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Service Over!

Guest post by: Enrico Varella

Article Overview: When was the last time you experienced excellent service? Seriously. What has the last two decades yielded with the plethora of service training opportunities? We talk about service standards, moments of truth, customer satisfaction and excellence, yet we experience more disappointments than fulfillment.

Service Over!

When was the last time you experienced excellent service? Seriously. What has the last two decades yielded with the plethora of service training opportunities? We talk about service standards, moments of truth, customer satisfaction and excellence, yet we experience more disappointments than fulfillment.

Can you be excellent in service if you don’t excel in it? To excel in something is to want to be better at what you are good at. How many of our staff enjoy serving the customers? How good are they?

If staff disliked customers, how can they truly serve the customers? It would be hypocritical. It would be tantamount in giving lip, as in ‘lip service’. Service should include values – both personal and professional; these are you personal touches, useful touches, and significant touches (Jan Kelly & Gary Yardley, Experience Orientated Management). Otherwise, the attempts to raise service levels become flaccid, confusing and lacklustre. Training harder does not make you a better runner if you lack the talent and the heart. It is about finding your forte and passion, and then running away with it.

Consider this: Instead of service excellence, focus on getting things right, and then doing the right things. Be effective before being efficient. Notch your service levels. Exceed yourself. Raise the bar of your competence. Create relationships of worth with your customers. Give them pleasant experiences they will remember fondly. Build on your capabilities. Create a sense of delivery. Create a sense of occasion.

Business Leadership Lessons: How would you serve another? How would leaders serve their team? Which disservice would you eliminate from your approach?

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Article Tags: lip service, service excellence, topnotch, touches



Related Forum Posts
Re: Service Or Product? - I agree with starting a Service-based Business in the economy. Here is what I think is critical: 1. Researching that your Service business has a market. 2. Marketing the Service with as much leverage as possible. 3. Product-izing the Service (aka Package Expert Knowledge). This will only help elevate you as "the" expert in your niche and make you accessible to people in different price points.
Who Said Twitter Doesn't Work...? - Last month, the BBC World Service programme, The Strand, featured 21 year-old Icelandic pianist/composer Olafur Arnalds. Arnalds achieved extraordinary success through his internet-led project to compose 7 tunes in 7 days, post them on his website and then post links to it via TWITTER. As a result his website got thousands of visitors eager to listen to his music, catapulting him to fame and bringing his music to the attention of the BBC, who featured an interview with him on the World Service programme, The Strand! So who says Twitter doesn't work? (HINT: It does help if you have something uniquely your own that other people want to get hold of...)
Re: Ways to Boost Productivity - 1. Give Employees More Than a Paycheck 2. Provide Better eSupport Channels to Promote Self-Service 3. Complete your most dreaded tasks first thing in the morning. 4. Outsource as much as possible 5. . Turn off the TV.
Re: Service Or Product? - Service company always thrive in down economy. Let look at the advertising industies in any economy, you need to advertise your products or services even if you cannot afford any other things
Show the Benefits - Offer a free test drive of the Product or Service with a Money Back Guarantee - Take the Risk out. This will help them make the decision but you have to work with them to realize it by explicitly state the benefits they are receiving.


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