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Homework answers / question archive / (1) Read the HBR article ‘Profitable Art of Recovery’ and write an article from your own travel experiences on successful or failed recovery of service from business perspective
(1) Read the HBR article ‘Profitable Art of Recovery’ and write an article from your own travel experiences on successful or failed recovery of service from business perspective. The article should be in 2 pages and be e-mailed in WORD before 12 November 2016. For grading, carry a hard copy to class on the first session after mid-term exam.(10%)
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Points for Writing a Travel Article:
Keen Observer: always seek the descriptive element, the penetrating detail that truly brings your subject to life and illuminates its uniqueness. When interviewing someone, avoid the obvious descriptors such as color of hair and eyes; instead focus on timbre of voice, tilt of head, the gesture or mannerism that reveals character, the way light and shadow play across the face. Likewise withplace, use imagery to evoke essential qualities; atmospherics and color are integral—the play of clouds, the tone of wind; use color dramatically—a cobalt sky; a sunset the color of apricots. Active Participant: be both dynamically and intimately involved with your subject; follow every lead and participate in every activity appropriate to the place you are writing about. Get up early, stay up late, and experience new things all day long. Depth of Feeling: develop empathy for your subject; seek to experience it emotionally and do not hesitate to reveal something of yourself—how events and people affect you. Openness to Experience: seek the harrowing, the exhilarating, the unusual. Canoe through the crocodile-infested waters; climb the treacherous cliff; stay up all night with the raucous carnival celebrants. In other words, be open to doing everything that might contribute to your understanding of the place you are writing about. Be spontaneous—one of these activities may form the basis of the lead to your story. Desire to Seek Knowledge and Understanding: strive to know your subject deeply; it’s the way it is today because of the confluence of history, geology, exploration, warfare, cultural traditions, racial configuration, tourism, and a dozen other factors. Understanding these elements will give perspective to your writing and help make it insightful and profound. Desire to Seek a High Level in the Craft of Writing: use a strong first person point of view and a clear literary style to elevate and distinguish your writing. Begin with an effective, original lead and end meaningfully. Always be aware of diction, sentence variety, and quality of transitions. Write so creatively and imaginatively that you leave your readers impatiently waiting to devour your next piece of writing. |
The Profitable Art of Service
Recovery
Christopher W.L. Hart, James L. Heskett, and W. Earl Sasser, Jr.
Harvard Business Review
JULY-AUGUST 1990
Th @ @
e Profitable Art of Service Recovery
Christopher W.L. Hart, James L. Heskett, and W. Earl Sasser, Jr.
Mistakes are a critical part of every service. Hardas One lawyer on board was already collecting names
they try, even the best service companies can’t pre- and addresses for a class-action lawsuit.
vent the occasional late flight, burned steak, or missed Silvio de Bortoli, the general manager of the Cancun
delivery. The fact is, in services, often performed in __ resort and a legend throughout the organization for
the customer’s presence, errors are inevitable. his ability to satisfy customers, got word of the hor-
But dissatisfied customers are not. While compa- __ rendous flight and immediately created an antidote.
nies may not be able to prevent all problems, they —_ He took half the staff to the airport, where they laid
can learn to recover from them. A good recovery can _— out a table of snacks and drinks and set up a stereo
turn angry, frustrated customers into loyal ones. It system to play lively music. As the guests filed
can, in fact, create more goodwill than if things had __ through the gate, they received personal greetings,
gone smoothly in the first place. Consider how Club help with their bags, a sympathetic ear, and a chautf-
Med-Cancun, part of the Paris-based Club Mediter- _—feuredride tothe resort. Waiting for them at Club Med
ranée, recovered from a service nightmare and won — wasa lavish banquet, complete with mariachi band
the loyalty of one group of vacationers. and champagne. Moreover, the staff had rallied other
The vacationers had nothing but trouble getting guests to wait up and greet the newcomers, and the
from New York to their Mexican destination. The partying continued until sunrise. Many guests said it
flight took off 6 hours late, made 2 unexpected stops, | was the most fun they’d had since college.
and circled for 30 minutes before it could land. Be- In the end, the vacationers had a better experience
cause of all the delays and mishaps, the plane was _ than if their flight from New York had gone like
en route for 10 hours more than planned and ran out — clockwork. Although the company probably couldn’t
of food and drinks. It finally arrived at 2 o’clock in) measure it, Club Mediterranée won market share
the morning, with a landing so rough that oxygen __ that night. After all, the battle for market share is
masks and luggage dropped from overhead. By the won not by analyzing demographic trends, ratings
time the plane pulled up to the gate, the soured pas- _ points, and other global measures but rather by pleas-
sengers were faint with hunger and convinced that ing customers one at a time.
their vacation was ruined before it had even started. Opportunities for service recovery abound. Any
problem that employees who are close to the cus-
SC tomer can discover and resolve is a chance to go
Christopher W. L. Hart is president of the TQM Group in Cam- beyond the call of duty and WI1n a customer for life.
bridge, Massachusetts. James L. Heskett and W. Earl Sasser, Jr. We're not talking about gas leaks in Bhopal or Ty-
are professors of production and operations management at the lenol poisonings, which threaten large-scale damage
Harvard Business School. Together they wrote Service Break- ! ;
throughs: Changing the Rules of the Game, which Free Press will and demand top management’s attention. We're talk-
publish this fall. ing about mistaken billings and late deliveries, the seemingly small issues that canignite aperson’stem- formly perfect, service companies cannot escape
per. The stuff angry letters to the chief executive are variation. Factors like the weather and the customers
made of. themselves are beyond a company’s control. The best
It’s tempting to dismiss the occasional problem airline reservation system can’t prevent the airport
as petty and complaining customers as cranks, but from fogging over. A restaurant that creates the most
managers should resist those easy outs. No business _ artistic food presentations can’t prevent a customer
can afford to lose customers, if only because it costs from disliking the taste.
much more to replace a customer than it does to When the inevitable problems arise, customers are
retain one—five times more, most industry experts almost always disappointed. The typical service de-
agree. Companies that alienate and frustrate their — livery system is completely unprepared to deal with
customers will soon have none left to bother them. exceptions. Studies we’ve done show that more than
Those that go out of their way to please customers half of all efforts to respond to customer complaints
will soon have many more. actually reinforce negative reactions to a service.
Good recoveries from service problems do happen, The surest way to recover from service mishaps is
but usually because some exceptional individual like | for workers on the front line to identify and solve
de Bortoli takes the initiative to solve a customer’s — the customer’s problem. Doing so requires decision
problem. Companies should not dependonsuchrare making and rule breaking—exactly what employees
instances of resourcefulness. They should take steps have been conditioned against. Workers have been
to ensure that everyone in the organization has the _ taught that it’s not their job to alter the routine. Even
skill, motivation, and authority to make service re- _ if they’d like to help the customer, they are frustrated
covery an integral part of operations. by the fact that they are not allowed to do it. Worse
yet, they don’t know how. We have all heard the
typical responses: “It’s not my fault.” “Tt’s not in the
computer.” “T’ll have to ask my supervisor.’”” Mean-
The Road to Service Recovery while, airline passengers stew over the meetings
they’ve missed; restaurant patrons return home hun-
Service companies must become gymnasts, able — gry and annoyed.
to regain their balance instantly after a slipup and Companies shouldn’t abandon their production-
continue their routines. Such grace is earned by fo- —_ oriented systems, but they should complement them
cusing on the goal of customer satisfaction, adopting with an equal facility for service recovery. They
a customer-focused attitude, and cultivating the spe- | should be as comfortable with the exceptions as they
cial skills necessary to recovery. are with the rules. Developing the perspective to
Ironically, recovery skills come especially hard to recognize service-recovery opportunities and the
companies that joined the quality-control movement skills to act on them is clearly an effort, but one well
and have spent the past decade making their service- | worth making.
delivery systems streamlined and efficient. Ac- Mistreating customers can have a devastating ef-
cepting admonishments to “do the right thing’ and __ fect on the business, as this example shows. John
adopting manufacturing’s philosophy of “zero de- Barrier, a 30-year customer of a bank in Spokane,
fects,” they developed rigid systems to achieve it. | Washington, parked his car in a lot owned by the
They introduced sophisticated technologies and en- bank while he did business across the street. An
acted strict policies to control employee behavior. attendant told him he could get the parking validated
The idea was to ensure that even uneducated, unmo- __if he did business at the bank, which was not his
tivated workers could consistently deliver high-qual- | usual branch. Barrier cashed a check, but afterward
ity service. By the 1980s, many such systems had _ was refused the validation because he had not made
been developed—to improve service in everything a deposit. He patiently explained to the receptionist
from scheduling airline departures and posting bank- _ that he was a long-time customer and that he had
ing transactions to maintaining hotel rooms. All of | millions of dollars in the bank’s checking, invest-
story when it hit the evening news. Needless to say, Considering how much it costs to lose a customer,
the bank executives were embarrassed and worked __ few recovery efforts are too extreme. At Club Med,
hard to persuade the customer to give the bank an- _ one lost customer costs the company at least $2,400:
other chance. a loyal guest visits the resorts an average of four
Companies that want to build the capability of — times after the initial visit and spends roughly $1,000
recovering from service problems should do these = each time. The contribution margin is 60%. So when
things: measure the costs of effective service recov- a Club Med customer doesn’t return, the company
ery, break customer silence and listen closely for loses 60% of $4,000, or $2,400. It also has to replace
complaints, anticipate needs for recovery, act fast, | that customer through expensive marketing efforts.
train employees, empower the front line, and close
the customer feedback loop.
Break the Silence
Measure the Costs
Every customer’s problem is an opportunity for
Measurement precedes management. This isespe- the company to prove its commitment to service—
cially true for service recovery—managers often un- _ even if the company is not to blame. The theatergoer
derestimate the profits lost when a customer departs —_ who forgets his ticket will long be grateful if the
unhappy, and therefore they undermanage ways of usher slips him in. The service experiences custom-
avoiding such losses. They concentrate on attracting —_ ers rave about most are those in which they were at
new customers that may actually represent unprofit- faut but the company responded anyway.
able business and neglect to take steps to retain more Of course, you can’t solve a customer's problem
valuable existing customers. Measurement often is nti] you know what it is, so all good recoveries start
the only way of getting top management's attention. _ with identifying the sore spots. Service company ex-
What gets measured is truly what gets managedhere. —_ecutives know very well that some customers make a
Errors have certain costs associated with them. _ point of being heard. They write letters, make phone
Some take the form of money-back guarantees, war- calls, ask to speak to the manager—and the manag-
ranty work, or replacements, which fall on the com- _y’g manager. Listening to these customers is im-
pany. But dissatisfied customers almost always get _ portant.
stuck with certain costs—the money they spend for But companies shouldn’t attend to just the squeaky
phone calls, the time they spend making their cases, — wheels. They must also be active problem finders.
and the aggravation they must endure throughout. Complainers are the exception; most unhappy people
The customer left stranded on the highway because —s gon speak up. They may think the situation is hope-
her car was not repaired properly might miss an im- less, or they don’t want to create a scene. Or they
portant meeting, have to pay for a tow truck, and can’t be bothered to write a letter or make a phone
spend time waiting for the repair to be made. Many —gajj__it’s one more hassle in what may have been a
service companies conveniently overlook these hid- string of many. There are many ways service busi-
den costs, but the customer surely won't. Companies _egges can encourage this ‘‘silent majority” of dissat-
known for excellent service will go the extra yardto —jgfied customers to identify themselves so the
cover all the costs a failure incurs or, if the inconve- company can win them back.
nience is so great that the company cannot com- The simplest way is to make it easy for customers
pletely compensate the customer, the tone of the tt) complain. Many businesses have established
response must signal the company’s regret. “800” numbers so customers can report problems
A study done for the U.S. Office of Consumer Af- easily and at the company’s expense. American Ex-
fairs found that in households with service problems press has installed such lines and estimates that it
with potential costs of more than $100, 54% would — achieves responses more quickly and at 10% to 20%
maintain brand loyalty if their problems were satis- _ of the cost of handling correspondence. Marriott Cor-
factorily resolved. Only 19% would repeat their poration has a 24-hour “hot line” in its hotels, which
purchase if they were unhappy with the problem makes it easy for guests to complain on the spot.
resolution. For less expensive problems ($1 to $5), It’s worth adding that hot lines should be staffed
70% would maintain brand loyalty if their problems sufficiently to prevent a common shortcoming of
were resolved satisfactorily; only 46% would re- centralized telephone systems—too few incoming
purchase if the problem wasn’t fixed.’ lines. Repeated busy signals do nothing to improve
TT —_——————— _ customers’ attitudes.
1. US. Office of Consumer Affairs, Consumer Complaint Han- A more direct way to solicit complain ts is to ask
dling in America: An Update Study, Part II (Washington, D.C.:
Technical Assistance Research Programs Institute, April 1, 1986), a simple question like, ‘“How was everything?” Many
p. 50. customers who can’t be bothered filling out forms
or making calls will volunteer their impressions of | Perdue chicken truck happened to pull up to the
the service they received when asked to. And even _ store’s loading dock. Within minutes, someone was
if the customer has nothing to say, the company __ heading off to the frustrated customer’s house with a
has sent the signal that it cares. That’s why British | complimentary two-pound package of fresh chicken
Airways has installed what it calls Video Point breasts.
booths at Heathrow Airport in London so that travel-
ers can tape their reactions upon arrival. Customer
service representatives view the tapes and respond.
Maine Savings Bank in Portland offers its patrons $1 Anticipate Needs for Recove ry
for every letter they write suggesting ways to im-
prove service. The bank averages more than 500 let- Companies can narrow the search for problems
ters a year from customers who might have kept (read “opportunities’’) by monitoring certain areas of
their ideas to themselves; it extended its lobby hours — the organization and addressing them in their ser-
after many customers made that suggestion. vice-recovery strategies. Complex scheduling that
An even more aggressive approach to unearthing involves coordinating the movement of people or
problems is to look for trouble in the making—to | equipment, for instance, tends to be problem-prone.
listen carefully for offhand comments customers There, one error can trigger a devastating chain reac-
make and to tune into and anticipate their needs. _ tion, as in airline flight cancellations.
An alert employee of a Marriott hotel that caters to We were among a group of professors studying ser-
business-people overheard a guest fretting about the —_ vice excellence that recently felt the brunt of a failure
lack of privacy in the concierge lounge where he to anticipate the need for recovery. En route from
wanted to hold an impromptu meeting with a few Boston to Columbus, Ohio with a stop at Washington
colleagues. The hotel worker called the front desk National Airport, the group was not warned that,
and arranged for a vacant suite so the guest could because of a take-off curfew at Washington National,
hold his meeting without distractions. a late departure from Boston might mean the flight
A participant in a service-recovery workshop would not be allowed to continue to Ohio. In fact,
shared this striking example of acompany thatrecog- — the US Air plane was held overnight in Washington,
nized a problem it didn’t create but nonetheless was making it impossible for the group to make it to its
prepared to solve: meeting the next morning. Worse, the harried late-
“A while back, there was a very bad fire in my night staff at US Air counters was shorthanded, so
house. The next day I was raking through my posses- _ already disgruntled passengers had to stand in line
sions, my family sitting on the front stoop, when a __ for an hour for assistance. If ever there was a problem
Domino’s Pizza truck pulled up. The driver got out waiting to happen, this was it. Because the company
and approached us with two pizzas.ItoldhimIdidn’t — failed to anticipate it, both US Air’s frontline employ-
order any pizza and explained that our house had _ ees and its customers suffered.
just burned. ‘I know,’ he replied. ‘I saw you when I New services and products also tend to create con-
drove by half an hour ago. I figured you must be —_ fusion and spawn unexpected requests. When Dallas-
really hungry, so my store manager andI decided to Fort Worth International Airport first opened, it
make a couple of pizzas for you. We put everything proved very confusing to passengers. Not only was
on them. If that’s not how you like them, I'll take — the airport of unusual design and size but it also
them back and get them made the way you like—on included one of the first rail systems to shuttle pas-
to see where they occur most often and which ones __ instead of months. And the cost of the phone call is
tend to recur. They can then prepare the organiza- _— offset by the elimination of paperwork.’
tion. When the CEO of an insurance company locked The urgent resumption of service and an apology
the keys in the trunk of his rental car ata Sheraton are often sufficient to make amends. But not always.
Hotel in Boca Raton, Florida, the staff rose to the Some situations call for a gesture that clearly says,
occasion. The bellman informed the CEO thatalock- ‘We realize there’s been a mistake, and we want to
smith under contract with the hotel would replace makeit up to you.” Many restaurants will automati-
the keys within 15 minutes. Meanwhile, other staff cally give patrons a glass of wine or a free dessert if
members used a rolling auto-jack stored nearby to _ the wait for a table is too long. First Union National
jack up the car and push it out of the driveway where Bank in Charlotte, North Carolina sends a dozen
it was blocking check-in traffic. Obviously, it wasn’t roses to customers who have been badly inconve-
the first time someone had lost a set of car keys. nienced. In some cases, branch managers or bank
executives personally deliver the flowers. Such ex-
traordinary efforts require extraordinary preparation
at every organizational level.
Act Fast
- | Train Employees
Identifying a problem quickly—even before it reg-
isters with the customer—is fruitful only if the com- The organization must train the people who inter-
pany responds fast. Our most recent research act directly with customers, and then it must em-
suggests that customers who have bad experiences power them. That is, it must give them the authority,
tell approximately 11 people about it; those with responsibility, and incentives to recognize, care
good experiences tell just 6. about, and attend to customer needs. Empowering
Service problems quickly escalate, so the opportu- the bottom of the organizational pyramid can be
nity to prove one’s commitment to the customer threatening, especially to middle-level managers,
is fleeting, especially if the company is at fault. In who may read it as an erosion of their own authority
general, the company’s first priority should be to and worth. But it is absolutely essential to good ser-
complete the service promptly. The customer whose vice recovery. Employees close to the customer are
car breaks down because it was serviced improperly the first to know about problems and are in the best
wants her car fixed. The bank customer whose ac- position to determine what can be done to satisfy
count is in error wants it properly credited. the customer.
Paul Hawken, CEO of Smith & Hawken, a garden Training can go a long way in developing the com-
supply mail-order company based in Mill Valley, Cal- munications skills and creative thinking needed to
itornia, found a simple way to speed response time: —_ geal with irate customers. Recovery training should
by using the phone instead of mail. Earlyinthecom- —focys on teaching employees how to make decisions
pany’s history, customers with routine inquiries and gn their feet and on developing an awareness of cus-
problems received form lettersin reply. Management — tomers’ concerns.
found that approach to be cost-effective, but the sav- The most effective way to develop recovery skills
ings came at the customer's expense. In oneinstance, jg through simulated real-life situations and role
an old and valuable customer placed an order on an playing. Agents for the U.S. Secret Service, who are
American Express card, which the company mistak- among the world’s most highly trained recovery spe-
enly thought was invalid. It sent the usual form let- cialists, go through a comprehensive assortment of
ter. The customer wrote back. The company sent _yecovery drills before they work in the field. Agents
another form letter. The customer wrote back. When spend hours thinking about what might happen and
a manager finally realized that the order had been discussing and planning for all the possible contin-
held up two months because of crossed correspon- gencies. Each agent—no matter how senior—goes
dence, he was horrified. The company prided itself through follow-up training sessions once a year.
on customer service, yet it had managed to anger Sonesta Hotels uses games as part of its orientation
and frustrate one of its best clients. program for new employees. Trainees are divided
The person who made the discovery immediately into two teams, each of which in turn receives a
sent the woman her order and swallowed the $90 description of a problem and is asked to come up
charge. And the company learned a lesson: from that — with a solution. The opposing team has five possible
moment on, Smith & Hawken stopped using the
mail to handle questions or problems: now someone 2. From Paul Hawken, Growing a Business (New York: Simon &
picks up the phone and resolves them in minutes Schuster, 1988).
answers to compare the response with. Points are power them to act. It must give employees the au-
awarded depending on how well the responses fit the thority, responsibility, and incentives to follow
general criteria of keen observation, responsiveness, through with customers.
care and concern, and compensation for true loss. The authority to act refers to the set of resources
The American Association of Homes forthe Aging — the employee has access to and the decisions they
distributes a board game, ‘‘The Game of Aging Con- _—_ are permitted to make. In most service companies,
cerns,” which retirement homes use to give workers only managers can spend money or otherwise make
practice in dealing with tough issues. The gamecon- __ things happen. Organizations that empower workers
sists of a board, six playing pieces, a die, and 40 make it clear that they are permitted to use their
cards, each describing a real problem or role-playing judgment to make phone calls, credit accounts, or
situation. One card reads: “Mr. Talbot, 78, com- — send flowers. For example, Montgomery Ward chair-
plains, ‘Your facility is too cold and makes me ill.’ man Bernard F Brennan has authorized its 7,700
He demands that you turn on the heat. Other resi- —salesclerks to approve checks and handle merchan-
dents want the air-conditioning left on. The heating/ — dise-return problems, functions that once were re-
air-conditioning system is centrally controlled.” An- served for store managers.
other reads, ‘‘A 72-year-old man who is intoxicated Responsibility goes one step further. It says that
walks into the dining room and acts disruptive.” employees are supposed to recognize and attend to
As players draw cards, they read them aloud, de- — customers’ needs. Managers can instill that sense of
scribe how they feel, and say what they would do. purpose in many ways—through training and re-
The idea is to expose players to a variety of concepts, | minders in newsletters and by developing an overall
give them feedback and reinforcement, and allow |= environment that puts customers first.
them to internalize a set of criteria for evaluating Responsibility means the obligation to act, not just
real-life problems. And the spirit of the game paves to accept blame. One couple was visiting a resort on
the way for an ongoing dialogue among workers. the coast of Mexico in the middle of August when
To help develop recovery skills, training should the water main from the town broke. The heat and
also give people a sense of the whole organization. humidity were ferocious, and the hotel was without
Extreme specialization of tasks gives operators tun- _—_ air-conditioning and water for most of four days. Re-
nel vision, which makes it hard to see problems in _ pair attempts were feeble. The water would run for
the making. A worker who understands the entire just a few hours before things would fail again. Each
service delivery process is more likely to understand — time the system broke, the general manager gathered
the interconnectedness of the system and find a the guests in the lounge and prattled on about how
quick solution. The most direct way to develop this he took ‘‘full responsibility” for everything. When he
perspective is by rotating workers through different said responsibility he meant blame. What customers
jobs and departments. wanted, of course, was action.
Managers know how to solve customers’ prob- Good service companies rely on “standard op-
lems, but people don’t want to waitfortheirconcerns erating procedures” for problems that come up from
to travel through the organizational hierarchy orto time to time. At McDonald’s, for instance, employ-
bounce from one department to another. Nor can — ees know that when a customer complains that his
managers answer every phone, stand behind every _ burger is cold, they should automatically give him
counter, process every piece of paper. So service re- a fresh one, no questions asked. For other situations,
covery ultimately rests on the shoulders of employ- management can only establish guidelines. Many of
ees on the front line. This implies a very different role | the problems at the Minneapolis Marriott City Cen-
for employees who have direct customer contact.In ter are one-of-a-kinds, so management has author-
addition to following rules, sticking toaroutine,and ized employees to spend $10 at their discretion to
treating every situation alike no matter what, front- satisfy guests. Once when a guest complained mildly
line workers must be able to do the opposite: bend about not being able to find a particular book in the
the rules, take initiative, and improvise. Building a hotel gift shop, the cashier, at the end of her shift,
staff that can do both requires rigorous and conscious walked toa local bookstore, purchased the book with
her flight was four hours late and that she was ex- __ feel as if they’re part of an extended quality-control
hausted, the staff person at the front desk sent a _ team. If it’s something that can’t be fixed, the com-
“Sweet Dreams” package to her room. Another asso- _— pany should simply explain why.
ciate noticed a guest with a hacking cough; she in- In our service-management classes, we ask each
cluded a box of cough drops with the package. student to send one letter of commendation and one
A company’s reward structure must give employ- ___ letter of criticism to service companies where they
ees positive reinforcement for solving problems and had memorable experiences. All contain suggestions
pleasing customers—not just for reducing the num- __ for service improvements. The responses to these
ber of complaints. Good recoveries should be publi- hundreds of letters from the real world are revealing.
cized and held up as examples to inspire others. | Only about two-thirds of the companies that receive
Federal Express created the “Golden Falcon” and thoughtful, constructive, but critical letters bother
“Bravo Zulu” awards to recognize service and recov- _to respond. A smaller proportion of the companies
ery excellence. Winners get a gold pin, recognition receiving praise write back. Worse yet, more than
in the company newsletter, and a phone call from __halfof all responses to letters of criticism either rein-
the chief operating officer as well as ten shares of force or fail to counter the senders’ original negative
company stock. perceptions.
As the nature of jobs with high customer contact Effective ways of closing the loop include making
changes, companies may find it necessary to change timely telephone responses, asking the customer for
their hiring requirements or reassign workers. Em- —_ even more feedback, and letting the customer know
bracing the notion of empowerment, the Marriott how his or her suggestions might be implemented.
Desert Springs Resort revised the job description for These efforts tend to give customers a more positive
its front-desk clerk/cashiers, room controllers, and impression than various forms of remuneration.
front-desk supervisors: the major—indeed the only—
goal of these positions is to ensure that “our guests
experience excellent service and hospitality while —Brj|liqnt Recoveries
staying at our resort.” The resort charges the people
in those positions with learning the correct technical Recovery is a different management philosophy,
procedures, using their authority to do anything to —_ one that embraces customer satisfaction as a primary
keep guests happy, using their power to satisfy guests —_ goa] of business. This mind-set can change the rules
on the spot without hassle, assisting in finding the of the game for service companies. It shifts the em-
ultimate cause for guests’ problems, and informing phasis from the cost of pleasing a customer to the
managers of ways to improve the overall hotel, work- —_ yajue of doing so, and it entrusts frontline employees
ing conditions, or guests’ comfort. with using their judgment.
. If this seems logical, why don’t more services do While many organizations pay lip service to the
it? Many are afraid that empowered employees will notion of serving customers, few are wholly commit-
“give away the store.” They overlook the fact that _ ted to it. Even those that see the connection between
tying employees’ hands effectively guarantees that —_ 199% customer satisfaction and the ultimate success
some customers won't return. The cost of keeping of the business are often ill-equipped to retain dissati-
those customers is small compared with what it ¢fied patrons.
takes to replace them. But recovery is fundamental to service excellence
and should therefore be regarded as an integral part
of a service company’s strategy. When a worker at a
Close the Loop San Antonio hotel accidentally broke the glass vase a
guest had carried from Mexico, the resident manager
If a customer’s complaint leads to corrective mea- drove 150 miles to replace it. Customers remember
sures, the company should tell the customer about — such experiences. In service businesses, the old adage
the improvement. Closing the loop makescustomers must be revised: To err is human; to recover, divine.
