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Posts Tagged ‘great employees’

Be ‘the’ Best vs. Be ‘your’ Best

Sunday, August 21st, 2011

I remember back to when my kids played soccer in my town’s youth league. Though we all wanted our kids to play well and make a difference on the team, one parent was obsessed with their daughter being the “best.”

This parent moved her daughter to teams she thought would win, paid for personalized coaching, browbeat coaches to increase her daughter’s playing time – all the signs of a parent living her life through the life of her daughter. There is a great preoccupation of being THE best versus being YOUR best.

What made this particularly poignant is that most days on the way home from the games, this kid would have an emotional meltdown on the way to the car – for all of us to see. She just didn’t want to be the best – she just wanted to play and make a difference. What struck me most was that the daughter was wiser than the mom.

To me there is always more value in being our personal best than being “the best.” Maybe it’s because I’m not a real competitive person. Or maybe because, for me, the only thing in life that really matters is living to our own potential – of living who we really are – done in our best way possible. My standards for me should be in terms of my capabilities, not others’ criteria.

I believe we are each born with unique abilities – unique talents, strengths and passions. Our focus should be to use our life to identify which abilities we have and how to develop them to be happy, successful and impact our world. To be the best is not the same as to be our best.

My job (Chief Performance Officer) has me managing performance for a company – this includes hiring, developing and engaging employees. What stops most employees from achieving their personal best is their lack of understanding about what they have as talents and gifts; they are unaware of their capabilities and constantly look for others to define success for them. Though in a company we can create performance expectations to define performance success, what I really want most from my people is their commitment to achieve their personal best.

At our organization, we focus on hiring the right employees (their natural abilities match those needed to be successful in the job, and they like doing the job), then help them realize their full potential – to add value and make a difference. I want my employees to know what their capabilities are and maximize them.

The only trophy anyone should ever get is one that applauds them for reaching their potential. If we all strived to reach our potential, there would be more “winners” in life and less of a regard for “superstars.” After all, each of us has superstar abilities just waiting to be discovered and lived. And being “the” best doesn’t mean you achieved “your” best.

Tags: achieve potential, attract, employee performance, full potential, great employees, great performance, hire and retain, hire the right employee, performance expectations
Posted in For Managers | No Comments »

Would Your Employees and Customers Recommend You?

Saturday, May 21st, 2011

The unusual thing in today’s intellectual economy is the questions you need to ask customers are the same you must ask employees. Both the service event and the workplace now are “human-based” – these events are personal and emotional – both benefit from questions that ask about our humanity, and our feeling connected and important.

Consider asking these questions of both customers and employees to assess and ultimately activate their emotional connection. Emotional connection inspires loyalty; loyalty drives performance and results.

1. Would you recommend us to a friend? To a customer, is your service so exceptional you would put your reputation on the line to recommend the company? To an employee – is the workplace dynamic, engaging and personalized enough to suggest your friends work there as well?
2. What is the best thing we do for you? For both, knowing this allows the organization to repeat successful behaviors.
3. What is not working for you right now? For both, inviting the discussion to share negative experiences can lead to meaningful changes and improvements.
4. At our company, we focus on making others feel like family; how have we made you feel like our family? For both, activating the sense of connection to family and belonging is key to creating personal relationships and activating loyalty. Behaviors identified in the responses can be repeated.
5. What information do you hear from your social networks and do you see in the world around you that would help us be a better company? Customers and employees are the eyes and ears of all great companies. Loyal employees and customers openly share what they hear, think, value and see. Organizations dramatically expand their connection to their world by using engaged and loyal customers to observe and assess their worlds. This keeps companies informed, current and aware of what is truly important.

Customers and employees both require a personal and emotional relationship to activate their best performance and loyalty. The more connected management is to employees, and employees are to customers, the more important and valued each feels.

In a service workplace, success is built on relationships. Valued employees create valued customers. Disconnect from employees and customers, and performance, innovation and loyalty suffers. Develop a culture that constantly asks each great questions and uses the information to improve, engage and activate loyalty.

Tags: customer referral, employee referral, great employees, hire the best, loyal customers, loyal employees, right employees, workplace
Posted in For Employees, For Managers | No Comments »

What is Your Superhero Identity?

Monday, May 10th, 2010

I have a fun (and high value) exercise for you.

Think about the connection between your employees and customers – this is a critical relationship that impacts results. Your employees must always connect with customers and provide service that does more than just get it right. Your employees must commit to doing the extras – the things that activate the customer’s emotional connection to you and products/services; this inspires customer loyalty.

Another way to say this is your employees need to be your customer’s hero – and because extraordinary is the only way to approach your service – your employees must be your customer’s superhero.

So here is your exercise: have each employee define their best customer-focused talents or skills. Use these attributes to invent their customer service superhero attributes and identity.

Here are some examples of employee superheroes:
o The Inventinator – able to invent opportunities to connect with customers and to share products and services.
o The TechWiz – able to find critical information from any system to help advance the service levels of customers.
o The SuperSolver – able to brilliantly solve customer problems in a way that makes them feel valued and important.
o The MaxXplainer – able to easily explain company procedures and the ordering process to help all customers feel supported and important.
o The Simplificator – able to make the service process, easy, fun and engaging for all customers.

Here is the value of this exercise:
o Your employees identify their talents and strengths.
o Your employees focus on how they make a difference with customers and that they must do it in a significant way.
o Your customers see your (exceptional) effort.
Consider having a caricature artist sketch each superhero. Exhibit them around the business. It wins customers over.

It takes a superhero approach to win customers for life. Have your employees invent their superhero persona and share it with the customers. Customers see and appreciate the extra effort. Employees get better connected to what they are good at and how they add value. This another way to Fire Up! your employees.

What is your customer superhero identity?

Please share this with someone who will benefit from it and contact me to help you identify your employees’ superhero identities.

Tags: customer loyalty, exceptional customer service, great employees, superhero, win customers
Posted in For Managers | No Comments »

One More Thing…

Wednesday, November 18th, 2009

“If you want to be creative in your company, your career, your life, all it takes is one easy step… the extra one. When you encounter a familiar plan, you just ask one question: What ELSE could we do?” Dale Dauten

Your organization needs you to be great; good doesn’t cut it. Good organizations quickly fade to poor ones. Great organizations continually improve, hunt for opportunities, survive recessions and build customer loyalty. They do this because they commit to a culture of “one more thing” – of doing the extras. And which type of organization do you want to be part of?

Let’s talk about customers. One more thing is the one extra, additional, or “and then some” response you provide in your service.

Customers expect you to get their order right – even good companies do this. But great companies get it right AND do “one more thing” to get the customer’s attention and win the customer’s loyalty. Down in Louisiana they call it lagniappe, that little extra to make a customer feel special.

Take action: What is one EXTRA that you can start to do to make a difference in your organization? What extras can your organization do to make it stand out and get noticed? How will you help them do this?

Tags: dale dauten, do one more thing, do something more, extraordinary, extraordinary service, good is not great, great employees, great management, what else
Posted in For Individuals, For Managers | No Comments »