TIPS NewsletterTIPS Newsletter
Date: Mon, 2 April, 2000
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Common Sense Managing TIPS Newsletter
April 2, 2000
Bill Werst, Editor
Common Sense Managing TIPS Vision: To establish Growth Associates as your primary source of practical proven information on how to build and maintain a solid organization capable of supporting outstanding customer service, customer satisfaction, and continuous quality improvement.
Part of our vision implementation is to use the Common Sense Managing book, TIPS newsletter, and www. growthassociates.org web site information to build rapport and trust with you so that you consider GA first when you need training and consulting services.
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Table of contents:
Follow The Bouncing . . . Puck -- Common Sense Managing Tip of the Week
But We’ve Always Done It That Way — Sometimes humor does have a point
Common Sense Managing Discussion Group
Reader Survey on Rewards Results
And The Winner Is
Additional Resource
Add me's
Speaking of Books
Rate it PLEASE
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Follow The Bouncing . . . Puck
Customers’ expectations are not static. Their needs and expectations are ever changing - at a faster and faster pace. The bar is always moving - up. Your organization’s success raises your customers’ expectations. Your customers’ needs are ever changing because their customers’ needs are ever changing.
Ice hockey great, Wayne Gretzky, when asked why he excelled in scoring so many goals, responded that it wasn’t necessarily his skating ability, or speed, or stick skills, but rather because his focus was always to: Skate to where the puck is going.
Seamless customer satisfaction is where the puck is going.
How are you tracking your customers’ ever changing needs and expectations?
How do you establish the priority of these needs and expectations?
What actions are you taking to satisfy your customers’ needs and expectations?
How are you measuring the effectiveness of these actions?
Are you concentrating the above efforts on your best customers?
NOTE: Best customers are not necessarily those that buy the most. Best customers are defined by how much they contribute to your bottom line profit. One client was selling $1 million of product per year to a valued customer. This went on for ten years until the new VP of Operations discovered it was actually costing the company $1.1 million to fulfill the orders. His organization lost $1 million serving the needs of this customer over a ten year period.
Reminds me of the old adage of the guy in Times Square selling $1 bills for a quarter. When ask how’s business, he replied GREAT! When questioned about how he was going to make a profit, he replied: "On volume!"
This Common Sense Managing Tip is from the Customer Satisfaction section of Common Sense Managing: Simple Ideas That Produce Results. The book is immediately available at http://www.growthassociates.org or amazon.com.
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But We’ve Always Done It That Way
Save the following story for the next time you are faced with the often creativity crusher: "But we’ve always done it that way." [Skip to the end of this story if you’ve already seen both parts. There are several additional points to consider.]
The US standard railroad gauge (width between the two rails) is 4 feet, 8.5 inches. That's an exceedingly odd number. Why was that gauge used?
Because that's the way they built them in England, and the US railroads were built by English expatriates.
Why did the English build them like that? Because the first rail lines were built by the same people who built the pre-railroad tramways, and that's the gauge they used.
Why did "they" use that gauge then? Because the people who built the tramways used the same jigs and tools that they used for building wagons which used that wheel spacing.
Okay! Why did the wagons have that particular odd wheel spacing? Well, if they tried to use any other spacing, the wagon wheels would break on some of the old, long distance roads in England, because that's the spacing of the wheel ruts.
So who built those old rutted roads? The first long distance roads in Europe (and England) were built by Imperial Rome for their legions. The roads have been used ever since.
And the ruts in the roads? Roman war chariots first formed the initial ruts, which everyone else had to match for fear of destroying their wagon wheels. Since the chariots were made for (or by) Imperial Rome, they were alike in the matter of wheel spacing. The United States standard railroad gauge of 4 feet, 8.5 inches derives from the original specification for an Imperial Roman war chariot. Specifications and bureaucracies live forever. So the next time you are handed a specification and wonder what horse's ass came up with it, you may be exactly right, because the Imperial Roman war chariots were made just wide enough to accommodate the back ends of two war horses.
Thus, we have the answer to the original question.
Now a twist to the story..............
There's an interesting extension to the story about railroad gauges and horses' behinds. When we see a Space Shuttle sitting on its launch pad, there are two big booster rockets attached to the sides of the main fuel tank. These are solid rocket boosters, or SRBs. Thiokol makes the SRBs at their factory in Utah. The engineers who designed the SRBs might have preferred to make them a bit fatter, but the SRBs had to be shipped by train from the factory to the launch site. The railroad line from the factory had to run through a tunnel in the mountains. The SRBs had to fit through that tunnel. The tunnel is slightly wider than the railroad track, and the railroad track is about as wide as two horses' behinds. So, the major design feature of what is arguably the world's most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of a Horse's Ass!
As soon as you are finished smiling, pause and reflect on your organization and your practices.
What are the two or three ‘sacred cow’ practices within your organization that might benefit from an effectiveness and efficiency challenge.
NOTE: The assumptive question. I have never seen an organization that doesn’t have sacred cows. Also not the question implies challenging, not destroying, them. Just because a practice is based on some historical event does not automatically make it bad, just suspect.
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Common Sense Managing Discussion Group
The discussion group is up and running. Two people have posted issues and already received several responses. The address to submit, subscribe, or check it out, is http://www.eGroups.com/group/commonsensemanaging/fullinfo.html.
So far I have succeeded in recruiting two General Managers, a Customer Service/Sales Manager, and a Director of HR to monitor your postings and respond when they feel they have something to offer. Each newsletter I am including a bio on one of the volunteer advisors to give you an idea of the depth of their background.
This weeks ‘star’ is JIM SKAGGS, SPHR:
A thirty year Human Resource Executive with experience in Insurance/Banking; Hospitality; High-Tech; & Manufacturing. Have held key positions of Vice President and Director of Human Resources at the following organizations: IBM Corp; ISD Corp.; Harrah’s; Del Webb Corp; Wellcraft Marine; Xebec Inc.; Continental Savings; Mandalay Bay Resorts; IGT, and Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield.
Earned the title SPHR (Senior Professional in Human Resources) from the Human Resource Certification Institute. Graduate of San Francisco State University with major in World Business/International Relations.
Instructor at Mojave Community College in Principles of Management & Human Resource Management.
Past Chairman Society for Human Resource Management with over 120,000 members; Past President Northern Nevada Human Resource Association; Past President Tri-State Human Resource Association and President Elect Northern California Human Resource Council. Current Member Nevada State Personnel Commission; Current Member Nevada Governor's Committee on the Employment of the Disabled; Current Member Society for Human Resource Management Area VI Board & Executive Committee; Current Member Board of Directors & Chair Personnel Committee for the Community Services Agency of Nevada.
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Reader Survey on Rewards Results
Thanks for the submissions on successful and unsuccessful rewards. I am posting the responses at http://www.eGroups.com/group/commonsensemanaging/fullinfo.html. This gives you another reason to go there and takes a page off this newsletter.
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And The Winner Is . . . Del
Del wins the free copy of Common Sense Managing for submitting the best true customer relations story for March. This means that the contest starts again for April’s best true customer relations tale.
I work at a computer software company taking technical support telephone calls. On this particular day I had a technician trainee sitting with me listening to my calls.
As standard I greeted my new caller with my name, received her name and other usual items we enter into the data base. To be able to properly diagnose the problem I needed to find out what version of our software my caller was using.
I went straight to work and asked if she was on our most popular piece of software by saying to her "Are you on version 4.0?" My caller immediately responded in a negative voice: "Excuse me?"
I asked the question again; "Are you on version 4.0?" She replied again in a much more negative tone: "Do not ask me that again young man." I was very confused at this point, as was my trainee.
I told my caller; "I am sorry ma’am, but for me to help you I need to know what version of my company's software you are using."
"Oh", she replied; "I am very sorry I thought you had said 'Do you have an aversion for porno'.
By this time she was laughing and so were I and my trainee. I quickly apologized for not being clear, found out what version of the software she had and finished the call successfully.
Remember to submit your customer relations story to bill@growthassociates.org
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Add me's
Know someone who could benefit from a little additional commonsense? You can simply email their names and addresses to bill@growthassociates.org. You may want additional people in leadership positions throughout your organization to receive the Common Sense Managing TIPS newsletter. There is no limit to the number of names you may add. It's free.
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Speaking of Books
All of the Tips you've been receiving are excerpted from Common Sense Managing, Simple Actions That Produce Results. Four organizations are already using the book as their primary approach to managing their organization. Five more are reviewing it right now for similar application.
Order you copy by clicking on the following link: http://www.growthassociates.org/CSM/order.htm
Know a peer or boss who might benefit from a little more common sense?
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Rate it PLEASE
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Higher ratings mean more recognition. More recognition means more readers. More readers result in investing more time and resources to bring you a meaningful newsletter.
It only takes seconds to do. Thank you.
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Have a great week - you've already started it with a little extra common sense.
Bill Werst
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