No. It is the stupid work!
Do you know how to kill a 16-year-old? Easy. Sneak into the fast food restaurants of the world and remove the amount tendered key from the cash registers. When they open in the morning, be first in line and place an order in the amount of, say, $4.48. Hand the clerk a five dollar bill and three pennies. Odds are that he or she will self-destruct.
Working in our little restaurant one day, a 16-year-old employee was watching over my shoulder as I quickly dispatched orders on the drive-through.
"How do you do that?" he inquired of my register technique. "Easy. Instead of entering the amount tendered, I just hit the amount tendered key, the drawer opens, and I count back the change. It's much faster."
"No. How do you know how much change to give them?" he puzzled.
"It's a secret! Only old people know how to do this!"
'Want to know why kids can't count change and do a few other things that their parents take as a matter of fact? We don't let them count change anymore!
True story. I walked into a Taco Bell and waited patiently in line while the guy in front of me proceeded to order $19.10 worth of tacos and such. When he finished ordering, the gal behind the register announced the total. He fished through his pockets looking for a dime to hand over with the 20 dollar bill.
For whatever reason, the amount tendered key malfunctioned. The poor clerk was totally baffled.
You can see why. A total of $19.10 and she is offered a twenty and a dime. Okay. Pencils down!
I thought that she was going to cry when along came the assistant manager who gently moved her out of the way saying, "You can't do this one, Evelyn. Let me handle it."
I thought that he was being a bit rude but was glad to see someone available to take charge. With that, he reached into his shirt pocket and took out a pocket calculator!
Thanks to computerized sales transaction technology, counting change is a lost art.
Not many years ago we required new restaurant employees to memorize the price of each and every menu item, including so-called "odd ball orders, before we ever let them step behind the counter. Today, we have a register key for every conceivable order. Sometimes the key is marked with a little picture of the item to make using it even easier.
It's no small wonder when clerks and servers are totally baffled when a customer asks for an item or combination that cannot be keyed using the little pictures on the register.
POS Point: When you make jobs so idiot-proof that only idiots can stand to do them you have no right to complain about the quality of the help!
I, for one, would not mind seeing us re-engineer the workplace with the intention of adding complications just to make the job at hand challenging enough to keep regular people from going absolutely bonkers. The added benefit would be that when customers made out of the norm requests, employees would be able and comfortable to handle them.
Along with the requirement to think that comes with every properly engineered job comes the requirement for management to empower and take a few small risks. Eliminating variance (make that "risk") through standardizing the job process and focusing employees into narrow, mind-numbing tasks is another way to offend thinking customers.
Here's an aside. Only 12 percent of customers think that they have a great deal of influence over the level of service that they receive. 'Guess that's because they, too, work at dummied-down jobs and are therefore willing to accept being told such nonsense as, "That's our policy" or "I don't know."
We walked into a well-known department store with the intention of purchasing two new serving bowls to match our stoneware.
I picked up a piece from our pattern that was on display and said to the clerk with a smile, "Hi! Can you find us a couple of bowls to match this pattern?"
"We don't have any. All we have is a matching blue or a plain white. Which would you like?"
"I'd like two that match this pattern."
"We only have blue or plain white." (She's thinking by now that I have a hearing impairment when, in fact, we are dealing with a service impairment.)
"Is this pattern no longer available?"
"Not here."
"But you have the rest of the pieces. How could we go about getting a couple of bowls that match?" (This was actually more dare than threat.)
"Well, they may have them at one of our other stores," she said, thinking that she was this close to getting this interruption out of her department and her hair.
"Great idea! How could we find that out?"
Now she was really steamed but had finally figured out that I didn't come in to "not" buy bowls and that getting me out would be a tad more difficult than dialing for security.
"I'll call."
Her frosty response made me thirsty for a Midori margarita but I decided to settle for the sport of getting what I wanted and perhaps teaching her a small lesson about customer service in the process. (As I write, "Teach Your Children Well" is on the CD, a Crosby, Stills, and Nash leftover. This kid's parents must have been making out in the Chevy instead of listening!)
She attacked the telephone. "They have one at North Star. Do you want them to hold it for you?"
"What about the other one? We need two." I dug in for the long haul.
"Would you rather have one bowl that matched your set or none?" said Ms. Frosty.
"I didn't drive all this way to buy one bowl. We need two. The pattern is open stock, so I know that if you are resourceful, we can find another." I smiled my warmest toother. "Got any ideas?"
"I'll call another store," replied Ms Congeniality.
I had ruined an otherwise quiet Saturday.
She attacked the phone again. "They have two at Rolling Oaks!" Now even she was excited. She was smiling and I was not quite certain why. Maybe because she thought we would leave. Maybe because she had had a win and was actually feeling good over her ability to solve a customer's problem (or is that solve a problem customer?)
"Great! You did good!" I lied to the Ice Queen.
"Will you be able to pick them up today ? No, I have a better idea."
You could almost see the little light go on. I knew without waiting for her next words that she had experienced a conversion of sorts. From mindless, gum chewing clerk to customer service champion.
Now she was speaking into the phone with authority. "Listen. Take those bowls up to customer service and have them shipped to..."
She gave our address and credit card number and finished by saying into the phone, "I know this is a bit unusual, but you can do it."
How many customers could be so much more satisfied, how many employees would be inclined to stay at their jobs if we made a concerted effort to make working less of an idiot-proof proposition? What could we do for service if we simply refused to lower our expectations and insisted that employees use that magnificent brain that we hire but so seldom put to work?
