You can’t have your cake and Eat it – Eat’s food might come naturally, their service doesn’t

Back in April 2009 I wrote a piece on the Eat restaurant chain entitled Cheap Eat – the ‘real food’ company that needs a course in ‘real service’. On the strength of that blog I met Eat to discuss the poor level of service I received. It was a robust conversation focused on the challenges of bringing great service to life on the sales floor day-to-day. As a former retail manager and trainer myself, I certainly identify with the difficulties and rewards when you do get it right, and as a commentator on service and a customer, I have continued to monitor Eat’s service level.

On Monday this week before a client meeting I was faced with that common choice – Pret, Starbucks, Eat or go local, around the Barbican. I chose Eat simply because it had more seating and I needed to take a client call over coffee and breakfast. First impressions of Eat were again quite poor with the female manager taking my order with a “what do you want?” rather than a “hi there, what can I get for you today? Nothing new, it’s what I have come to expect from the chain. I noted she repeated this attitude to all of the customers served while I was there.

Finishing up my client call I became aware  that there were three members of staff in the customer seating area engaged in what looked like a disciplinary conversation. At first I couldn’t believe that this type of conversation could possibly take place on the sales floor in full view of customers and at a very audible level but it was in fact the case. A poor employee was receiving a very accusational and somewhat forceful dressing down by a manger with what I guess was a witness recording the conversation, in public! Shock and awe of entirely the wrong kind.

I couldn’t help thinking, as I was on my way to a local law firm, just how much of an employee rights infringement conducting a disciplinary in front of customers actually is. Aren’t employees entitled to confidentiality? And besides the legal point, what about how demoralising this must have been for him? Factor in embarrssed customers in the vicinity having to listen to what the employee had not done correctly in the kitchen and the cajoling tone of the manager and you have a near fatal combination of poor management and employee practice and complete neglect of the customer service experience.

Having chosen Eat I now had another choice – leave without saying anything or intervene. I decided on the latter, a renegade move. I spoke directly to the manager in question who had just finished firing another “Do you realise …?” to the employee sitting passively on the other side of the table in the seating area. I opened with “Do you realise that your conversation is audible, visible and taking place in front of customers, it’s unnacceptable and I suggest you move to a more private area?” The manager was totally taken aback by my interruption, agreed, apologised and began packing up.

Am I wrong to think that running a ‘record of conversation’ as the manager called it, on the shop floor is a near criminal display of bad procedure? I would like to think that this is an isolated case but given my overall experience of Eat I doubt it. And with this latest example in mind I began to put my Meal Deal together here – no wonder Eat can’t get service right if staff are routinely disciplined in public. How about that for a positive working culture of employee engagement, commitment and job satisfaction? You can’t have great staff and service in an environment that in the case of this restaurant, demoralises them. You can’t have your cake and Eat it!

My response to emailing Eat on this matter was along the lines of – “our mystery shopper reports have shown an improvement in service but we don’t always get it right”. Never mind your service to me, what about being of service to your employees? No mystery shopper report good or bad can account for my experience in the Barbican Eat this week but it does bring me back to – I could have chosen Eat or Pret directly opposite. Which one would you go for?

Travelodge does cheap, nasty and with sex at breakfast, just a little dirty

The girl on the desk was struggling to serve all the guests checking in when I arrived at 9.30pm. Many of them were coming back to the desk with issues about their room. She had a studied look of patience and control which was very off-putting for guests but that clearly helped her cope with operating the entire hotel, it seemed, by herself.

My room delivered a policy of zero-tolerance toward atmosphere and unlike the new and slightly flashier Travelodge’s that manage to bring some cosyness into play with ambient lighting, it was school flourescent strip lighting all the way.

The worst thing however was the mattress which was so thin I could feel the springs collapsing. “Tucking” into bed there seemed to be a plastic mattress protector which made sleeping on it feel like being in a nappy. Just horrible. Continuing the kinder garden theme at breakfast, a voucher is exchanged for cutlery before a flimsy 7 quid breakfast is administered.

It’s the second time I’ve stayed at the Travelodge Cambridge Central and it underlined just how overpriced and underwhelmed one can be as a guest. The fact of the matter is I’ve never actually seen a 19 quid night’s stay, which is heavily advertised by the chain. Even at that low price, the standard of care and service innovation is so poor as to be criminal.

I am in the dubious position of being able to compare Travelodge’s with my current work schedule and while there are some better one’s such as Birmingham Newall St, the overall standard is insulting for an educated business budget traveller.

The only bright moment at an equally poor Norwich Travelodge was when a member of staff broke the monotony of breakfast by explaining to a guest how to get to the art college by looking out for the sex shop on the left and the gentleman’s club on the right. It broke the ice and was almost worth paying for.

Less buckle-up and more cozy-up

A few months ago I reported from the Emirates new triple 7 airliner sporting constellation ceiling displays and newly designed reclining economy seats. Now it seems Air New Zealand have gone one better and introduced a ‘Sleeper Economy Seat’ that, according to the airline, better reflects the different economy fares paid by passengers.

The standard economy seat has been designed with an enhanced winged headrest, a new pillow, fully retractable armrests and legrests that pop up to form the bedbase. Every economy seat on the B777-300ER will also come with in-seat power and USB connections, allowing passengers to connect their MP3 players to the IFE.

A product and service revolution indeed. At a small extra charge you get extra-snuggle and a whole range of couchy possibilites that could fall under the label ‘mile-high’. Let’s hear it for bringing back the romance to flying and lots more naughty goings-on from the cheap seats at the back!

Giraffe’s service walks tall

I happened to Tweet my regular trip to Norwich to work with the law firm Mills & Reeve and was pleased when @giraffetweet offered a free trip to their new restaurant in the city. It was several weeks before I could take them up but I did, last night. A few cheery @giraffetweets got me a booked table for two for precious little. Nice one Giraffe.

I arrived solo with a suitcase and after a change-twice London to Norwich train trip on National Express on a Sunday, to one of the warmest and biggest hello’s I’ve experienced. “You must be Carl” said the waitress on the door at Giraffe. I was seated and made to feel right at home on the range.

From here on I received consistently attentive and enthusiastic service from everyone and no, I don’t think it was because I was a sado by myself or an @giraffetweet convert. Every customer that evening seemed to be leisurely grazing through the menu while being treated to the same wonderfully smiley, upbeat and chatty service-style accompanied by a cool African breeze of chill-out tunes.

Busy tweeting @giraffetweet while scoffing my salmon and sweet potato fish cake and salad dish I catch the eye of one of the team. We get to talking about how impressed I am with the restaurant. Surprisingly she tells me that she previously worked as a conveyancing secretary, a coincidence since I was in town to work with 30 legal secs at Mills & Reeve.

“This must be a little different” I offer. “No” she replies and goes on to explain that in hospitality as in professional services it’s all about people, care, passion and simply being nice to others. Funnily enough this is exactly what Pret told me when I interviewed their HR Director last year – spotting and recruiting the nicest people people is key and something that many businesses fail to do or fail to develop once they’ve found them.

I Tweet Tushla May’s name over to @giraffetweet talking her up and receive a response immediately ‘@carl_potentio she is ace – will show her your tweet, she’ll be thrilled! Speak soon’. Virtual or otherwise this is stunning service from Giraffe . A taxi is ordered on my behalf and I leave knowing they’ve made me into a raving fan.

The next day I use Giraffe as an example in my service class with secretaries at Mills & Reeve under the headline – “we are all in hospitality now …”

Emirates Airline’s sexy little number – seduced by the 777’s sky at night

Economy is basically economy whichever airline or aircraft you fly but on a recent trip to Beijing via Dubai on Emirates there was a little twinkle in cattle class as night fell two hours out of Gatwick enroute to Asia. The new 777 has a surprinsgly sensuous lighting system which dims the cabin through a series of ambient shades of yellow, orange and blue while dots of tiny constellation LED’s glimmer on the ceiling. More sophisticated than sticky glo-stars in a bedroom and not as impressive as the Greenwich Planetarium, nonetheless the 777’s lightshow was an unexpected highlight in the humdrum of eight hours of Economy.

Relaxing the seat-back, an operation that normally brings frustrated noises from the person behind and only slightly eases sleep, also was a little different as I found myself being tipped gently into the seat and head-rest an inch or two more than I’ve experienced before. I can’t say I slept like a baby but it is the first time I have ever got shut-eye on long haul. Maybe the introduction of a few child’s mobiles in addition to the night lights would work. Now there is something to think about Boeing.

The 10 pillars of the most successful small business in the world.

1. All businesses require a Vision.

2. All Visions are personal and impersonal.

3. Every company is an organisation

4 . An organisation is organisation of systems

5.  There’s no such thing as customer service, there is only customer commitment, a promise, this outrageous promise has become your brand, built on your word, reflected in every decision and action you take, all employees must understand and be an expert at the part they are to play in keeping the promise, the effectiveness of every system is based on the function it plays and how it validates the promise; if this is not happening, what are you gonna do about it?

6. Master the money, bottom to top, all must be a master of money, truth of the business is the money, how it makes it and how efficiently it runs

7. Your people are not your business and your business are not the people, your business is its own reality, your people are only interested in the business as long as it gives them what they want for themselves, the business provides them them; the business must provide a philosophy that meets their needs so they meet what the customer wants according to the agreed upon standards; what are the rules of the game?  No rules = no business

8.  The business is a good idea, if it’s a bad idea there is no business, so get out! If its a great idea, great stick with it, commit and be consistent. Exude Passion for it.

9. We know more about our business than anyone else, we need to coach and train our people so that they know and deliver what we know, until then they are at risk of harming our business

10.  A business must mean something, it has to do something that means something, if it produces meaningful results to the customer that’s what it means.  Adding value to business and peoples lives.  Stop and focus.  The Vision begins to take form.  Dream to envision, be specific – The specificity asks questions, keep asking the questions.  No idea how you going to do it?  Who/what is the success model, why, what are we saying about how we provide it better than the others; a medical service that runs better than a racing crew does.  Unlikely excellence? Think Kick Ass Quality (KAQ), make a list of the attributes your business will have – visually, functionally, emotionally, financially – keep a pad by your side noting about these – Notes to myself, insights? Impressions, uncommon impressions. Call it your Entrepreneurial spiritual scrapbook.

Excerpt, and adapted slightly, from the Gerber’s Dreaming Room

The jewel in Dubai’s service crown? Reporting from inside the Middle East

I am currently flying high on Emirates EK380 from Dubai to Beijing after a four hour layover in Dubai International Airport. There are few films I haven’t seen on board and having failed to work out the entertainment system in the seat back I settled for Emirates World radio. The power of radio – finally upon departing, I am excited about the bigger, best and most extraordinary Dubai.

Was this my experience at Dubai’s airport, its gateway to the wonderful world of who can build taller and, as my newly made Aussie mate in the seat next to me put it, serve with the most “pouffiness”? Well not exactly. In fact I was a little too exhausted to care  but I was hungry and what amazed me was a Chan De Lise’s worth of duty free with wait a minute, no supermarket, two Starbucks and a giant MacDonald’s plus a few very bland sandwich places. Could Dubai International boast nothing better ?

Airports, like the great British motorway service station, I was always think, are major lost opportunities. The good one’s like KL International in Malaysia and Changi in Singapore, oh and Copenhagen’s  Roskilde airport too, are a destination in and of themselves with nice highlights – the nice shower facilities in Changi, the food and massage in KL and Mies Van Der Rohe recliners in Copenhagen with quiet zones and individual lighting. Don’t laugh but I live for these things when I travel, they make all the difference.

I love departure lounges but it wasn’t until reaching Dubai International that I felt compelled to blog about them.  Departure lounges: I love that I can switch off, there is no more I can do with work, with packing or even to organise myself safely and efficiently from A to B. It’s out of my hands, a beer is calling, some shopping and a book, it’s a beautiful thing! But upon arriving at Dubai there was not a single thing to eat and I couldn’t live on Gucci or a Frappucino.

MacDonald’s was truly it and wait for it, they didn’t even serve a Macdonald’s cardboard breakfast. At the very least that’s expected.  So to my horror I found myself scoffing back a second burger in 12 hours with the torpor of jetlag setting in and worrying about my last knock-out beach fitness session back at the gym (now served with fries). I’m in Dubai, the kingdom of service and death-defying service statements  and there is a complete lack of local cuisine, design and extravagance. I wanted  an even-more-fabulous-Bellagio fountain on the concourse shooting lasers, water jets and Jean Michelle Jarre but I would have  been happy for a slightly more interesting breakfast proposition.

In all seriousness, making travel more comfortable with even a few nice surprises should be considered ‘expected’ on the service ladder. It should not have escaped Dubai’s attention that surprisingly exceptional customer care has a first impression and your national airport is it. Fabulous service is not to be found in rows of Channel sunnies or Vertu mobile phones, it is to be found in properly considered design that speaks to your nation and to you visitors.

That’s one thing Dubai does seem to have – genuine friendliness, an openness and willingness to serve. “Welcome” said the security guard as we re-scanned belts, shoes and bags through transit. “Where are you from?”, “London” came my reply. “Chelsea won yesterday!” he said. It reminded me that I need to get that international language of football down.  It seems I have an international service-duty to read the back pages at least once a year.  Note to myself. Note to Dubai: start spectacular regional service from “doors to manual” and let your airport people showcase more than a Grande Latte and Gucci.

Stress to success

Jan’s Blog

Wednesday is National Stress Awareness Day – so every day I will be writing a Blog with a tip or 2 to help you get more Balance in your life and work resulting in less negative stress and more energy and positive stress.

Thepassion2perform in association with Potentio specialises in helping small to medium size business owners go beyond stress through to maximizing their success.

Having had direct experience of the impact of negative stress in my life I have first hand evidence of the powerful impact it can have for the worse, if left to grow uncapped.  for may the formula looks like this:

Stressful job + busyness in and outside of the job + ambition + denial that stress would affect me + sporadic attempts to prevent it through exercising and meditating occasionally + deluded that I was somehow protected from it like I’m superhuman or something = recipe for the negative effects of stress on self, family and work.

Whats been your experience of stress?

• Do you sometimes think or feel not like your usual self?
• Do you get tetchy and irritable for no apparent reason?
• Do you sometimes go into a negative mindset or outlook on life issues?
• Do you experience relationship issues and not sure how they get started?

These are all signs of stress.  The reality is stress is on the increase, its a fact, the complexity and demands of modern life plus too much information overload does it too us. Why is this? Well its quite simple although for millions of years we’ve been living quite stressful lives, as we have evolved we have had to survive and fight for our food and our lives without modern day niceties pretty much up to only 50 or so years ago.  Its in our genes to be survivors but what the past didn’t have was the high expectations we have, the busyness and the huge amount of information we have to now take in every day.

Basically the stress response is our bodies saying WARNING your in a dangerous place here, be weary. And before 50 years ago for million of years it literally could have been a matter of life and death. The natural reaction back then would be to flight your way out or withdraw from the danger.  Our millions of years genetic history’s tells us still to react in this way and to be on guard when our lives are out of balance. What we mean by out of balance is ‘work hard no play’ which tends to result in denying ourselves what is really important to us, and focusing on none or one passion only while neglecting all others.

Here are a number of typical stress symptoms to be aware of:

Physical symptoms:	Emotional symptoms	Mental symptoms
Pounding heart Headaches Sweaty palms Indigestion Skin rashes Shortness of breath Holding of breath Cold hands Sleeplessness Too much sleep Fatigue Nausea Stomach tightness Muscle tightness Pain	Mood swings Irritability Depressed mood Anxiety Lack of sense of humour Abrasiveness Hostile attitude Nervousness Irrationality Loss of direction Cynicism	Forgetfulness Loss of concentration Poor judgement Disorganization Fuzzy perception Confusion Lack of interest in pleasurable activities Deterioration in ability to calculate Difficulty in thinking Diminishing use of imagination Negative self talk

If you’re a business owner experiencing some of these symptoms, ranging from mild through the severe, then they are basically your body warning you.  The following may apply to some of you.  Just like when the oil light comes on in our car it’s a warning that our oil is low before our car breaks down. We have a choice to listen to it or ignore it.  Sometimes its turned off without having done anything.  What a relief! But then it comes back on again.  Each time we ignore it the risk to damaging our car increases.  Its gonna putt out at some point in the future.  But why wait until then? Perhaps we’re in denial and hope that the inevitable won’t happen when we are so busy getting on with other urgent things that have to be done.   Or conversely doing nothing because we’ve been stunned into freeze mode with just too much to do.

The reality is that we’re talking about our bodies and our minds in this instance and we talking about our business.  Your body and you mind are your best instrument and asset you have for making a success of you business.  It all starts from you.  If you know your instrument well, look after it and keep it finely tuned then it will play beautifully and people will want to hear you play it.  People will be attracted to you.  Good bands don’t think about avoiding how bad they’re going to sound they imagine how good they will sound and aspire to that.

So how about we apply this to ourselves? Lets start thinking about what we can do to help us feel really good every single waking minute.  The more positive, focused, passionate and energetic you are the more likely you will feel in tune with yourself and your environment and actualise success in your business.

In this place you are at your best. This is the place that inspires people to buy from you.  So how do you get there? Well awareness that there is this place is the beginning.  So spend some time imagining what life might be like for you in this place.

They say that the actualizing of you desires and dreams happen twice, second in real life and first in your imagination and minds eye.  So spend sometime wondering over the following questions:

Remember what it feels like when your on holiday, the tranquility, calmness and natural happiness?  Really remember what you were feeling, seeing and smelling at the time.

You hold that memory and feeling inside you every day whether you choose to access it or not.  Now take that feeling and apply it to your work environment. What do you notice is different in the way you handle your day to day problem-issues?

Live life with passion,

Jan

Pinewood Studios

Jan’s Log

Only  month ago I had never thought I would be hanging out at Pinewood Studios with OO7, Harry Potter and the like.  As you may or may not be aware it’s in the world class league of production studios as many world famous films are made, produced and edited there.  I must say it was a great experience, not because I  mingled with famous people and I’ve been invited back to star as an extra, as that would be far from the truth, but because it felt like I was observing something that was ‘great’  something that had made a huge success of itself in the world arena.  There’s something big and bold about Hollywood sending movies over to little Old Blighty to be finished off with the magical final British touch.

However, we did meet with SWAT.TV, a relatively new TV and online TV company, to pick their brains about how to make movies and max out on You tube and the like.  You Tube is the new google of online video (now owned by Google).  Video is the cutting edge of marketing yourself and your business and video will make you and your business different from the rest because it provides a richer experience than just words.  We found out how easy it is to make video using a Flip cam and easy to upload onto You Tube.  1-3 minute videos mean you can make them to complement, or instead of, your blog and gives your audience a richer experience.  We also talked about social media and ways to update all your social media via one web tool instead of the time intensive updating one by one, thanks to tubemogel.com and ping.fm

so to grow your market presence:

1. Decide on what subject to video yourself on and do it – upload onto You Tube etc

2. Get blogging daily, include video and update other social media with the same information

3. Build the business presence using as many social media sites as you can and keep them updated frequently

Happy Days,

Jan

The ability to convert ideas to things is the secret to outward success.
Henry Ward Beecher

My other place is a mansion – life in “off-Peak” Hong Kong and Chungking Mansions

What there is no one waiting for the lift? Wait a minute, oh no, it’s a bloke with a brand new trunk freezer. The even number lifts in Block D are dodgy at the best of times,  a trunk freezer is a double-whammy of space and weight. I’m not going to risk it.

An Indian guy who tried explaining this to Mr Freeze joined me in the odd number lift. He’s carrying a massive Sony SLR, wears a giant turban and I must admit I was surprised he came from Canada. We agree the best bet is getting off one floor above our respective destinations and negotiating the stairs down to our level.

In the Shanghai HengShen Pen hotel I was more likely to be greeted by the hotel “masseuse”, here, like this morning, it is trolley loads of Indian food being pushed down to three floors of canteen outlets below. On my way out today One resident and lift passenger commented on the uncovered state of the balti. I didn’t get the reply but it came with an expression of “whatever”. Unlike the freezer, food trolleys seem to be specially customised to fit into lifts here plus 10 people.

I was secretly harboring Wong Kar Wai film romances when I booked my 220 HK dollar stay here. My friend bought into French films when he was a kid and I went for Chinese movies. My favourite being the amazing Chungking Express. See below.

But when you arrive with a raging fever having concealed the fact at HK airport and with most of your friends and associates happily chatting about staying on the island, even on the peak, I was completely freaked out. Rewind 24 hours and I was ill, tired, disorientated and depressed. My room is 7 foot by 3 and includes a WC with a shower over the toilet. The walls are tiled and the window looks out into the ghetto which is Chungking Mansions, an estate so large and it has its own TV channel – Chungking World.

Am I in business for this? Am I crazy? What the F**k am I doing in Asia staying in a place like this based on future potential and the promise of corporates picking up my tab at The Sheraton in a few years.  I am 35 years old. This hit me last night, half out of my mind with a banging headache, sore throat and temperature. After the Shang-HIGH’s it was the valley (or very) low.

But it’s amazing what unpacking and making a cell in the middle of this incredible jungle called Chungking, into a home, can do. I woke up and decided to like it. I put up some artwork bought in Shanghai, arranged my clothes and things in a tiny space. I thought – it’s clean, things are free like wireless and not an X dollar rip off as in the biggie hotels, and the Indian guys how run the place are totally great, “If there is anything we can do, we are here for you”. Not once have I heard these words in a large hotel on my trip.

I left this morning in the even lift with the smell of Indian food all around, TV’s and electronics stacked ceiling height, guys selling watches and chipati and I saw those amazing scenes in the film Chungking Express flash past me. I was out on Nathan Rd, groggy but happy and heading for Shek O.