How ‘exceeding expectations’ can be the final nail in the coffin for good customer care
Recently we’ve worked with staff empowered to deliver customer care, who have been designated “failures” by their business. This is often as a result of performance reviews or appraisals. “You’re doing a lot of things well, but you just need to continue to work to ‘exceed expectations’”, is what’s said. But it so often seems this is largely unachievable in any real meaningful sense. Perhaps managers are just thinking about driving forward on their targets for revenue and margin. Perhaps they see that only by staff “exceeding expectations” will the business get the paying customers.
The undesirability of ‘exceeding expectations’
We’re pretty confident that any one of us could enter any business and exceed customer expectations, for example. Perhaps we could offer a free holiday to the Bahamas with every £10 spent? That would certainly exceed expectations, surely. However, surely neither we nor the business would last very long! Therefore, we think it’s time that businesses and organisations learnt to get past this phrase of “exceeding expectations”. Instead they should focus on defining what is desirable within the bounds of what is sensible and feasible. We’ll all appreciate the results!
“Management interventions must be an empowerment not a kick in the teeth”
We are reminded of a story about a school trip where frustrated teachers on a long coach journey back to school, stopped the coach in a lay-by with an adjoining field to allow the children to let off steam. They just stood there in unhappy groups, groaning and complaining about the long drive, until one experienced teacher defined their boundaries: “There’s a wall down there, and a field of cows to the left and you can just see that stream to the right. You’ve got 15 minutes. Go and see what you can find.” And they were gone.
In the same way managers need to enable staff to explore their boundaries, enable them to test their limits. Not through the use of pointless and lazy phrases, but through clearly defined, discussed, and agreed expectations, the achievement of which is obvious evidence of high standards of workplace performance. Ultimately, management interventions must be an empowerment for staff, not a kick in the teeth.
Customer Care Training from Total Training Solutions
To learn more about ‘exceeding expectations’ and many other pitfalls of poor customer care practices, you can try our one day Customer Care course, either as an individual or a group. Our Customer Care training course will help empower you and your staff to achieve better results with customers, and turn a larger percentage of new customers into long-term, loyal customers. The course is aimed at those working at all levels, but especially those who are in customer facing roles or who manage a team of people in customer facing roles.
Want to make the most of your customer base? Need some inspiration about finding your organisation’s niche? We are here to help. Check out our motivational Customer Care Course from Total Training Solutions.
Our Customer Care course can help you with:
- Identifying who your customers actually are (and how you should pursue them)
- Spot problems in your current brand message and identity
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- How to empower your team to deliver great customer service
- Resolving difficult situations and customer problems
- And many more areas!
The course can be tailored to you as well, so you can focus on resolving the customer care problems which are most impactful to you.
