Moments of Truth

Every organisation that I have dealt with recently tells me that they have a “Vision Statement”.

Proving that the Vision is shared and understood throughout the organisation has been much harder. Even more difficult has been ensuring that everyone working in the organisation is working at delivering the Mission Statement.

Dealing with certain organisations is a miserable experience. Long waits on the phone, emails not responded to, disinformation, misinformation, rudeness and indifference are common. When your organisation is competing for scarce resources be it sales, funding, grants or a positive image can you afford to inconvenience anyone trying to engage with you?

A few years ago I persuaded a commercial training organisation to purchase presentation binders from a Social Firm. Numerous phone calls were answered by people who had no idea about the product, the price, delivery times or in one case anything at all about the Firm itself.

With a deadline nearing we asked to speak to someone more senior. We were put through to a manager. The manager very rudely informed us that we had left it too late to get the binders delivered in time and that it hadn’t been necessary to ask for her at all, the receptionist should have taken the order, and in future we were not to ask for the manager to deal with such trivia!

Rest assured my client didn’t call her or her organisation again, ever.

A commercial supplier delivered the binders the same afternoon.

To survive and prosper in a very competitive market everyone within the organisation should be doing their best to maximise opportunities. Every point of contact with the outside world adds or subtracts from your organisation’s image. Each such encounter has been described as a “Moment of Truth”.

Can your organisation deliver on every “Moment of Truth”, every encounter with the public? Will the public be left with the image of an efficient, competent and polite organisation, one in which the employees have pride or will they, like my clients, be left with a very negative impression?

Everyone involved with your organisation should be trained to deal with public in a positive way. Queries need to be answered or directed to the right source, or responded to as soon as possible. The organisation’s ethos should sparkle everywhere.

Robert Townsend who successfully grew Avis in the 1970’s recounts his initiative in the book “Up the Organisation”. When he took over Avis the first thing he did was to increase the training for the telephone receptionists, increase their pay and greatly improve their work environment. Why? Because the receptionists were the first point of contact for the majority of customers and potential customers. A happy, motivated and enthusiastic response to a phone call set the tone for the rest of the encounter the customer had with Avis.

At the other extreme look at the damage local authorities are causing themselves. For the majority of the public the daily encounter with the local authority, especially in London, is the traffic warden. Now that is a “Moment of Truth” we all dread!

Uday Thakkar