speech with a question which every Indian should ask from himself. How I wish to be remembered (in terms of one's contribution to growth of country)? I think this is a question which one should keep asking himself because if answers, followed by actions, are missing to this question than there is problem. Thanks Alma Mater for this opportunity. On Sunday, I had an opportunity of meeting some entrepreneurs. Couple of them have already made it big, some are small but doing good for themselves, some who has just jumped on this bandwagon and lot of aspiring entrepreneurs like me. Discussions were related to practical aspects of launching and doing 'the own thing'. There were no fairy tale stories or inspiring stuff from them but focus was on difficulties one face while trodding this less travelled road. Lot of insights, sharing, conversations and guidance.  An interesting point resonated by almost everyone, try to keep your customers happy and satisfied while your business is gaining momentum. Hey, opportunities for people like me. Cool!

Fortune named Steve Jobs as a CEO of decade. After all there are not many CEOs in the world who have transformed four industries in a decade - music, movies, mobile and computers.

This article was perfect fodder for any Apple fanboy's soul. And yours truly is no different.

A comment pertaining to air travel on a blog post.

Insightful post on Lateral Thinking blog

  

Your Inner Whining Artist (IWA) is the part of you that tells you you’re a genius waiting to be discovered. If only the big bad world would sit up and recognise your talent, the IWA tells you, all your problems would be over. Audiences and critics would bow at your feet, agents would queue up to represent you, and all the people who’d ever rejected your work would be gorging themselves on humble pie. You just need to get your break, to be discovered. It can only be a matter of time …

 This is so true about so many bloggers from India (may be worldwide) as well. Check out any blogging forum and you will notice all bloggers have a feeling that they have one of the best blog in their genre (yours truly is no different). Their content is far superior than every other blog present. Their blog content has everything which can translate into best-seller. Next blockbuster will be because of their blog.  Most bloggers are waiting for that right moment. Right time when a stroke of luck will change their blog into a money spinner instrument. Everybody is waiting to be discovered. Nobody wants to be left out.  With more than 9,00,000 blogs are getting added every 24 hours, this seems to be a wishful thinking. What say? Does anyone have a chance of making big? Yes.  Bloggers writing for themselves. Bloggers not writing to please audience who regularly or occasionally comments on their blog. Bloggers writing original and interesting stuff. Bloggers challenging status quo.  But then this is true for individuals as well. After all blogs derive personality from the individuals behind them.

I have registered Aloo Kachalu under Creative Commons License.

Means? In case you want to use Aloo Kachalu on your blog, feel free to do so. Please give credits by linking back. Do not alter image. Okay, you can re-size it according to your needs.

Feel free to pass it on to your friends. Let us see, if it inspires anyone to do good for customers. Or bring a smile on someone's face. Or someone uses it in entirely creative way. Like framing it and putting up on desk, putting it on a computer desktop. Just thinking aloud...

Let me know...

 Some of the points which I feel relevant to many businesses are: Greet warmly - An eye contact. A hearty smile. A friendly hello. A sincere greeting. All these things help in initiating a relationship which can be cherished for long time to come. Opening lines matter - Do not open your conversation with a lame sentence like "mineral water or tap water?" More the interesting opening lines are, more the customer will be inclined to stay with you. After all you do want him to come again and again because of you.  Interrupting a conversation is a sin - Yes, you have some wonderful ideas and bombarding your customer with those ideas is the only logical thing occurring to you. But hold on. Let your customer speak first. Do not interrupt him. If customer is accompanied by a friend or spouse and they are discussing something, do not interrupt them as well. Be patient, you will have enough time to throw your ideas at them. Take feedback and fix things which are not right - After customers are done with their shopping, dinner or window/floor shopping, do take their feedback. And taking feedback will be the first step only and it would be an incomplete step if you do what needs to be corrected. Be consistent throughout your conversation - Charming at the beginning of conversation. Listless in the middle. Tired at the end of the conversation. Not done. Hardly an impact which you want to leave on customer.
This is only part one and I can't wait to read the second part as well. Will share with you all as soon it is updated.

On Sunday, I ran my third half-marathon of the year and was fully satisfied with my timing as well. It was fun and the whole environment was lively. I have always dreamt of running on road leading to India-Gate and te dream was fulfilled with this run.



However, I found the whole place extremely crowded. By the time I crossed starting line after crossing a sea of people, I was already behind by 5 minutes. My official photographer, Zoobie, got lost in crowd somewhere, hence not much photographs to share.



Another thing, as I was nearing finish line, it was very hot. Not an ideal environment for running.  Now I am waiting for the Gurgaon Marathon on December 6. I am sure it will not be crowded and weather will be cool enough to make this marathon a cooler one. Another thing, onus will be on runners and not on celebrities standing on the periphery.  If you happen to be in Gurgaon on December 6, do come to run, walk, cheer and have fun.  Moreover, you never know whom you may run into. You can find details about the run here.

   The whole design sounds simple. To me at least. Anyways, run went well. Though course was too crowded, I had fun.