| As a customer service consultant there is a good | | | | without captain or crew. Few are listening, or if they |
| reason I have never focused my professional efforts | | | | are, they aren't detecting and then rejecting |
| on the retail sector. Generally, given the low wages | | | | dysfunctional service methods. Actually, one of the |
| and lack of investment in personnel, along with | | | | reasons we hear that ubiquitous announcement that |
| rampant employee turnover, it has never been a | | | | conversations are being monitored is corporate |
| promising sector for me. | | | | America's effort to deter customers from going |
| But today, my experiences as a consumer are | | | | ballistic. Fear of eavesdropping inhibits the expressions |
| convincing me that the level of customer care in retail | | | | of righteous indignation. |
| has descended to new lows. | | | | (4) There used to be an ethos that was very much |
| There are five reasons retail customer service is | | | | like sociologist Erving Goffman's dramatic model. In |
| endangered and sinking fast: | | | | business, we put on our front stage faces, with smiles |
| (1) The long-time adage, "The Customer is Always | | | | aplenty, and we enacted our role, to efficiently and |
| Right" has been replaced with a presumption the | | | | nicely help people to buy and to get value. We were |
| customer is wrong and up to no good. Try to return a | | | | told to save our back stage concerns and issues for |
| defective item to a store and you'll probably face an | | | | our personal time away from the job. No longer. |
| inquisition, instead of an apologetic clerk that gladly | | | | Today, employees are permitted to let their private |
| offers an exchange or refund. | | | | selves become public, to selectively perform their roles |
| (2) The employee "empowerment" movement has run | | | | as they please. This makes a visit to a store a crap |
| amok. It's one thing to enable smart, well-trained, | | | | shoot. You don't know what or whom you're going to |
| thinking folks to exercise discretion. But when dimwits | | | | get when you walk through a business's door. |
| are given power, they usually make dimwitted | | | | (5) By hiring inadequate personnel that can barely |
| decisions. That causes a degradation of service. Calling | | | | express themselves above the level of grunts and |
| employees "associates" and "team members" and | | | | groans, corporations have merely extended their |
| bestowing upon them other exaggerated titles has | | | | outsourcing philosophy to in-store hiring. Obtain the |
| sent the wrong signal, encouraging people to make-up | | | | most raggedy items you can find, mark them up many |
| rules as they go along and operate idiosyncratically. | | | | times, and then hire the cheapest employees to staff |
| (3) Despite the fact that we're told our transactions | | | | your stores. Invest your revenues in mall rent, |
| may be monitored to assure service quality, it is all too | | | | advertising and public relations hype, and in outsized |
| apparent customer service is becoming a ghost ship, | | | | officer salaries and perks. |