Good goals vs. Bad Goals

Companies that are serious about customer service set goals that motivate employees and allow them to evaluate how well they're doing. But beware - not all goals are created equal! Some will help drive the desired results while others can inadvertantly contribute to poor performance and bad behavior.

Motivational Impact
First, let's briefly examine why goals are important. The video below is a demonstration that shows how goals can foster positive behaviors such as innovation, teamwork, and healty competition. You'll also notice that a good goal itself is powerful enough to motivate people without an external reward like a prize or bonus.

Good Goals vs. Bad Goals
Setting appropriate goals requires some careful choices or you'll end up motivating people to do the wrong thing. Good goals have three distinct characteristics:

• Focuses attention on the desired results, rather than diverting attention from the big picture.
• Promotes teamwork rather than rewarding selfishness.
• Relies on intrinsic, or internal, motivation to driver performance rather than external rewards.

This short video provides a more in-depth explanation of the difference between good and bad goals:

SMART Goals Are Best
The most powerful customer service goals follow the SMART model. SMART is an acronym that stands for five qualities every good goal should have:

• S = Specific
• M = Measurable
• A = Attainable
• R = Relevant
• T = Time-bound

The short tutorial video below provides a more in-depth explanation of SMART goals and transforms a weak, "squishy" goal into a solid example:

Companies fall short on measuring customer service

I recently conducted a survey to determine how companies were measuring the effectiveness of their customer service. The results were disappointing, though not at all surprising.

How do companies measure customer service?
A whopping 25% of respondents don't formally measure their customer service at all. If you aren't trying to measure something, it's hard to make the case that it's important. Maybe this is one of the reasons customers receive poor service so often these days.

Of the companies that do measure service, surveys are the most popular option. Here are the results:

Do companies set goals for customer service?
The survey also asked whether respondents set measurable goals for customer service. Failing to set goals for customer service is like spending money without a budget -- it's really hard to tell how well your're doing. Yet, 37.5% of companies don't set measurable goals. Here's the breakdown:

Does company size matter?
The survey also included an optional question on company size by revenue. The goal was to determine whether larger or perhaps smaller companies were more likely to measure service. The results were inconclusive, though many participants opted to skip this question.

I set out to discover what companies are doing and instead found myself focusing on what companies are not doing. What do you make of the results?

TPS Named a 2011 ASTD Champion of Learning

If you notice me walking around with a little extra swagger in my stride it's because Toister Performance Solutions, Inc. has been named a 2011 ASTD Champion of Learning. The designation recognizes a commitment to workplace learning and performance through participation in the 2011 Employee Learning Week.

This honor marks the third year running for TPS. Drop me a line to learn how your organization can join me in 2012 or visit the official website.

Customer service measurement survey

The survey will close on Friday, January 20. Click here if you have trouble viewing the survey on this page.

Did you set your "out of office" message?

I never thought I'd write a blog post about the amazing virtues of an "out of office" email responder. It hadn't dawned on me until recently to point out that you can change your outgoing voice mail message to indicate you won't be returning phone calls for some time. I had simply assumed everyone knew about these wonderful inventions. After this December, I now know what happens when you assume things.

Why is this important?
With so many holidays like Christmas, Hanukkah, New Years, and Festivus, December is obviously a time of year when many people take a few days off from work. When you are out of the office it is important to set appropriate expectations about when you might return a phone call or email. Otherwise, you may cause someone to anxiously wait for your response and even think a little less of you when they don't hear back.

This December, I estimate that only 50% of my vendors, clients, and colleagues who were out of the office had an out of office message. Those that didn't contributed to several delayed projects, multiple emails and voice mails, and a lowered impression. Plenty of others did provide out of office messages, and it was easy to know when I could expect a response from these folks.

What makes a good out of office message?
Email and voice mail out of office messages should all have a three key elements:

• Inform the person you are not responding to email or voice mail
• Tell the person when you will resume normal communication
• Provide an alternative contact should the person have an urgent need

One quick tip -- be sure to turn off your email auto responder and change your voice mail greeting back to normal as soon as you return!