Unconditional

 

Do you believe that love can solve a problem?

It may not be magic, but it is a great place to begin. Love, rather than resentment, for the situation. Acceptance and compassion for the person or thing in the way helps us see more possibilities.

Unconditional love enriches the target of the love. And, there's a wonderful bonus. Unconditional love enriches the giver most of all.

-- doug smith

Moderation

Moderation produces more opportunities than extremism.

-- doug smith

 

It's Not About the Money

Of course we all need to make money. We earn our profits with honor when we provide goods, services, and care for our customers. It's possible to create a better world AND make money in the process.

But, all too often, in that process we encounter problems. In  the service of our people (customers, team members, vendors, regulators...) we should solve those problems.

Sometimes, companies seek to monetize that process by creating problem situations that beg for solutions, which are then made available for an upgrade with an extra fee. Yuck. Short term that may seem smart but long term it's burning down the house you live in just to warm it up.

The minute you monetize problem solving you create more problems. 

And those problems will be much harder to solve.

-- doug smith

 

Follow the Script?

 

Have you ever had a conversation with a customer service representative and you could tell that they were simply following a script?

How did you feel about that?

Sometimes the script works, but usually it doesn't feel human to the customer. As we get more and more responses from actual robots, it's worth considering how much better we can give human responses as humans.

Quick Service Do's and Don'ts:

• Don't just follow a script when you hear it's not working.
• Don't assume that the customer is wrong.
• Don't take it personally when the customer gets upset.
• Don't argue with the customer.

Instead, do these:

• Do listen to understand the customer's needs.
• Do empathize with the customer.
• Do collaborate rather than dictate.
• Do think creatively, even if you need to pause, in order to find better answers.

That's not the whole list, of course, but it's a useful place to start. No matter who we're talking to we should always be better than a robot.

-- doug smith

A Frustrating Problem

As an old six sigma project manager I firmly believe that most problems are caused by broken processes, not broken people.

But let's face it, some people not only don't realize that but they refuse to fix the process.

If you know a process is broken, and do nothing to change that, the problem gets worse. If you can solve someone's problem but refuse to, you might be the problem.

Don't be the problem. Fix the process, even if you need help.

Because there are no perfect processes, but there are lots of people avoiding them.

-- doug smith