First, Break All the Rules

by Marcus Buckingham

  As a passenger, this is a singularly depressing announcement. A ground stop is worse than a cancellation. At least with a cancellation you know for certain that you will have to make other arrangements. With a weather ground stop, who knows what you should do to take control of your situation. You might be delayed for five minutes or two hours. The weather gods are fickle.

  So Mark pressed his call button and asked the flight attendant: “Please, do you think we could go back to the gate and deplane?”

  The flight attendant had obviously heard this plea before and was already shaking her head. “I’m sorry, sir, but we don’t want to miss our place in line. Besides, you never know when a ground stop will be lifted.”

  Mark smiled weakly and settled down to try to find something to do. With no computers allowed and one hundred passengers battling for the three phone lines, he opted for a vacant stare out the window. He was still staring three hours later. He had seen squadrons of planes take off, but apparently none of them were destined for Chicago. Thinking that time might have softened her stance, he beckoned to the flight attendant and tried a more persuasive approach:

  “Look, it’s been all afternoon. Why don’t you take us back to the gate? We’d all be happier. You’d be happier — you wouldn’t have to deal with a planeload of short-tempered passengers. The airport would be happier — we’d be spending money in their stores and restaurants. Please take us back to the gate.”

  The flight attendant, perhaps feeling sympathetic, knelt down and whispered conspiratorially: “Sir, I’m afraid that the quality of this airline is partly measured by on-time departures. And unfortunately, on-time departures are measured by when we left the gate, not by wheels-up. So you see, sir, we really aren’t encouraged to take passengers back to the gate in situations like this.”

  At this, Mark broke down and wept. Well, no, he didn’t, but it’s fair to say that he was less than pleased.

  This is a classic example of where the very steps designed with a particular outcome in mind — in this case customer satisfaction — actually hindered the achievement of that outcome. And in fact, when you investigate this specific situation still further, you discover that there are other, even more compelling reasons not to return to the gate: flight and cabin crews are paid a higher wage, a command wage, when their plane leaves the gate.

  Of course, many pilots will use their own judgment and decide that the present discomfort of the passengers is more important than the airline’s future on-time departure rating or their own pay packet. But you can hardly blame the ones who choose to stay on the runway. All the signals are telling them to ignore the most important outcome — customer satisfaction.

  As you look around, you can see many examples of steps hindering the very outcomes they were designed to facilitate. During the wave of quality initiatives, many hotel reservation centers decided that customers would want to have their call answered within three rings. Jobs were redefined, departments were reshuffled, and compensation systems were changed to ensure that the reservation agents would meet the three-ring goal. However, it gradually emerged that customers didn’t really care about how quickly the phone was answered. They just wanted to have their questions, all of their questions, answered when they had the agent on the line. With agents hurrying to complete the call and move on to the next one, customers were feeling rushed. The steps were obscuring the outcome.

  Perhaps the most obvious example, though, is scripting. Many managers seem to feel that the only way to ensure that employees deliver a consistent level of service is to put words in their mouth.

  How many times have you heard a variation on this?

  “Welcome to New York, where the local time is approximately 8:06 p.m. For your safety and for the safety of those around you, please remain in your seats until we reach the gate. Please be careful when you open the overhead bins, as contents may have shifted during flight. If New York is your final destination, welcome home. If not, we wish you a pleasant journey on to wherever your final destination may be. We know you have a choice of airline, and we hope that you will think of us again whenever your plans call for air travel.”

  You might think that the Federal Aviation Administration requires that flight attendants read this script. It doesn’t. The FAA requires only that passengers be told about seat belts, oxygen masks, safety exit operations, and the water evacuation procedure if the flight is due to cross a large body of water. The rest of the script has been designed by managers to ensure consistency of service. Some airlines insist that their employees read it word for word. Others simply offer it, or some version of it, as a guideline. Although the level of enforcement may vary, most flight attendants are encouraged to use this script to show concern and warmth for their customers.

  This is quite a trick. Concern and warmth, if you are going to attempt them, must be genuine emotions. And a script, even when designed with the best of intentions, makes it supremely difficult to convince a customer that you are genuine, even when you are. The problem here is not that managers provided their people with a script — all employees, particularly new hires, appreciate help in finding their feet. The problem here is that following the script, rather than showing genuine concern for the passengers, has become the definition of good performance. The creed has been allowed to overshadow the message.

  Southwest Airlines, for the last six years winner of the Triple Crown Award — fewest complaints, best baggage handling, best on-time performance — is one of the few airlines that has succeeded in maintaining its focus on the message. Ellen P. is their director of in-flight training:

  “Everything is focused on ‘fun’ here at Southwest. Obviously safety is important — all our flight attendants must follow FAA regulations. But the whole purpose of our company is to help the customers have fun. How he or she makes that happen is up to each flight attendant. We don’t want them all sounding the same. In our training classes we will give you ideas and tools, but you’ve got to use them in the way that fits you. For example, we give every single flight attendant our Fun Book. In the Fun Book we have a section on jokes, a section on five-minute games, a section on twenty-minute games, a section on songs. There are some great ideas in this little book for how you can entertain our customers. But you don’t have to use them if that’s not your style. It sounds simple, really, but what we do here in my department is train you how to be the best You possible for our customers. Because at Southwest, we don’t want clones.”

  Southwest Airlines, with their unabashed focus on fun for the customer, can then allow each flight attendant to find his or her own route to that outcome. Ellen says it better:

  “At Southwest, I think everyone is expected to color outside the lines.”

  RULE OF THUMB #4: “THERE ARE NO STEPS LEADING TO CUSTOMER SATISFACTION”

  Required steps only prevent dissatisfaction. They cannot drive customer satisfaction.

  In virtually every kind of business, customer satisfaction is paramount. You, and every other employee worth his salt, want to do everything in your power to build a growing number of loyal customers. You want to take prospects, who have never tried your product or service before, and turn them into advocates. Advocates are customers who are aggressively loyal. They will not only withstand temptations to defect, they will actively sing your praises. These advocates are your largest unpaid sales force. These advocates, more than marketing, more than promotions, even more than price, are your fuel for sustained growth.

  So how do you create them?

  Over the last twenty years Gallup has interviewed over a billion customers, trying to identify what customers really want. As you would expect, we first discovered that customers’ needs vary by industry. Customers demand a different kind of relationship from their doctor than they do from their cable repairman. They expect a more intimate bond with their accountant than they do with their local grocery store.

  Our se
cond discovery was more surprising: Despite these differences, four customer expectations remain remarkably consistent across various types of businesses and types of people. These four expectations are hierarchical. This means that the lower-level expectations must be met before the customer is ready to pay attention to the levels higher up. These four expectations, in sequence, show companies what they must do to turn prospects into advocates.

  Level 1: At the lowest level, customers expect accuracy. They expect the hotel to give them the room they reserved. They expect their bank statements to reflect their balance accurately. When they eat out, they expect the waiter to serve what they ordered. It doesn’t matter how friendly the employees are, if the company consistently fails the accuracy test, then customers defect.

  Level 2: The next level is availability. Customers expect their preferred hotel chain to offer locations in a variety of different cities. They expect their bank to be open when they can use it and to employ enough tellers to keep the line moving. They expect their favorite restaurant to be nearby, to have adequate parking, and to have waiters who notice that distinctive “I need help now” look. Any company that makes itself more accessible will obviously increase the number of customers who are willing to give it a try. Hence the proliferation of drive-through windows, ATM machines, and, more recently, Web sites.

  A couple of points about these two lower-level expectations: On the one hand, they are, fortunately, quite easy to meet. Both lend themselves to technological or step-by-step solutions.

  On the other hand, these solutions are, unfortunately, quite easy to steal. Any restaurant succeeding because of its location soon finds itself surrounded by competitors hoping to cash in on the prime real estate. Federal Express’s innovative package-tracking system is quickly replicated by UPS, Airborne, and the post office. And, of course, ATM machines are now a dime a dozen. Any effort to meet these lower-level expectations, no matter how unique, quickly shrivels from a competitive advantage to a commodity.

  Finally, and most significant, both of these expectations, even if met successfully, can only prevent customer dissatisfaction. If the utility company manages to send an accurate bill, customers don’t sit back and smile in admiration. The accuracy is demanded and expected. They react only if their bill seems to reflect the gas usage of the entire apartment complex next door. Similarly, if the cable company actually agrees to an appointment that is convenient, customers don’t start calling all their friends with glee. They simply sigh with relief at being spared one of life’s inevitable frustrations.

  Accuracy and availability are undoubtedly very important expectations. Companies that consistently fail to meet them will wither. But accuracy and availability are insufficient. On their journey from prospect to advocate, your customers are only halfway there.

  The next two expectations complete the journey. They don’t just prevent negative feelings of dissatisfaction. Rather, when met consistently, these expectations create positive feelings of satisfaction. They transform a fickle customer into your most vocal advocate.

  Level 3: At this level customers expect partnership. They want you to listen to them, to be responsive to them, to make them feel they are on the same side of the fence as you.

  Service businesses have long realized the importance of this partnership expectation. That’s why Wal-Mart positions hearty senior citizens at their front door to smile a welcome and remember names. That’s why all airlines create loyalty clubs offering special treatment to frequent fliers. And that’s presumably why video stores offer a “staff picks” section: “We’re like you. We watch videos, too.”

  But recently other businesses have zeroed in on the importance of looking at the world through the customers’ eyes. For example, in the spirit of partnership, Levi’s now offers you the chance to purchase made-to-order jeans. Furnished with your measurements, the retail store relays them to the manufacturing plant, which punches out a unique pair, for your size only.

  Snapple has also cottoned on to the power of partnership. To urge its target market, college students, to drink more Snapple, it promises prizes if you are lucky enough to buy a bottle with the special code under its cap. Rather than offering hard cash, Snapple decided to position the prizes to coincide with the priorities of their young consumers. Thus the first prize is presented as “Let Snapple pay your rent for a year. 12 payments of $1,000.” The second prize becomes “Let Snapple make your car payments for a year. 12 payments of $300.” Even the smaller prizes, with onetime payments, are described by the way a young college student might spend them — thus a prize of $100 becomes “Let Snapple pay your phone bill for a month.” Although few college students actually win, by presenting the prizes in this way, Snapple manages to communicate the same message to every young customer: “We understand what you are going through.”

  Most businesses, whether in the service, manufacturing, or packaged goods sectors, now realize that a customer who feels understood is a step closer to real satisfaction and genuine advocacy.

  Level 4: The most advanced level of customer expectation is advice. Customers feel the closest bond to organizations that have helped them learn. It’s no coincidence, for example, that colleges and schools are blessed with the strongest alumni associations. But this love of learning applies across all businesses. The big public accounting firms now place a special emphasis on teaching their clients something that will help them manage their finances more effectively. Home Depot, the home improvement retailer, proudly advertises their on-site experts who offer training on everything from plant care to grouting. And Amazon.com, the online bookseller, continues to build a devoted following, at least in part, because they offer customers a recommended reading list based upon what other customers who have purchased the same book are also reading. Everywhere you look, companies are trying to transform their tellers/salespeople/clerks into “consultants.” They have realized that learning always breeds loyalty.

  Partnership and advice are the most advanced levels of customer expectation. If you can consistently meet these expectations, you will have successfully transformed prospects into advocates.

  This is all well and good, but it does beg one question: How can you meet these higher-level expectations? The answer rarely lies with technology or steps. For example, customers will feel a sense of partnership only when employees are responsive. Therefore, to meet this expectation you need employees on the front line who are wired to find the right words and right tone for each specific customer. By its very definition, you cannot legislate this in advance. A sense of partnership develops in real time. It is in the hands of the employees.

  The same goes for advice. Amazon.com may have found a technological solution, but they are the exception. Most teaching will occur between one employee and one customer. Realizing this, managers can certainly encourage their employees to help each customer learn something new, but teaching/learning is a very sensitive interaction. It requires a special kind of retail clerk or bank teller to find just the right time and just the right way to educate each customer. Technology can provide support. Suggested action steps can serve as guidelines. But the teaching/learning will happen, or fail to happen, based upon what transpires between each employee and each customer, moment by moment.

  Gallup’s research confirms what great managers know instinctively. Forcing your employees to follow required steps only prevents customer dissatisfaction. If your goal is truly to satisfy, to create advocates, then the step-by-step approach alone cannot get you there. Instead you must select employees who have the talent to listen and to teach, and then you must focus them toward simple emotional outcomes like partnership and advice. This is not easy to do, but it does have one decidedly appealing feature. If you can do it successfully, it is very hard to steal.

  All of these rules of thumb help great managers decide how much of the role should be structured and how much should be left up to the employee’s discretion.
But even though some aspects of the role will indeed require conformity to steps or standards, great managers still place the premium on the role’s outcomes. They use these outcomes to inspire, to orient, and to evaluate their employees. The outcomes are the point.

  What Do You Get Paid to Do?

  “How do you know if the outcomes are right?”

  Getting focused on outcomes is one thing. Figuring out which outcomes are right is something else entirely. So how can you define the right outcomes? Of all the things your people could be doing, how can you know which are the few things they should be doing?

  Well, as you would expect, we can’t offer you a step-by-step solution. First, it takes a certain talent to hear the siren song through the clamor. Second, even if you have this talent, this talent to focus, to discriminate, then you will undoubtedly have your own way of deploying it. What we can offer you are some deceptively simple guidelines from some of the world’s great managers.

  #1: WHAT IS RIGHT FOR YOUR CUSTOMERS?

  This is the first question you should ask. Whatever you happen to think, if the customer thinks that a particular outcome isn’t valuable, it isn’t. Since this is the basic tenet of capitalism, it is a rather straightforward guideline. Nonetheless, many companies, perhaps dazzled by their own habits and expertise, seem to have forgotten that the customer is the ultimate judge of value.

  Not to pick on the airline industry, but they are as good an example as any. Most airlines ask their flight attendants to focus on safety first. Hence the captain’s announcement “Please remember, the flight attendants are here primarily for your safety. If there is anything else they can do to make your flight more enjoyable, please don’t hesitate to ask.” Our flight attendants are professional safety experts, this announcement stresses, not glorified wait staff. Safety is paramount. Anything else, like friendly, attentive service, is an optional extra.