by Jan Dwyer Bang on July 28, 2010
As you think about creating a culture of contribution, don’t forget the importance of engaging your customers. Take note of my last BLOG entry where I shared a number of creative ways to engage your internal customers, your staff. Here are a few ideas to engage your external customers, those that purchase your goods and services:
- Thank your customers for their service.
- Thank your customers for their feedback (whether it was positive or negative – remember, a complaint is a gift!)
- Ask your customers how service can be improved.
- Make it easy for your customers to communicate with you. (How accessible is a live human being to your customers when they call your organization?)
- Appreciate their partnership with your organization (Provide gifts or “rewards” for your major donors or long time customers)
- Understand service delivery by “walking in the shoes of your customers” and examining every touch point for service
by Jan Dwyer Bang on July 21, 2010
Employee engagement seems to be the “fad” these days. Yet engaging your employees is not a passing fad but rather, a crucial strategy to keep your employees and managers operating with optimism, intentionality in service delivery, and enthusiasm that will positively transform your organization.
Here are a few ways you can engage your staff:
- Consult with your staff before making any changes affecting their work.
- Value the differences in opinions and ideas.
- Listen to and respect your staff member’s opinions. Be open to new ideas and suggestions.
- When presented with a problem or question, ask how they might solve it.
- Recognize their contributions. Make it timely.
Remember that your staff members are perhaps your organization’s most important customers! Engaging your staff members shows them that you value them!
by Jan Dwyer Bang on July 16, 2010
In his book, Good to Great, Jim Collins provides evidence that those companies that are great put first things first – they get the right people on the bus (and the wrong people off the bus). In Mr. Collin’s words, they “did the WHO before they did the WHAT.” Sometimes focusing on the “who” means making rigorous, even ruthless decisions in order to build a team who all are exceptional and committed to the organization. The “what” (vision and mission casting) follows after you have the right people.
Here’s the take-away for you and your organization. Are the right people on your team? Collins says that the moment that you need to tightly manage someone is when you made a bad hiring decision. The best people just need to be guided, not controlled. Or take a look at the skill level of your managers. Are they aware that their number 1 priority is to provide guidance and coaching for their staff? Do they have the skills to help a marginal performer transform to an exceptional worker? Are you allowing the wrong people to continue to divert energy from your high performers?
What about your organization’s hiring policies? How much time are you taking to ensure that the right person gets hired? When I was looking for a job, I was always impressed when a company spent a lot of time on the interviewing process. Indeed, when I was hired at Weyerhaeuser Company as a training consultant, the interviewing process included my meeting with several team members, my conducting a training session for their staff, and my participating in a rigorous assessment process so that they could see that not only did I have the skills, but that I would fit in with the company culture.
My next entry will focus on another way you can create a culture of contribution – by engaging your staff and your customers.
by Jan Dwyer Bang on July 16, 2010
I love this term! I first heard this term from Sally Zeiger Hanson, former Executive Director with the Puyallup/Sumner Chamber of Commerce. Though I am relatively a new comer with the chamber, I have been impressed with the way the chamber members have been supportive and encouraging to one another – with a real focus on helping other chapter members grow their business. I believe that this “culture of contribution” permeated from the leadership to the members.
What can happen when you can instill a “culture of contribution” in your organization? I contend that people will experience a positive energy and enthusiasm that can translate to customers. I believe this kind of culture inspires people to want to do their best and motivates others to get involved. And customers can recognize this kind of positive enthusiasm and want to get involved.
How can you create a culture of contribution in your association, team, organization, or board? Here are some ways:
- Hire the right people
- Engage your staff and your customers
- Enthusiastically promote others
- Offer benefits to be involved
- Recognize good work
- Reward contribution
- Create expectations
In my next 7 BLOG entries, I will flesh out every one of these elements.
by Jan Dwyer Bang on June 18, 2010
Like many of you, I travel a lot for my business and every year strive to earn “gold” status in my airlines frequent flier program. And like many of you, I see the benefits of being a “preferred traveler” diminishing. Yes, we are seeing cut backs in every industry, and the airline industry is no different. And yet, what value is it for customers to engage in frequent flier programs, invest tens of thousands of dollars to a preferred airline, and be treated no different from any other customer?
Here are a few real-life scenarios of recent experiences I had as a “gold” customer on my preferred airline of travel:
- Needing to introduce myself as a “gold” frequent flyer customer even though the airline gold program assured me that flight attendants would know my status
- Little to no difference in wait times as some airports
- Very surly attitudes on the part of attendants whenI asked them for the “benefits” that I supposedly should be receiving anyway
- Standing in MVP gold lines and not being helped or acknowledged
- Flights not having first class upgrades available
- A dedicated phone number for “gold” members but representatives who are not knowledgeable in what services should be offered
But this BLOG is more than my venting about my experiences. I write this to help you think about how you are treating your major donors and customers. What ways are you telling them “thank you” for doing business with us? What special perks are you providing to assure them that their status is worth it? What are you doing to make sure you are constantly creating innovative ways to provide benefits? (In this economy – companies need to get creative to offer benefits). What are meaningful methods to remind your major customers that you appreciate their investment in your company?
by Jan Dwyer Bang on June 15, 2010
What are the reasons that your organization provides training for your employees? (You can check all that apply)
__ Meeting state and federal requirements (safety, harassment, etc)
__ Orienting new employees to your corporate culture (new employee orientation)
__ Informing employees of corporate-wide initiatives
__ Training employees on specific skill sets to improve their leadership and team effectiveness
__ Investing in your employee’s current and future potential
No matter what type of training – I contend that first and foremost, training is an investment in your employee’s current and future potential in terms of their development, competence, productivity, morale, teamwork, communication, and overall contribution to your company. Companies that recognize the invaluable benefits of training, even during lean times, can attest to the value that occurs when a cross-section of employees come together in a classroom environment and engage in learning that focuses on real-world concepts, transferable skills that learners can apply to their jobs, and opportunities to network and learn together with other students. An experienced trainer can help facilitate the kind of learning environment where students are most apt to learn and are actively engaged.
I have been in organizations where training was non negotiable – even during a downsizing - and can attest to the ways that training was used as a key strategy to help increase employee morale, equip them with useful skills, orient them to their future, and increase their sense of hopefulness and optimism.
Classroom training is not always a viable option in all cases so e-learning classes –where employees learn from their own workstations – can fill in the gaps.
For an informative article debunking some of the great myths of training – (Learning and Training: Statistics and Myths) click on http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/trainsta.html
by Jan Dwyer Bang on June 10, 2010
How many of us have attended a training event that cost a considerable amount of money for you or are your organization with no noticeable effect in your staff’s productivity or morale? We all have at one time or another. All of us have spent long hours in a training class – feeling “trapped” by the choice we made and vowing never to waste our time or our staff’s time again. Unfortunately, there is some training that is overpriced, monotonous, not relevant, and not transferred to people’s jobs. But this is the fault of the training company you hired – not the fault of training in general.
The next time you are thinking about choosing a training company to serve your organization, here are some questions you can ask them:
How much experience does the trainer have in teaching the topic?
- How much interactivity does the trainer incorporate in his or her teaching?
- What ways will the training company assess the needs of the audience?
- In what ways do they suggest that the concepts get best transferred to people’s jobs?
- How much of the training is “theory” vs. practical so that skills can be used immediately?
- In what ways is the learning environment encouraging students to succeed?
- What are past clients saying about the training?
- What are some ways to reinforce the training (before, during, and after) the learning event?
And by the way, these same questions are the same ones that I use to assess the effectiveness of my organization (Boundless Results)!
by Jan Dwyer Bang on June 8, 2010
In the February 3, 2010 edition of the On Line Business Examiner (BE) daily, it was reported that Workforce Central has $450,000 available to help Pierce County Washington businesses pay for training related costs. (Soft and technical skills). Franciscan Health System and MultiCare Health System already took advantage of the funding and indeed, 230 health care professionals completed training through the program.
Since training and consulting is part of the services I offer to clients, this made me wonder – how many other businesses took advantage of these dollars for training? Perhaps those that took advantage of these dollars had the mindset that training is an investment – not a cost.
In the next 5 BLOG entries, I will share some ways that you can make your investment of training dollars stretch as far as possible and how you can receive the maximum value that real-world learning events can offer your managers and employees.
Is training a cost to doing business – too expensive in terms of financial commitment? Or an investment in your most important resource – human capital. Stay tuned!
by Jan Dwyer Bang on June 4, 2010
How large is your Sales force?
I am a sales person for the Hewlet-Packard Company. No, I am not a part of their sales force but I could be – I “sell” HP when I rave about their products and service! Here’s a rave – just the other day, my copy/printer/scanner machine had a paper jam. Immediately, I received a pop-up window on my computer that said, “Paper Jam Error” – with the statement- “Solutions are available” with a number of possible solutions listed, along with a phone number to technical service to contact if none of those worked. (One of them worked for me). There was also some verbiage that said “If this event happens again, please check one of the following statements:
-Notify me again
-Do not notify me again
-Notify me again only if a new solution is available
I love the products that I buy from HP – high quality, long-lasting, and well-made. But I also love the service that invariably goes along with their products. Even when I don’t speak to a “live” service representative, the service is efficient, helpful, and effective. And that’s what I want as a customer!
So – here’s some questions- how big is your sales force? And is your sales team growing with satisfied customers?
by Jan Dwyer Bang on June 2, 2010
Yes, we can give outstanding service on the phone. We can quickly respond to customers, demonstrate friendliness and follow up – but if we don’t ultimately fix the problem – we are ultimately failing in our service! I know of a national bank that focused on creating a positive and friendly service environment – I felt so good walking into the branch and getting helped by any one of the bank tellers. But guess what – many times I walked out with my question or problem not being resolved! Or I would be directed to call a 1-800 customer service number.
As you train your staff, don’t forget about making sure they know the technical aspects of their job! Customers are looking for courtesy and competence!
