September 19, 2010

CARING is Strategic and Binary

Tom Peters in his new book Little BIG Things talks about CARING and how critical it is to any organization searching for eXellence. Its one of the things that Peters does so well: take an apparently small trait and argue successfully that it is Strategic, of the utmost importance to any business and is an “Essence Dimension” of the journey to greatness.

CARING fits nicely into BE DiFFERENT or be dead as one of the factors that will set you apart from the competitive herd. Sad really. ALL organizations should at the very least CARE about people as a basic human character.

CARING is a binary concept. Either you CARE or you Don’t.

As an organization, you don’t get Loyalty Points for claiming you CARE “most of the time”, or that you “mostly CARE”, or that you “slightly CARE”. It’s like saying a woman is “slightly pregnant”. Can’t happen.

The CARE thread weaves through everything we do as an organization and is highly visible to each and every customer we have. Here are some aspects of your business that you need to examine through your CARING lens:
> (Consistent) ATTITUDE. ATTITUDE. ATTITUDE. of all employees. CARING attitude 24X7 needed. Even when they are having a bad day. Nothing else will do.
> Rules, Policies and Procedures must accommodate a customer nor drive them wild. You can’t make the CARING Claim and then put your customers through the Process Pain Mill every time they want to transact with you.
> Knowledge & Competencies of people If you CARE, you make sure your employees know what they are talking about across all aspects of your business. When is the last time you did Refresher Training for your Frontline?
> Appearance and Cleanliness of your premises. Washrooms clean? Floors swept? Old carpets replaced?
> CARE on the outside. Are you active in the community? Do you take your CARE Claim to the not-for-profit sector? You can’t CARE on the inside and turn your back on your community responsibility.
> Problem Solving. Are your people problem solvers? LISTENING, ASKING QUESTIONS, FINDING SOLUTIONS scream that you CARE. Their absence yells “We really don’t give a damn”.
> Your language. How do you refer to your customers? Do you use words such as ‘transaction’, ‘call’ or ‘committment’? Use of these types of inanimate descriptions certainly don’t position you well on the CARING scale.
> Serving Leaders shows CARING for employees. If you don’t CARE about your own people you will NEVER show honest affection to your paying customers.

Cheers, Roy
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Posted 9.19.10 at 07:00 am by Roy Osing | Read Comments (0) | Leave a Comment