NANDINI VAIDYANATHAN explains about the importance of empowering employees to take ownership of customers by sticking to their vision statements
Recently I was in a heated discussion with a branch manager of a reputed bank. The bank had frozen my current account because even after repeated reminders, I had not done the KYC. Fair enough, my tardiness and I deserved the punishment. When I submitted all the documents for KYC, the bank had a spate of holidays. So practically a whole week was written off. Then when the bank reopened, I requested the branch manager to get the approval through and release my account. I got a very surprising response that he is helpless because he is not the concerned person. I said to him, for me you are the face of your bank, so it is your job to get it done.
This made me ruminate over the most obvious and disturbing question: why do organisations not foster a culture where everybody takes ownership of the customer?
When will organisations learn that empowering employees to take ownership of their customer is a tried and tested bullet-train ride to growth, success, and branding?!
In my 20 years as a corporate professional and 14 years as an entrepreneur, my pet peeve has been that organisations create vision and mission statements for the express purpose of hanging in their reception areas, much as they would hang a Matisse. To be admired from afar by people waiting in the reception. To be admired for the artistry, and not so much for the relevance of those words in their corporate culture.
All vision statements, if you notice, have the following elements: customer is king, employees are their biggest asset, value-guided profit is their ethos, growth is their anthem. And rightly so because these are the bedrock of why organisations come into existence in the first place. But the chasm between these motherhood statements and ground reality has frighteningly widened to a point where both customers and employees have used these to create memes, poking fun at the organisation.
I have also noticed that some employees go out of their way to demonstrate their ownership of the customer. And sadly each time, it is not the organisation culture that has facilitated it but the employee’s own sense of professionalism and how seriously s/he has crafted her role.
I love sharing this example often. I had gone to a restaurant in Bangalore many years ago with some friends. It so happened that I was the only vegetarian in the group. So when we placed the order, I told the waiter to make sure mine was not mixed up. True enough, when I dug into my first forkful of Schezwan fried rice; the first thing that rattled is a piece of bone! We brought the roof down and left.
Years later I went back to the same restaurant, not knowing it was the same restaurant, as the name had changed. But as soon as we walked in, my mouth was full of bile, remembering the past experience. The waiter came, took the order, looked at me and said, I am so glad to have you here ma’am, I was the waiter who served you 7 years ago, I was not responsible for the chicken in your rice, but I felt very bad that I didn’t get a chance to apologise to you then, I’m so glad I have the chance today!
You see my point? His bosses had not told him to apologise. He did it because he took ownership of me.
When will organisations learn that empowering employees to take ownership of their customer is a tried and tested bullet-train ride to growth, success, and branding?!
As an extension of this, I want to dwell on yet another point. Corporate is all about power. Not just having it but showing it. Whom do the employees show it to? Immediate target are people working under them and with them. Then it’s a show of brinkmanship with customers. Office rage is more common than road rage. Rudeness is the expression of office culture. Divisive politics is the most favourite game of one-upmanship.
I have also noticed in the last one year that corona virus has brought out the worst in us. We are rude to everybody. We shout at everybody. We behave entitled. We think we are privileged. A mentee told me that when her husband who is an IT professional gets on a zoom call from home, the kids are frightened because there is literally a Kurukshetra created out there. No holds barred.
Is that how we want to be remembered? I always say this to everyone, YOU ARE YOUR BIGGEST BRAND AMBASSADOR. Just as you have a responsibility representing your organisation, you have a bigger responsibility representing yourself. Do you want your image as that of a bully? Or as someone who enriched lives around him/her?
It costs next-to-nothing to be polite. I remember I was stopped by a policeman in Goa for parking wrongly. I was profusely apologetic and told him that I had been late for a meeting, so even knowing that I shouldn’t be parking there, I had. He asked me, are you a teacher? I was taken aback and said so. He said in Hindi, and it sounds much nicer in Hindi, you explain so politely and affectionately, so I thought you’re a teacher! My grandmother used to say, live a life where people remember you when they want to remember the best things in their life
