World Class Customer Experience

[00:00:14] Speaker A: Welcome to Momentum. Your inside track to the strategies, mindsets, and the how they did it stories behind world Synergys continued success. Let's unlock new levels of achievement together and join today's podcast. [00:00:27] Speaker B: Welcome to another episode of our podcast. As always, with me is Glen Smith. Hi, Glen. Hi there, Charles on engineering. [00:00:37] Speaker C: Hello, team. [00:00:38] Speaker B: And I'm Matt Jones. Today, as we continue to go through our core values and discuss in further detail what they mean to us, we're going to hit on world class customer experience. So, Glenn, I don't know if we want to start with a high level definition of what that means. I know we have a couple definitions within our different locations, like in 90 and whatnot, where we keep the core values. [00:01:12] Speaker D: Right, right. Well, let's just start where the name came from, the core value, which is in our name of our company, World Synergy. Right. So when I named the company World Synergy, the concept was world class customer experience, customer service. And it's always been paramount in my mind to have people that understand world class really can't be defined, because it's always changing, it's always evolving. So I really love that title of world class because it would force us to always improve, like, what is really world class? What does that mean? And so, 26 years ago, when World synergy was founded, we used that in our name so people would always know what world meant. It always stood for world class. And again, that's going to mean something different to every company and every individual. But the concept of it was that when you're dealing with people, you're trying to treat them the best that you know how in a somewhat consistent format, but also a unique experience. And so, in fact, Matt, we were talking earlier about our core value, that originally we called it world class customer service, and then in the past year, changed that name service to more of experience, which there's somewhat the same, but experience was really just trying to make it more of a focus on a unique interaction with a client and not just providing a routine. This is the way we're gonna handle a typical situation or an interaction with a client. [00:02:55] Speaker B: Yeah, we wanted to really kind of follow this flow and make it more in alignment with the platinum rule. Right. And. Which we talked about last time, which is really about doing to them how they interacting with a client, how they want to be interacted with. And that ultimately is what provides that world class customer experience. Right. But we wanted to take it further than when you think of customer service, you don't necessarily think of that whole interaction with them. The whole experience that they have with world synergy, and not just one person's interaction with them, but their interaction across the board with everybody they work with at World synergy, should be that next level that they're not even expecting in some cases. So, yeah, I think it hits home. It hits harder that way. [00:03:50] Speaker D: Yeah, I think that's another element to talk on or to speak to is creating that extra thing, whatever that experience is for that individual. No matter where you go, what companies you deal with, there are some obvious answers in terms of who has the best world class service or experience, whether it's Disney, whether it's a particular hotel, shopping mall, plaza, store, brand, whatever. There are some ones that stand out as these guys get it. They really care. As an example, we know this is an internal communication, but we were just at Pat O'Brien's the other day, the car dealership, and walking in, we never touched the doorknob. Someone opened the door for us before we even got to there. [00:04:43] Speaker B: Yep. [00:04:44] Speaker D: And they greeted us multiple times, multiple people, service guys, asking us if we wanted anything to drink or anything. And so some of that's trained, but some of that is also innate in the people that they hire. Right. Those people that go the extra mile, and it comes across as genuine. So that's another part of the world class customer service is you do have to care. You have to care about what the client's saying or what they're experiencing, and you've got to have some, some emotional intelligence to figure that out. So while we have a lot of processes and we try to improve how we communicate, whether it's email, phone, whatever, we have some standards that we use in our handbook. But at the end of the day, it's being thoughtful and listening and communicating with the client or person or vendor, whoever it is, and just really listening to what is going to make this interaction a little bit better than when it started. [00:05:55] Speaker B: Absolutely. Yeah. And a lot of it is your character. Right. And who you are. And I'm going to pick on Charles for a second, but something that he started doing, I noticed, with clients that is not in our handbook, it's not a part of a template that we've ever instructed anybody to do, is he would end his emails with, let me know how I can serve you. Let me know what I can do for you. And just that the verbiage, the way he, it can sometimes sound silly, like, let me know how I can serve you. But it's true. How can I be of service to you? That is just who you are Charles, right? That's your character. That's who you are. But it speaks to this core value of, you want them to have this great experience working with us. And if there's anything we're missing, please let us know so we can step in and do that thing. Right. And nobody told you to do that, did they? [00:06:56] Speaker C: No, no. It's a premise of letting you know that I'm here and available for you when I'm on client sites. A lot of times when people ask for help or something, they end up apologizing at first, like, I'm sorry I have to bug you, but. And my premise is like, wait a minute. No, I'm here to serve you. I'm here to assist you. That is my literal job. That is what we're here to do, is to help engage with you and build you up. So how can I help build you up and take you to the next level of what you need to do to help your company, help your clients see the value of who you are and increase that? [00:07:36] Speaker B: It's perfect. [00:07:38] Speaker D: It's perfect. [00:07:40] Speaker B: I think that also speaks to what you were saying earlier, Glenn, of world class changes even over time. I'm reminded of that SNL skit, what was his name, the IT guy that would you call your it guy, and he would come in and basically make fun of everybody for having problems and tell them how stupid they were for having to have an issue. So it used to be that, and that was a little bit stereotypical, but it was also kind of true a long time ago of how it people would actually act. And so the bar was so low that to take world class to that next level was, to me, I think, a very low bar of customer service. Whereas now, in our world, where there's 10,000 plus MSP's and there's people that are doing just kind of that they're already doing. It's the expectation now, it's not the world class to have that bar of customer service. And so you then, Charles, in this, you're taking that to that next level. And I think that's that evolution of what world class means in that realm. And I think it will change over time. Right. As people get better and better. But I do also believe that as it plays into the platinum rule, as long as we keep understanding what people, how people want to be interacted with, we will continue to be able to evolve that world class customer service even further and further. [00:09:16] Speaker D: Right, right. And it's not just about making just a great, happy experience. I mean, our goal here is to serve whatever service we're providing. So whether that's marketing it, ERP, building an application, the goal is not just to make it a happy experience, it's actually to get the result done. So it's got to be a combination of what do we do when we interact on projects and support to get the result that the customer ultimately wants. Right? So having great customer service and a great customer experience gets you to that result, because people are going to want to work with you in a partnership if it's a pleasant thing. No one wants to work with somebody that's a prima donna in the beginning of the company, across the board, it doesn't matter if it was marketing or it or whatever. There were a lot of prima donnas because a lot of the business people didn't know, and the people providing the service did know. They knew the terms, they knew the buzzwords, and they felt superior in those conversations and treated people poorly, unfortunately, which is, again, another reason why we have core values. We're trying to find the right characteristic, the right disciplines, the right behaviors, so that when things do get heated, that you're going to rise above that and stay the course and provide great experience as much as you can. And that ultimately results in, you know, in helping the client achieve whatever they were trying to achieve. [00:11:03] Speaker C: And if I can just interject with what has changed in the business world, it is now more of a relatable relationship than just do the job, which I think is the difference maker now, being able to not just do the job, but be relatable to the client or the person, because what ends up happening is, and this was astigmatism variety all the time. You could do the job, but there was no real interaction and there was no real component where the client felt they didn't feel, I guess, for lack of a better word, stupid when it's all said and done, even if it was a simple task, by making it a more relatable experience, like we see in social media now and across the board nowadays, it allows us to have the interaction, which gives us lead way when we do have those tough situations with a client. [00:11:57] Speaker B: Yep. Since this is internal, I know we talked this morning, Glenn, and I said I wasn't going to bring up this text, but I feel like this is kind of where the conversations go. And I texted Glenn this morning, because I've listened to a podcast and I was talking about the characteristics of what makes you a valuable person and employee. And I just think a lot of these we've even said now in the last ten minutes here, if you want to be successful, these are the sort of things, the character traits that people need. And I think these embody a lot of what we are. So they are initiative, discipline, self control, ambition, creativity, relational wisdom, vision, analytical skills, problem solving, insight, integrity, faithfulness, and steadfastness. And so I think those exactly are what we look for in employees and what we should be striving to get better at. You know, all of those, some of those are easier than others for us, but we should look for where our weaknesses are and try to get better at those. So I just think it's a great list. [00:13:13] Speaker D: Yeah. And you know, another reason why we're doing these podcasts is to kind of reemphasize why these core value exists. Why are they important to us as a company? So that all employees embody this and they really get it. Cause it's just not a name, it's just not a title, it's not a. It's not a plaque on the wall that we write or we put on the website. It's something we want people to embody. And my hopes and desires of doing these is that employees will start to get the backstory of these core values and start to embody them even more than what we put on paper. And so what I hope to see in the next, the next year is that our core values become even greater, because employees are looking at this, they're going through the EOS process, they're having their l ten s, and they're looking at making change. And they ask questions of, how do I improve customer service? How do I make this better. [00:14:22] Speaker B: For. [00:14:22] Speaker D: Our interactions with customers, with vendors? What do I need to do to make it better? What do I need to do when things don't go well? How do I get the feedback from our clients? We have lots of mechanisms where you put in place, as we all know. We have crew who and several other tools that we're always asking for feedback. But sometimes you gotta say it multiple times, multiple ways. You gotta put it in an email signature, you gotta put it in your voicemail, you gotta put it in your communications with clients, you have to put it in at the end of a meeting, you have to put it in various places, so the customer eventually gives you the feedback that's genuine. And they're not just saying something as a repetition to, hey, how are you? I'm fine. You? Good? Yeah. Right, so there's no real interaction. Even as a parent, you learned to not ask your kids when they come home from school, how was school? Because they're going to get the same response. It was fine. I hate it. It was okay, right? You want to ask what was the best thing happened today? What was the worst thing happen? What did you have for lunch? You want to ask very specific questions so you get more of an engaged response and you can actually get something from it. Same thing with our clients. We got to ask those questions. I mean, how many times at the end of our meeting did we say, how was this meeting? Would you rate it? What could we have done differently? Was this a value to you? Because we want to constantly change. We don't want to do things in repetition. I think that's what's happened in earlier years is that we get stuck in these processes and we're like, oh, this is a great process. So let's follow this a to z. And then we forget the customer is there and we forget that life is there, and we got to pivot. So I'm hoping that us talking about internal processes, our core values, that every employee is going to look at this and say, hey, what can I do to make this different? How could I make a customer experience better? Because it is changing. I mean, when we first started world synergy, we had this attitude, and I accepted it was that we don't have a live answer. Like we're a technology company. We started out with technology. So voicemail, having a digital phone system and allowing people to kind of find who they needed to talk to and figure it out on their own. So, you know, having these phone cues was like that. That was the thing to do. You know, if people want to talk to somebody, eventually they'll get there. Not making it a great experience until, I don't know, probably ten years ago, we started saying, no, we got to answer the phones. And we got, even from our employees, we got a bunch of pushback. I don't want to answer the phone. That's just a waste of time. Just put them in my voicemail. I'll get to it. No, that's not great customer experience. People that are calling want to talk to somebody, go figure. We don't want to put them on hold. So we even monitor that. What's the answer rate? What's the resolution? Time to solve problems. So we look at all that stuff because it all plays a factor, right? How long do you talk to someone? How long are you working on someone's system and taking away from their business? When we're meeting with them on a marketing client, when we have our monthly meetings. What data are we providing them? What's valuable to them? And it's not all the same, but there's some consistency in the base of what we do. But then everyone's different. Some customers love email, some customers love talking on the phone. So some people want to be on site, some don't. And even today, after two years of COVID people are still saying, I'm fine having a virtual meeting. And then we get quite a few customers that are still old school and say, no, I want to meet in person. Which is fine. We like it. We prefer it. Is it the most efficient driving somewhere? Of course not. There's time to do that. But you gain efficiency in the communication and engagement. And again, that's world class customer experience. [00:18:51] Speaker B: Absolutely. [00:18:53] Speaker D: Again, I think you said it before going back to experiences. What do we need to do beyond of what is being asked? And that's an individual thing, right? Everyone has their own traits of how they communicate, and some are more outgoing than others. So we have to, we as a company, we gotta look at every employee and say, how do we help augment in some instances. In other instances, we gotta maybe turn the dial down a little bit because there are some people that just like to chat. Right. I can't remember, Matt, who you're talking to, but you were talking about some, one of our employees a while ago and he said after 30 minutes, he knows your dog's name, he knows your grandchildren's name, he knows where you went to high school. And that's not something that would typically happen on a call with myself. I'd get there eventually, but it might, it might take a couple months. Right. It wouldn't be in the first 30 minutes. [00:19:54] Speaker B: Right. [00:19:55] Speaker D: And I don't know how you do that when you're on a support call and someone's, you know, having an issue and somehow you get to that whole, hey, what's your dog's name? I hear it barking in the background. [00:20:05] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:20:05] Speaker D: Right. [00:20:06] Speaker B: You know, the term that he always used was, I want to be a soft place for them to land when they call nice, I want. Because when people call their, I clearly they're not usually calling just to say, hey, how's it going? But they usually have a problem, and they're usually frustrated about the problem for whatever reason. Maybe they're blaming us, maybe they're not, but either way, they're frustrated. So we want to be that soft place for them to land while they're dealing with the issue. And that's kind of how he thought about it. And that's how he always was able to. Well, he also was a very, very personable person. But. Yeah, and I think so another big key to that, and we talked a little bit about it on the platinum rule, but it really follows here, too, is we need to be good listeners of our clients, and that might mean not giving them exactly what they're asking for, but giving them, but reading into what they're asking for and give them what they're. What they need and what they're truly asking for. So what I mean by that, it was a perfect example. This was a couple years ago, we had a client that I knew very well that was asking our team for a specific report that they wanted. They just wanted auto delivered to them every month. And I said, okay, so he's asking for that. And that's fine. We can give that to him. But that's not really what he's asking for. We need to listen to him and understand him and know what he's actually asking for. If he's asking for that report, it's because he doesn't either trust something we're doing or he doesn't feel like we're able to give him the information in a timely manner. What's he going to do with the report when he gets it right? And the answer was nothing. And so I told him, I said, we need to go back and we just truly understand what he's trying to. What he's trying to read out of that report. What is he trying to get out of that report? Because anytime somebody asks, just send me that report, something else is going on, right? And so, sure enough, we did. This was an employee who's no longer here, but they didn't really listen to me, and they just sent the report, and he got the report, and he's like, I can't really read this. I don't know what I'm looking for. And so we had to then have the conversation after the fact, as opposed to having the conversation ahead of a time and saying, hey, look, I know you want the report. Can you tell me what you're actually looking to do with this? What are you trying to do, and what is it that you're not getting right now that we can provide for you? Because I don't know that this report is going to give you what you're looking for. So I want to get you the right thing. Right. It's not always just being a yes man and doing exactly what the client asks because it's not always necessarily what they need and what they're truly looking for. They don't always know how to ask for what they're looking for. And so that's a big part of this, is being able to listen and not just react. That customer service and the customer experience isn't just about reacting to a client's request and just giving them what they want and moving on. It's understanding what they actually need, what they're trying to gain from that interaction, and providing that to them. [00:23:20] Speaker D: Right, right. And I think that's a fundamental piece of, of us as a company, is understanding the customer's need very specifically and not just reacting to it and just give them a response, because they ask, wherever he or she is, is understanding the why behind it. You know, we were on another call, Matt and I, and, you know, there was an individual across the table that said, hey, I take a lot of calls, and I'm helping clients with this or employees with this. And we said, well, is that, you know, is that your preference? Is that a good use of your time? They said, absolutely not. I'd much rather have you guys take care of it for us. And, you know, at first blush, you might hear somebody say, oh, yeah, I take care of those things. And then we do. And they would just move on as opposed to saying, was that really a good use of your time? Is that something you really should be doing and want to be doing? Just like asking about that report? Why do you want the report? Because maybe they're looking for something very specific. So it's important for us to understand and listen, as you said, Matt, to what really do they want? What's their ultimate goal? And not just take it at face value. And I think that's a tough part. I mean, we've been on some calls together, even long, long time ago, doing. Handling tech issues where somebody might have been down, and we're listening to them talking about their servers are down. And then very specifically, in a very short manner, to understand. Well, to get them back up, we don't need to get the servers back up. We just need to get this other device online so they can connect to the cloud and get up and running as opposed to trying to fix the initial problem. It's how do I get their business back online quickly. Right. And so oftentimes, it's not trying to figure out how do I fix it or how do I go through that barrier. It's how do I get around to get them back online, get them working so then we can deal with that fire a little bit later. [00:25:31] Speaker B: Absolutely. And that only comes from knowing them, knowing their business, knowing what's important to them. Right. And again, that just falls in line with all the core values we have. Yeah, yeah. [00:25:45] Speaker D: And the, you know, again, the hopes and desires of this is that when people hear this podcast and they listen to it, is that they're looking at ways of, and I think you used the word delight. How do you provide an exceptional experience and how do you, how do we use it as a process or a mechanism where other people can use it and learn from it? And so we don't have the answers to that. We just know that world class customer experience is what we desire. And we're not on the front lines every day, so we don't necessarily know what that looks like. And as we said before, it's changing the environment. The businesses in the last two years has changed drastically of what that looks like. And so last two years, we were, prior to that, going on site and talking and meeting people and having interactions. And now a lot of people are remote. So how do you make that experience better when they're remote and it changes and it's going to continue changing. Charles, you talked about social media. There's good things and bad things about social media. There's good things and bad things about texting and communication. The generations that's starting to come into the workforce, unfortunately, is less prone to having a genuine interaction with somebody because they come up with their phone stuck to their face and they're not used to talking to people, they're not used to answering a call. They want to do a text message or some chat form, or now they're on their oculus, right, and they're again communicating back and forth. It's just so weird. It's such a different way of communicating. So how do we take that and get in front of it and say, how do we create a great experience using the new tools and the way the future generation wants to communicate with? [00:27:51] Speaker B: Yeah, it's like you said, it's not, there's no one set answer that we're going to be able to create. Like, the reason we don't have a very specific definition for what this is is because it does change and we have to adapt to it. But I think the thing that helps to keep in mind is we really just want to, I like the term meet them where they are. Right. We want to meet the client where they are. If that means that they are somebody who just, they are remote, they don't want to come in, then we have to figure out how to meet them, maybe not physically at their house. Right. We figure out how are we going to meet them where they are. Right. Is that going to be a virtual meeting? But how do we make that virtual meeting engaging so that they're not just checking a box, that they had a meeting, that it's truly a good experience for them on that meeting, because it's going to be handled very differently than we would in a personal meeting. If I'm sitting across the table from somebody, I can interact with them in a different way than in a virtual meeting. So we tend. Sorry, go ahead. [00:28:57] Speaker D: No. Well, again, we have certain types of cues, certain types of processes that we put in place. We probably need a lot more, but general guidelines of how we communicate. Right. And in our handbook, we talk about how you should answer your phone, how you should answer your emails. You know, we have a process that says you never want to respond to an email in a neutral or negative way. Right. If it's something that is going to be a little bit difficult to talk about or somewhat neutral information you're sharing, pick up the phone and call them and explain it. So often, I think today, in how we communicate, if we don't put these things in place properly and teach people that when the message is difficult to explain or it's possibly going to be misinterpreted, you got to talk to them direct as opposed to putting in an email or text because it gets misinterpreted. I mean, I'm sure everyone here that's listening in our own lives, we sent a text message that got misinterpreted because someone read it and they, you know, maybe someone accidentally hit the caps button and it's all upper, you know, it's all uppercase. And like, why are you yelling at me? Right? Like, I'm not yelling at you. My thumb hit the caps button. Right? Or you, you know, you put something in voice to text and it misinterpreted what you were saying, but you just sent it in now because you were in a rush and people misinterpret it. So, you know, we're going to talk about some other core values later, but it's important to understand the message first. And if you have any questions before you act, make sure you understand what that person's asking for or what that person's saying. Right. Because I can tell you many times in the past, gosh, well, I'll just say in the 26 years of business I've asked people, hey, could you read this email? Because I don't know, what are they saying? And sometimes I misinterpret. Actually, a lot of times I misinterpret. It's either worse or not as worse as I thought. Right. I mean, it's just, you just don't know. And so you gotta, sometimes you gotta pick up the call and call the person and say, I got your email. I'm a little confused. I need some help. And 95% of the time it wasn't what I thought. Sometimes it is, but you just want to make sure before you react to something. [00:31:21] Speaker B: Absolutely. [00:31:21] Speaker D: So that's, to me, that's part of being, having great customer service. Right. My last example is just from a recent movie I watched. Wherever someone was purchasing a product and it was sold by 10ft, right? And they only wanted 6ft, right? And so they're like, I don't want to buy 10ft because I only need 6ft. I don't need the other 4ft. So they only wanted to pay for that. The whole reference of that movie was just about how his, in his mindset, how he grew up was pay for what I want and I don't want to pay anymore. And the whole customer service experience was terrible. I was like, well, we only sell it by 10ft, so you got to pay for the rest. [00:32:07] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:32:08] Speaker D: And, you know, at the end of the day, it's really understanding the individual and trying to make sometimes allowances for certain things, you know? And you don't always win the battle, but you want to win the war. Right. And that is ultimately getting the customer where they want to be or where they need to be. So it's a two way street that you got to understand the customer. But at the end of the day, we always want to be the same person, whether there's a fire or if there's a celebration. Right. We want to be that same person, and that's not always easy to do. [00:32:40] Speaker B: Awesome. So that is world class customer experience. So thank you very much, Glenn. Appreciate that. Thank you, Charles. [00:32:50] Speaker C: No problem. [00:32:51] Speaker B: And have a great week. [00:32:59] Speaker A: Thank you for joining us on momentum today.