Make More of Your Job

It's Never Too Late to Show Passion

Some of you may have read about my less-than-passionate experience at a Corner Bakery recently while trying to grab a quick lunch. To make a long story short, my bad experience resulted in them refunding my money and giving me gift certificates for a return trip. I wrote an entry about the experience because it highlighted for me how dangerous it is (particularly for small businesses) to give away money or lose revenue because they fail to provide passionate service.  In my case, a little communication from the Corner Bakery store employees could have turned the whole situation around. I didn’t want free money, I just wanted lunch. So I thought telling the cautionary tale on the blog would be a great example on how costly little lapses in passion can be.

Much to my surprise, I was contacted by Corner Bakery not long after the post went up. I have to admit I was deeply curious what interest they had in contacting me.  In our modern world, companies tend to be super-protective of their image and I was intrigued to see whether they wanted to ask questions about what had gone wrong, or just save face or ask for the post to come down.

It took a few days, but I finally got in contact with Diana Hovey, VP of Marketing for Corner Bakery. In just over a few minutes on the phone, I was reminded of an important lesson: It’s never too late to show passion.

It was clear from the first sentence Diana spoke that she wasn’t calling to complain about the post or to defend Corner Bakery. She was calling because she was literally hurt by reading the story of my experience.  My tale was not compatible with the company she knew and loved, and she was committed to finding out how things could have gone so wrong.

For the duration of the conversation, Diana was amiable, interested and clearly intent on making lemonade out of lemons. I couldn’t help but notice the enthusiasm she had for Corner Bakery (notable by the ease and excitement with which she discussed their history and growth) and it was clear that hearing that even one customer had experienced a lousy time at on of their café’s was something that she took personally. As I've mentioned before, it's impossible for me to not take my own business personally, so I immediately identified with her point of view.

I will admit it tickled me when she said that the printout of the post had been passed around the whole headquarters, and that they were very upset. "I wasn’t enjoying it because the blog had been passed around, and I wasn’t enjoying it because my disappointment was being felt," she said. "I was enjoying it because it was something that would happen at my company, in my life!"

I know what it feels like to be hurt and deflated when we drop the ball as a company, and seeing that behavior in someone else’s company was very reassuring.  These people loved their company, and hearing about the ball being dropped (which happens to even the best of companies) was something they reacted viscerally to.

I shared with Diana the fact that many of my experiences with her restaurant have been great.  In fact, there is one in my office building that has frequently impressed me with their ability to serve hundreds of lunches during the noontime rush with speed and grace.  I also told her that I wrote the piece not to shame Corner Bakery, but rather to tell a cautionary tale about why passion is so important in any and every job.

By the conclusion of the call, I was convinced that Corner Bakery is run by talented people who are truly passionate about what they do. We all have a bad day every now and again, but the Corner Bakery team seemed committed to making those bad experiences fewer and farther between by always learning from their mistakes.  Diana reminded me that passion also requires humility, and a genuine interest in hearing about your failure so you can fix them going forward.

If people believe that you love what you do, your errors will almost always be completely forgiven. I was also reminded that as consumers, our voices and experiences matter.  When a company does a great or lousy job, take the time to let them know about it.  If they’re a company worth doing business with, they will take your opinions to heart and be better for the information.

For me, Diana’s passion for Corner Bakery made me an instant fan.  I may have had a rotten lunch, but it was just one lunch.  Going forward, I have much more important knowledge that every dollar I spend at Corner Bakery is going to an organization that is humble, passionate and committed to continuous improvement.  I had lunch at Corner Bakery again the day after my phone conversation with Diana.  Not only was it served quickly, but I was happy to pay for it after throwing out those gift certificates.  After all, I wasn’t hungry for free food, I was hungry for passion.

Great Service Requires Passion

Last Sunday afternoon, I came across a particular example of how important it is to be passionate about the business you’re in.  I had some extra time before an appointment I'd scheduled, so I stopped by a local Corner Bakery, figuring I’d be in and out in no more than 15 minutes.

The first sign that this business wasn’t being run with passion was the way the line was moving -   not so much the speed of the line, but the enthusiasm level of the people behind the counter.  When a register opened up, each of the three cashiers would just stand there, staring at the line, waiting for the customers to realize that their register was open.  A simple friendly “Next in line!”  could have sped the process up by half alone.  As I often do in these situations, I started looking around to see how the rest of the business was functioning, and calculating the cost that lack of passion could be creating for the business owner.

When I made it to the front of the line, things got worse quickly.  The employee taking my order was mute throughout the process - no smile, no welcome, just a dour expression while punching in my order on his screen.  I took my order number and moved to a seat.

About 10 minutes later, an eternity in quick-serve restaurant time, I still hadn’t seen my food and had seen many people who ordered after me get their meals. I walked up to the counter and asked if my order would be up soon and was told it would take “less than a minute.”  I returned to my seat. Ten minutes later, I was back up at the counter asking for a manager.

The manager who came over was curt and clearly unhappy to be speaking with me.  When I asked if my salad was ready, she said, “Somebody already told you we were out of dressing and making more." I informed her that nobody had told me anything of the sort, at which point she said, “Well, we’re out of the ingredients we need so you’ll have to choose something else."

By this time I was late to the appointment I had scheduled, so I simply requested that they refund my money. The manager barked, “Fine, whatever.”  Throughout the entire process, the manager was extremely rude, so before I left I asked for the name of the franchise owner with the intention of writing them a letter about my experience. Only once I’d asked that question did the manager attempt to act pleasant, and all of the sudden insisted that I take $20 in gift certificates for my troubles. The end result for Corner Bakery: $10 in lost business for a refund, and an additional $20 out the door in an attempt to appease an unhappy customer.

Though the situation was handled poorly, it could have been completely corrected through simple, respectful communication. I didn’t want my money back, nor did I want $20 in gift cards. All I wanted was my salad.  If someone had merely been polite, or apologized, or offered to make a different one quickly, I would have happily left with a little bit of lunch and they would have kept my $10, and Corner Bakery would've kept their $20. For owners of small businesses, it doesn’t take a lot of $30 mistakes and irritated customers to create disastrous results.  Unfortunately, poor attitudes are just as contagious than great attitudes, and in business lack of passion is an epidemic that will doubtless leave your profit margins dead.

I'm not telling you this story simply to complain about not getting a salad I wanted. This instance, along with so many customer service nightmare experiences, demonstrate how easy it is for dispassionate employees to create total disaster in a business. Clearly this manager, who at one point had chosen to take on the responsibility of leading others, didn't love her job. That attitude, in turn, had trickled down to many of the employees beneath her.  I’m not placing all of the blame on this manager. Perhaps her boss enforces this same poor attitude. Perhaps she was having trouble outside of her job. However, if she were truly passionate about her job as a leader and manager, she would've used that passion to improve her attitude.

To me, my experience at Corner Bakery was an affirmation that good people with a lack of passion aren't helping anyone, including themselves.  Life is simply too short to spend time doing something that doesn’t stimulate you, and it has a ruinous effect on your peers, clients and business’ bottom line.  Everyone deserves the chance to work in a job that makes them happy, but to earn that chance sometimes takes the guts to admit that it's up to you to ignite your own passion. Allowing yourself or other dispassionate employees to remain in any position is a guaranteed losing proposition for all involved.

My experience reminded me that you can’t buy great service. That comes exclusively from people that are engaged in what they do for a living.  Finding a job you believe it is invaluable to your happiness and the success of the business you’re in, because no amount of gift certificates can make up for a lack of passion and pride in a job done well.

Workplace Myths: "The Customer is Always Right."

Whoever came up with the phrase “the customer is always right” deserves to be poked in the eye with a very, very sharp stick. Obviously, the person who coined that phrase never worked in a service-based position.  To fix the saying and make it work for the modern workplace, one should say “the customer always deserves to be treated with respect." Treating a customer with respect, however, does not always include raising the surrender flag whenever they demand something from you.

I come from a sales and service background, and hardly a day passes that at least one customer doesn’t mistreat one of my employees or make a completely unrealistic demand.  I try to teach my employees that while the customer should be treated with respect and kindness, there are limits to what anyone should be willing to do, regardless of what the customer wants.

Not everyone is employed in a sales or customer service position; however, most of us deal with customers in some form or another on a daily basis. Customers come in two varieties: internal and external.  An external customer is someone who purchases goods or services from our company.  Internal customers are those in the organization  who patronize the services we perform at work each day.  If you’re a marketing employee, the sales employees are your customers, as your service benefits them as customers.

What people fail to realize is that neither of these customers can always be right.  Firstly, we are all human and can never make the right decision 100% of the time. Secondly, you are the expert on the service you provide and are in a much better position to be “right” about how things should work.

If the customer were always right, my product would be faster and cheaper. All of my employees would bow to the customer's every whim.  Obviously, that’s not the way to keep a business running.  When customers demand something unrealistic, or treat employees inappropriately, the only correct course of action is to respectfully reeducate the client and create reasonable expectations. If the client is unhappy about those terms, they are free to do business elsewhere.  Our job as businesspeople is to provide reasonable products and services for reasonable prices, not to conjure miracles or absorb endless abuse.  Customers who refuse to understand those facts should be quickly shown the door.

While it is never appropriate to treat a customer harshly, even when they are being excessively demanding or abusive, it is completely appropriate to refuse to do business with someone who you will never be able to please.  Continuing a business relationship with such a customer would be a recipe for disaster down the road.  Often times, employees are afraid to reeducate their clients and dole out reasonable expectations because they’re afraid their company will tell them that the customer was right.  If your organization doesn’t support you by drawing realistic and respectful customer service boundaries, then you should probably look for work at another organization.