How Customer Service is Being Ruined by Toxic Coworkers

My favorite local coffee shop took a turn for the worse a few years ago.

A new barista was hired who was rude and abrupt with customers. She made frequent mistakes that caused extra work for her coworkers and created unnecessary service failures. The barista was persistently negative and refused to take responsibility for the problems she caused.

One day, the barista arrived to work and parked her car so far over the line that I couldn't open my car door. I went back into the coffee shop to ask her to move it. She begrudgingly did, but never apologized.

“I was running late,” was all she said.

A new study reveals this is a common issue. A widespread number of toxic employees are working in customer service jobs—far more than in other professions. And it's creating a big problem for both customers and coworkers.

What the study on toxic employees revealed

The survey was conducted by my company, Toister Performance Solutions, in July, 2019. 

More than 1,500 adults in the United States were asked if they work with at least one toxic coworker in their current job. The results are startling:

Customer service employees are nearly four times as likely to have a toxic coworker.

Toxic employees negatively affect the organization. They consistently engage in inappropriate behavior that makes them difficult to work with. This includes:

• Poor customer service

• Harassment

• Theft and fraud

A separate study conducted in 2015 by Michael Housman and Dylan Minor found that 1 in 20 customer service employees were fired for toxic behavior within their first year of employment.

Toxic employees can also harm team dynamics. According to Melanie Proshchenko, Founder and Principal Consultant at Honeycomb Team Solutions, "One toxic team member can infect the entire team by turning otherwise positive, unsuspecting teammates negative."

The barista was a good example. 

Her attitude put her coworkers on edge. They stopped being their usual, friendly selves whenever she was working. When she left her job after just a few months, the remaining employees quickly returned to their previous, customer-friendly habits. 

Why customer service employees are more likely to be toxic

There are a number of explanations for the high number of toxic customer service employees, including poor hiring, poor leadership, and a dangerous combination of risk factors.

Poor Hiring

Imagine you had a hiring process that accidentally made you more likely to hire a toxic employee. Unfortunately, that's exactly what's happening at many companies.

For example, many customer service job postings advertise a quest for "rockstar" employees. The Housman and Minor study found that self-regarding people who consider themselves to be rockstars are 22 percent more likely to be fired for toxic behavior.

Side note: I’ve put together a list of resources to help you improve your hiring process.

Poor Leadership

Catherine Mattice Zundel, CEO and Founder of Civility Partners, shares that many leaders are ill-equipped to handle a toxic employee.

"In my experience, there are so many toxic employees because managers don’t know how to address the behavior. Coaching bad behavior into good isn’t a skill people automatically possess–it requires training, practice, and empowerment from the organization. If the organization doesn’t provide the tools and encouragement for managers to coach toxic behavior, then managers will attempt to work around it instead."

One leader is so afraid of confronting a toxic manager who reports to her that she's resolved to wait until the manager retires—more than two years from now! Meanwhile, that manager's team has the highest turnover and the worst customer service in the organization.

Mattice Zundel also points out that some people may engage in toxic behavior, like workplace bullying, without even realizing it. These employees won't change if their boss doesn't address it.

Dangerous Risk Factors

A 2016 study by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) examined the risk factors that contribute to workplace harassment.

Customer service work itself was one of the risk factors identified. Customer service employees in some industries, particularly hospitality, are routinely subjected to harassment by customers. Some employees begin to accept inappropriate behavior as normal and can see it as tacit approval to act inappropriately themselves.

The EEOC study identified several other risk factors that are common in customer service work environments:

• Young workforces

• Monotonous work

• Decentralized workplaces

The next time you read a headline about a fast food or retail employee doing something terrible, like this, this, or this, there’s a good chance the employee was young, bored, and working far away from corporate oversight.

How to prevent employees from becoming toxic

Organizations can address this issue by focusing on teamwork over individual achievement, setting positive examples, and preventing toxic behavior from spreading.

Focus on Teamwork

Grace Judson is a leadership geek, trainer, coach, and consultant. She wrote a useful guide called The Five Most Challenging Employee Types—and how to manage them. (Download your free copy here.)

Judson suggests emphasizing teamwork. 

"Toxicity can develop in an environment where individual achievement is valued over team accomplishment. It’s important to acknowledge outstanding contribution at the individual level–and it’s equally important to avoid creating competition between individuals by setting team goals and offering whole-team rewards."

My own research on customer-focused teams backs this up. I've discovered that team-oriented metrics are one of three criteria for effective goals.

Set a Positive Example

Melanie Proshchenko emphasizes the need for leaders to set a positive example.

"Get clear about what you expect and let the team dig deep into what that looks like in practice. Tired of backstabbing? Lots of complaining in the halls? Folks whining about petty problems? Define the opposite, positive, specific versions of the behaviors that are bringing the team down and showcase them to the team."

Leaders are often guilty of setting a poor example, and then wrongly expecting their team to do the opposite. For example, frontline employees frequently say the wrong thing to customers because their leader accidentally trained them that way.

One way to set a positive example is to establish a customer service vision. This is a shared definition of outstanding service that gets everyone on the same page, including the leader.

Prevent Toxic Behavior from Spreading

Companies are often too slow to fire people who routinely engage in toxic behavior.

Toxic employees can easily infect others. Research from Philip Zimbardo, the psychologist responsible for the infamous Stanford Prison Experiment, reveals that when people around you are engaging in inappropriate behavior, it makes it more likely that you will do the same.

According to the Housman and Minor study, adding just one more toxic employee to a team of 25 made everyone on the team 46 percent more likely to get fired for toxic behavior.

Leaders must take action as soon as they spot inappropriate behavior. Allowing it to go unchallenged almost always results in worse behavior and negative consequences.

What's been your experience with toxic customer service employees? Please leave a comment or drop me a line.

Why Customers Should Not Help Write Your Vision

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A question I'm often asked is what role customers should play in helping a company write its customer service vision.

A customer service vision is a shared definition of outstanding service that gets everyone on the same page. Creating one is the most important step you can take toward building a customer-focused culture.

My answer surprises people. I don't think customers should be involved at all when you write your customer service vision.

What is the danger of asking customers what they want?

There's an old episode of The Simpsons where Homer discovers he has a half-brother named Herb Powell. 

Herb is the CEO of a car company called Powell Motors, and he's frustrated by his design team's uninspiring new car concepts. So he enlists Homer to help design his company's next car, believing that Homer personifies the wants and needs of the average American consumer.

The result is a disaster. The car, dubbed The Homer, is so overloaded with unnecessary features that it can't be sold at a profit. 

There's a real-life lesson here. Customers have diverse tastes and interests. And a customer merely wanting something doesn't automatically mean a company can make money providing it.

I’m a huge fan of the online pet store, Chewy. It offers convenient online ordering, a huge selection of products, incredible prices, and has a fun and helpful service culture. Chewy’s sales have grown rapidly over the past several years, but the retailer has yet to turn a profit.

At The Overlook, a vacation rental cabin my wife and I own, we've gotten all sorts of requests. A few have asked for air conditioning, which would be cost-prohibitive to install given the short warm period of the year is also a slow time. Others suggested we list The Overlook on Airbnb, but the listing fees would add expense without bringing in much additional revenue. (Airbnb would also make The Overlook more expensive for our guests.)

Sometimes different groups of customers have conflicting needs. For example, all the rooms at The Overlook have either a king or a queen bed. This is perfect for our target market, but others would prefer bunk beds, sleeper sofas, and air mattresses to accommodate as many people as possible in one house.

When I researched customer-focused organizations while writing The Service Culture Handbook, I consistently found these companies resisted the urge to be all things to all people. That’s why you won’t find a chicken salad on the menu at In-N-Out Burger, but you will find a line of loyal customers waiting to get their hands on a delicious cheeseburger at 10pm on a Wednesday evening.

Who should help write your vision?

The vision should be rooted in reality. It should describe how you’d like to serve customers in the future based on how you serve customers today when everything is going well. For this reason, all employees should be given a chance to provide input on your customer service vision.

This step-by-step guide describes how to do that.

When it comes to drafting the vision statement, there should only be 7-10 people in the room, plus an outside facilitator if you decide to use one. More than that, and the group becomes unwieldy. Fewer than that, and not enough perspectives are included.

The group should be comprised of a representative sample of employees:

• At least one frontline employee. They keep it real.

• At least one senior leader. They provide authority.

• At least one mid-level manager or supervisor. They're the link between execs and the front lines.

Many organizations try to have the executive team create the customer service vision at a retreat. My research reveals that's a big mistake.

Should you ever ask customers about your vision?

Absolutely!

The time to ask customers for their input is after you write the vision and start using it to guide your operations. This is when customer feedback can be invaluable. Keep in mind you're not asking customers what they want, you're asking them how well you are executing your vision.

At The Overlook, our vision is welcome to your mountain retreat. We constantly use guest feedback from surveys, comments, and even our own observations, to refine our approach. For example, we added extra guest towels after learning that many guests like to shower after returning from a sweaty hike, but don’t want to use the same towel later that evening when they use the hot tub.

How can I write a vision statement?

Here are some resources that can help you write an effective customer service vision:

• Book: The Service Culture Handbook

• Guide: How to Write a Customer Service Vision Statement

• Video: Guide Employees With a Vision

Guide employees with a vision from Leading a Customer-Centric Culture by Jeff Toister

Culture Report Reveals Executives Disconnected From Reality

There's a scene in the movie, Office Space, that gets me every time. 

Bill Lumbergh, the clueless executive, announces a new culture initiative in an all-hands meeting. "So you should ask yourself, with every decision you make, is this good for the company?" A banner hangs overhead that reads "Is this good for the company?"

It was the beginning, middle, and end of the initiative. 

A new report from the consulting firm PwC shows this type of executive disconnect from corporate culture initiatives is real. A 2018 survey of 2,000 people in 50 countries found large gaps between what executives and employees felt about corporate culture.

You can read some stunning conclusions below or read the entire report here.

Consistency

Companies often create a mission, vision, or value statements to help define the culture. Yet the true culture is how people think and act. 

The report revealed a disconnect in how consistently the cultural statements were followed:

At just 63 percent, even leaders sense there's a huge gap between the culture message and what people are actually doing. The perception is far worse among employees.

There are two causes that I frequently see.

The first is executives try to define the culture all by themselves. They sequester themselves in a conference room or hold a retreat, and dream up what they think the culture should be. 

I've called leaving your employees out of the process the worst mistake in building a service culture. That's because you need everyone represented to come up with an authentic description of how people should think and act.

The second leading cause of the consistency gap is too many culture initiatives are like the banner in Office Space. They're symbolic, with no real commitment behind them. 

So how should you define your culture? I recommend this proven process.

Priority

Employees don't always believe culture is a priority for senior leaders. This graphic is telling:

The root cause is often tied to how culture initiatives play out. The executive team dreams it up behind closed doors, an announcement is made, and employees see little else. 

There may be a culture committee or task force doing some work, but frontline employees don't see that and usually aren't involved. They just see their daily work continue as usual.

The customer-focused companies I researched for The Service Culture Handbook took a very different approach. Leaders in these organizations involved employees every step of the way. For example, a customer service leader at Cars.com shared customer feedback with her team on a daily basis, and solicited employees' ideas on how to fix issues.

Pride

Customer-obsessed employees take a lot of pride in the companies they work for. They love their products and services, believe in the mission, and are often customers themselves.

The PwC report revealed a big gap in company pride between executives and employees:

I interviewed psychologist Gemma Leigh Roberts for my latest book, Getting Service Right, to get a better understanding of the executive disconnect. She shared some interesting insight:

"Challenging your perception of business performance (which you are responsible for leading) can lead you to challenging your own performance, which can be painful for your ego and damaging for your confidence. In this scenario, sometimes executives choose not to acknowledge facts or consider them irrelevant, which is a self-protection strategy."

In other words, executives are human just like the rest of us. Our egos try to protect us from our personal failings, such as creating a miserable work culture.

Take Action

The PwC report revealed that 80 percent of respondents felt their organizational culture must change in the next five years.

If that's you, what are you going to do about it?

My suggestion is to start by defining the culture you want to have with a simple statement called a customer service vision. This is a shared definition of outstanding customer service that gets everyone on the same page.

You can use this step-by-step guide to help you create it. I've assembled some additional culture change resources here.

Great Customer Service Leaders Keep Things Simple

I spend a lot of time talking to leaders about service culture. One of the challenges I hear most often is complexity.

None of these leaders actually say "complexity." I hear it in the way they describe their business and what they're doing to get everyone on the same page. They often struggle to articulate exactly what they want their employees to do.

If you can’t describe it, it’s hard for your employees to do it.

One restaurant chain I worked with had a company mission statement, a service slogan, four elements of a "great experience," and a 17-step service procedure that waitstaff had to follow with every guest. The really confusing part was all of these elements pointed to slightly different behaviors. 

Worst of all, there was no agreement on what was most important:

• Executive leaders tended to focus on the mission and service slogan.

• Store managers talked about the four elements of a great experience.

• Shift leaders typically encouraged efficiency over everything else. 

The chain's leadership team had the best intentions when all of these items were created. But they unwittingly created complexity for their employees by giving them too many things to think about.

Keep Things Simple

Leaders in customer-focused companies make things simple for employees, so employees can focus on customers.

Trader Joe's is a terrific example. Founder Joe Coulumbe created the successful grocery chain by focusing on simplicity:

• Smaller product selection than typical grocery stores

• Less square footage than typical grocery stores

• No coupons

• No loyalty program

What you will find in Trader Joe's are high-quality, reasonably priced products along with friendly and helpful employees who are really knowledgeable. A Trader Joe's staffs more employees than most grocery stores, so it's also easier to find help when you need it.

At the restaurant chain, I asked the leadership team to decide which statement was the most important. It took some discussion, but they ultimately decided the mission statement would be the main thing. 

The 17-step service procedure still contained helpful operating guidelines for servers, but it needed some changes. It was shortened to just ten steps, and those steps were carefully aligned with the mission. 

These changes suddenly made it far easier for servers to understand what was most important when serving guests.

Take Action

Here's an exercise that can help you focus your organization or team on simplicity.

Start by taking an inventory of existing cultural artifacts. These are statements, slogans, models, or other items that help define your culture. Examples include:

• Mission statements

• Vision statements

• Values

• Brand promises

• Mottos

• Service slogans

• Service standards

Next, identify which one of these is most important. The way to do this is imagine an employee is in the midst of serving a customer. What one statement do you want the employee to use as a guide?

The answer for many companies is "none" or "we're not sure." If that's the case, you may want to start from scratch by creating a single customer service vision.

Finally, take this mini-assessment to see how well your business is aligned with the single statement or slogan you chose. It's a shorter version of an in-depth service culture assessment I offer to my clients.

Unlock Your Employee Empowerment with this Hidden Secret

A customer once taught me an important lesson about empowerment.

I was a national account manager for a uniform company that sold hats, jackets, shirts and items embroidered or screen printed with a company's logo. My customer was frustrated by a two-week wait for a product sample. In my inexperience, I meekly tried to explain the limits of our process. I'll never forget his retort:

"Isn't that what they pay you for? Sometimes, you've gotta bend the rules."

He was right. I managed to get the customer's sample order out in three days rather than two weeks. It took a lot of effort, and I bent a lot of rules, but he was happy.

I blamed our strict policies and procedures for making things so difficult. 

Years later, I discovered a hidden secret to improving employee empowerment. Counterintuitively, it's having strict processes. It turns out the ones we had at the uniform company just weren't the right ones.

The Definition of Empowerment

When I researched customer-focused companies for The Service Culture Handbook, I was surprised to learn that leaders at elite companies had a different view of empowerment.

You can read a more detailed explanation, but here's a quick summary:

Empowerment really means enabling employees to provide outstanding customer service. There are three elements required:

1. Resources: good products, services, tools, etc.

2. Process: a consistent way of doing things right.

3. Authority: the ability to bend the rules when needed.

We had pretty good products and I had a lot of authority at the uniform company. It was our processes that stunk. Following the standard processes resulted in longer leader times and more shipping errors. Following our pricing policy led to higher prices. All of those were a recipe for angry customers.

Why a Strict Process is Essential

Quality was a real problem at the uniform company.

We'd often ship the wrong item, embroider the wrong logo, or fail to detect a damaged item. Customers already frustrated by long lead times would go through the roof when their shipment arrived and it wasn't quite right.

I had the authority to hold any order until I personally inspected it. This allowed me to catch errors before they shipped out.

The inspection process added a day to the already long lead time. And when I did catch a problem, I could have the problem fixed (adding to the lead time), but I was rarely able to address the root cause of the issue.

It would have been so much better if I could have trusted that my customers' orders ship out correct and on time. That was the missing piece that would have enabled me to spend more time proactively addressing customer needs rather than just playing defense and trying to prevent errors.

Strict, reliable processes are essential to empowerment. 

Amazon is able to ship products from its warehouses at blazing speed with fantastic accuracy because of a tightly choreographed fulfillment system. Each step is carefully documented and monitored.

Do Amazon employees have the authority to deviate from the process?

Yes, but only if there's a reason. For example, when I toured an Amazon fulfillment center, I saw employees shut down a shipping line when they detected an error and needed to identify the root cause. 

Tinker to Constantly Improve

My biggest account at the uniform company was an anomaly. 

A competitor held a master contract with the corporate office, so I had to target the customer's individual locations. Rather than selling a thousand uniform shirts at a time, my average order from this customer was about ten items.

Our factory's smallest embroidery machine could put a logo on six garments at a time. So the factory set a minimum order size of six items with the same logo in an effort to run more efficiently. A lot of orders from my big client had fewer than six embroidered items, which caused us to lose business.

I organized a meeting with production leaders to find a solution. We worked out a plan to group orders from this customer together so it was easier to meet the minimum. 

Here's what would happen:

• Location A might order two shirts on Monday

• Location B might order one shirt on Tuesday

• Location C might order three shirts on Thursday

By Thursday, I had enough shirts to meet the six item minimum, so the production team would start the orders for locations A, B, and C at the same time. 

This might delay the orders for locations A and B by couple of days, but it was better than refusing the business altogether. And I learned that I could earn some goodwill by telling the customer I found a way around our six item minimum.

There was just one snag in the plan. A different embroidery pattern was required for different types of materials and fabric weaves. So if location A ordered two cotton oxford shirts, location B ordered a polyester work shirt, and location C ordered three poly-cotton blend polo shirts, I'd actually need three different embroidery patterns.

That put me back to square one since the embroidery machines could only follow one pattern at a time.

The solution was experimenting to find more universal embroidery patterns that would look great on multiple fabric and weave types. Cutting down the number of different patterns required made it easier to meet the minimum of six items with the same logo.

Customer-focused companies constantly tinker with processes.

Southwest Airlines provides a great example. It experimented for years with different boarding processes until it arrived at the system it uses today. Customers are assigned a boarding group (A, B, or C) at check-in along with a number that tells them when to board. So the passenger with A31 on their boarding pass will board right after the passenger with A30. The process allows Southwest to board its planes very quickly with minimal passenger confusion.

That doesn't mean Southwest is done tinkering. The airline is currently testing boarding planes through both the front and rear doors. 

Conclusion

I was ultimately laid off from my job at the uniform company. 

All those broken processes finally caught up to us. Competitors were able to ship orders faster, with fewer errors, at lower prices. My department was eliminated in a cost-cutting reorganization effort.

One thing that doomed us was we didn't have a process for fixing repeated problems. I'd share feedback with my boss and he'd just shrug and say there's nothing we could do. 

Getting laid off turned out to be fantastic for my career. I got a job as a contact center training supervisor. My new boss, Debbi, was a mentor who helped me grow my training and leadership skills. One thing Debbi encouraged me to do was work with my team to develop really good processes.

You can find more information about empowerment on this resource page.

How Culture Insurance Services Uses Culture to Help Clients

Andrew Uber, managing director of Culture Insurance Services, hosted a customer service meetup last month at the company's office just outside of San Diego, California.

It was an informal gathering of Customer Service Tip of the Week subscribers. The idea was to meet in person, share some ideas and best practices, and learn something new.

Uber gave a presentation about how Culture Insurance Services uses its unique culture to differentiate itself in a crowded market. The company is a broker that sells business insurance policies ranging from health insurance to corporate liability.

One thing that struck me is how closely Culture Insurance Services follows the steps outlined in The Service Culture Handbook. Here's a summary of what I learned.

Codify the Culture

Culture is a shared way of acting and believing. Organizations with intentional service cultures take the time to clearly define how people should work to serve customers.

I call this a customer service vision, which is a shared definition of outstanding customer service that gets everyone on the same page. The vision can take many different forms in a company, including its mission, vision, or values.

At Culture Insurance Services, a set of eight values serve as the company's customer service vision. 

Uber shared that the values were created by examining two things. 

The first was the company's aspirational culture. This is how people think and act when the company is at its best, and the aspiration is to work this way more consistently. 

The second source of inspiration was the values of well-known and admired customer-focused companies. For example, Uber told us that "Love Others" was inspired by the love theme that Southwest Airlines is famous for.

There's a word of caution here.

It's fine to draw inspiration from other organizations when defining your own culture, so long as the elements you adopt ring true for your company or team. Trying to copy another company's culture doesn't work because every organization has its own unique essence. 

The bottom line is your customer service vision will only truly work if it's authentic. Culture Insurance Services seems to have done a nice job doing that.

Take Action: You can create your own customer service vision with this step-by-step guide.

Create Stories

Stories are a powerful way to communicate your customer service vision to employees. This can help them understand the culture through specific, concrete examples.

One of Culture Insurance Services' clients was a tree trimming service that found itself losing a lot of key employees. Many of the employees took customers with them when they left, costing the company a 20 percent drop in revenue.

Following the core value of "reject passivity," Culture Insurance Services helped its client diagnose the root cause of high turnover. The analysis revealed that only 40 percent of employees were participating in the company's health benefits. The company offered a great plan, but the company only covered 50 percent of the premium. The employee's contribution was more than many employees felt they could afford.

The solution was to find another option that still offered good coverage, but was more affordable. The company covered 75 percent of the new plan, which dramatically lowered employees' costs. When the new plan rolled out, 27 percent of employees who were previously uninsured enrolled in health insurance coverage and the client stopped losing key people.

This story is an instructive example that can help other Culture Insurance employees understand what it means to "reject passivity" when working with a client. Stories like this can make vague-sounding values seem specific and actionable.

Take Action: Collect stories and examples of your customer service vision in action. They don't have to be over-the-top hero moments where an employee runs into a metaphorically burning building and saves a bag full of puppies. Everyday actions actually work better because they are things that can be implemented immediately.

Engage Employees

An engaged employee is someone who understands the customer service vision and is committed to helping achieve it.

Measuring employee engagement isn't relegated to an annual survey. You can evaluate whether an employee understands the vision and is committed to helping achieve it through regular communication.

At Culture Insurance Services, leaders consistently engage employees around the eight core values. They're shared with new hires, discussed in company meetings, and even posted on the company website.

Uber explained how the values play an important role in giving employees feedback. One-on-one coaching sessions revolve around how well employees' actions align with the values. Recognition is given when an employee does something that's consistent with the values (i.e. they're engaged), while constructive feedback and encouragement is shared when an employee does not follow the values (i.e. they're disengaged).

Take Action: Use your customer service vision as the basis for one-on-one employee feedback. It becomes a built-in employee engagement barometer.

Conclusion

One of the hallmarks of customer-focused organizations is the unique culture is codified through a simple statement or set of values, it's explained through stories and examples, and employees use the culture to guide their daily actions.

You can work through the process with your own organization or team by downloading this toolkit.

Why Enthusiasm is Worthless and Commitment is Everything

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Okay, excuse the clickbait title.

I imagine some readers are indignant. Enthusiastically indignant, if you will. "What do you mean enthusiasm is worthless?!"

By itself, without commitment, enthusiasm often is.

Here's a story. A training professional, let's call her Susan, attended a conference where Keith Ferazzi was the keynote speaker. His message was that our success in life comes from the people we know, so we should work to build our networks.

Susan was so motivated by Ferazzi's message that she bought his book, Never Eat Alone. She eagerly started reading it while eating in the airport restaurant on her way home from the conference. Alone.

The Distinction Between Enthusiasm and Commitment

Susan was clearly enthusiastic about the message, but she wasn't committed.

What you can't see in the picture is there were several other people in the restaurant who had clearly just come from the same conference. They each had the same conference tote bag at their feet that Susan had.

You can probably imagine what commitment looks like in this situation. Susan would boldly find at least one other dining companion and strike up a conversation about the conference, Ferazzi's message, or the book itself. 

Enthusiasm is the feeling you project. Commitment is what you actually do. We applaud enthusiasm with more enthusiasm, but commitment is harder.

Why Culture Needs Commitment

I wrote The Service Culture Handbook to help customer service leaders get their employees obsessed with service. An entire chapter is devoted to commitment.

One of the unique features in the book is I included my phone number and email address. I invite readers to call, text, or email with their questions and I've had many terrific conversations.

Commitment is by far the biggest challenge I hear.

One service leader, we'll call him Eric, called me to ask for help. There had been some complaints about his company’s service quality and now Eric's boss, the company's CEO, demanded swift action. Eric wanted to know how soon I could fly out and train his team.

We talked a bit, and I asked him if his company had a customer service vision. This is a shared definition of outstanding service that gets everyone on the same page. I explained that Eric should have one in place before doing any training.

Eric had been responding to complaints by telling employees what not to do, but in my opinion they needed a vision to follow so they all understood what they should be doing instead. That way, any training would be based on the vision rather than a generic set of tips and tricks that wouldn’t fully address the root causes of poor service.

I even offered to help Eric create the vision for his company and then develop training around it.

Eric told me he'd think about everything, re-read my book a bit, and share our conversation with his CEO. A week later, he called again. “Can you come out and train my employees?”

I asked Eric about the vision, but he was impatient. He wanted to put the vision on the back burner and have me do some initial training. What Eric was really doing was trying to pass responsibility on to me for “fixing his people.” I gently reminded him about the importance of giving employees clear direction, and basing the training on that vision.

He seemed to understand and told me he would think about it some more.

Two months passed and I hadn't heard anything, so I sent Eric a follow-up email. He replied and wrote that nothing had been done anything yet, but he would soon start working on a customer service vision for the company.

Think about Eric as a leader. Two months ago, poor service quality was an emergency, but that was enthusiasm talking. When it came time to do the real heavy lifting, a lack of commitment stalled any progress.

What a Commitment to Service Culture Looks Like

Contrast Eric's story with this one from Tim Chan.

He emailed to tell me he worked for a grocery delivery company in Malaysia, called HappyFresh. Tim told me he was following the steps in The Service Culture Handbook and had just worked with his team to create a customer service vision.

Now Tim wanted some advice on helping employees stay focused so they could continuously improve service. In other words, Tim was eager to remain committed. (You can read more about Tim's story here.)

The process Tim followed can be broken down into three major steps.

1. Create a customer service vision. Here's my step-by-step guide.

2. Engage all employees with the vision, using this simple plan.

3. Align everything around the vision, including training.

The steps are actually very simple concepts. The real challenge is remaining committed to the culture journey over the long haul. Creating a service culture isn't a short-term project. It's a way of doing business.

The New Definition of Employee Empowerment

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The classic definition of employee empowerment never seemed right.

Most customer service leaders I talk to think of it as giving employees a certain degree of autonomy. Here's a quick story that illustrates the challenge with this definition:

A technical support rep, let's call him Scott, was empowered to take as long as necessary to help a customer solve an issue. One particular challenge routinely took Scott about 30 minutes to fix, which was much longer than the five minute average for a typical call.

Scott was empowered in the classical sense—he had the authority to spend an unusually long time on the phone to help his customer.

Where the definition falls short is one of Scott's colleagues, let's call her Janet, figured out how to solve the same issue in just five minutes. This was great news for Janet’s customers, but not so great for Scott’s. It meant Scott wasn’t truly empowered to fix the issue quickly because he didn’t know how.

Here’s a better definition of empowerment and how it can help you improve service quality and employee engagement.

What is employee empowerment?

When researching customer-focused companies for The Service Culture Handbook, I discovered that authority is just one aspect of empowerment. A fully empowered employee is able to do their job well. Here's the full definition in a customer service context:

Employee Empowerment is a process of enabling employees to deliver outstanding service to their customers.

Customer-centric companies combine three elements to empower, or enable their employees:

1. Resources

2. Procedures

3. Authority

Resources refer to the materials, tools, and equipment necessary to serve customers. For Scott, the technical support rep, this meant creating a knowledge base where he could quickly access solutions to common challenges.

Procedures refer to the best-known way to get things done. It's incredibly inefficient for Scott to take 30 minutes to solve a problem that Janet knows how to solve in 5; Scott would be more empowered if he knew about Janet's solution.

Authority is still that classic definition of autonomy. There are times when the standard procedure just doesn't make sense, and employees need a bit of leeway to do what's right. So Scott could still spend 30 minutes on the phone with a customer, if that was necessary for a new or tricky issue.

Why is employee empowerment important?

Empowering employees benefits customers, employees, and managers. Customers are happy because they get faster, higher quality service. Employees are happy because they feel they can truly make a difference with the people they serve. Managers are also happy because they spend less time doing tasks that empowered employees can do themselves.

Here's a simple example from a movie theater:

A mom with a young child placed an order at the snack bar. The mom handed a hot dog to her child, who promptly dropped the hot dog on the floor. It was a frustrating moment for the mom, but the movie theater employee quickly remedied the situation by giving the mom a new hot dog. He did it instantly without asking his manager for permission.

Think about the impact this small gesture made:

• The mom was relieved to avoid a potentially frustrating and embarrassing situation.

• The employee was able to quickly fix the problem.

• The manager didn’t need to stop whatever she was doing to intervene.

There was also another benefit. Other customers who witnessed the incident saw how helpful the employee was. This primed customers to think of their own experience more positively.

What are the risks to empowering employees?

Empowering employees must be done carefully, because there are definitely some risks involved. The most common examples cited by customer service leaders include:

• Service will be inconsistent if each employee does things their own way.

• Employees might cost the company money by giving away too much.

• Customers might take advantage of overly generous empowerment policies.

The real cost of these risks is typically overblown.

Several years ago, a cable company called Bright House Networks instituted a new empowerment policy. (The company has since been acquired by Charter Communications.)

Employees were allowed to issue account credits up to $1,000 without getting a manager’s approval. There were specific guidelines put in place to help employees make good decisions, but the decision was their’s to make. Bright House Network did put in one safeguard: any credit issued for more than $250 was audited to ensure employees were making smart choices.

In the first six months after the policy was implemented, management found zero inappropriate credits. In other words, employees were using good judgment!

How do you empower employees?

The starting point to empower your own employees is to look for areas where they are not able to make customers happy, even if they are doing their jobs correctly:

1. Start by identifying your top customer complaints.

2. Identify any complaint an employee is unable to resolve.

3. Investigate what resources, procedures, or authority is required.

You can find more detailed instructions for empowering your employees in this post.

New Training Video: Leading a Customer-Centric Culture

Advertising disclosure: We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.

In August 2013, I traveled to Carpinteria, California for a screen test at the online training video company, Lynda.com.

The test went well and I have gone on to shoot twenty training videos with Lynda, and later, LinkedIn Learning after Lynda was acquired by LinkedIn.

As part of my screen test, I filmed a short, unscripted course called Leading a Customer-Centric Culture. The idea was to capture me talking direct to camera, as if I was having a conversation with a colleague. Little did I realize at the time that the course would become the basis for the bestselling The Service Culture Handbook.

It's funny how things come full-circle.

My latest LinkedIn Learning training video is a new version of Leading a Customer-Centric Culture. This one is based on my book.

Course Overview

The training video is a step-by-step guide that shows you how to get employees obsessed with customer service.

It's based extensive research into leading companies and my own work helping clients build service cultures. The course is broken down into short segments to allow you to focus on one step at a time.

There are three key steps in the process:

1. Create a customer service vision

2. Engage employees with the vision

3. Align the organization around the vision

Here's a short video overview:

Get employees obsessed with service from Leading a Customer-Centric Culture by Jeff Toister

Resources

You can access the course on LinkedIn Learning if you have a subscription. You can also get a 30-day LinkedIn Learning trial that will give you access to the entire library of training videos.

The video is a great companion to The Service Culture Handbook:

• Amazon (single copies)

• BookPal (quantity discounts)

There's also a service culture toolkit you can download here.

Why is Service So Great at the USS Midway Museum?

Let's start with a few facts about the USS Midway Museum.

The decommissioned aircraft carrier has operated as a museum in San Diego since 2004. Visitors can explore the flight deck, crew quarters, and other areas of the ship while enjoying a self-guided audio tour narrated by Midway sailors. Well-informed volunteer docents are on hand to answer questions.

It's become the top-rated tourist attraction in San Diego.

The museum offers visitors a unique opportunity to see what it was like to live and serve aboard a US Navy aircraft carrier. It features an incredible service culture where volunteers and employees go out of their way to create a special experience for guests. 

Here are just a few of the Midway's online ratings:

• 4.8 (out of 5) stars on Google

• 4.5 (out of 5) stars on TripAdvisor

• 4.8 (out of 5) stars on Facebook

• 4.5 (out of 5) stars on Yelp

• 4.8 (out of 5) stars on Expedia

Keep reading to learn the secrets behind the Midway's powerful service culture.

Photo courtesy of the USS Midway Museum

Mission-Focused

Last year, I had the honor of working with the Midway to help revise its customer service vision. This is a shared definition of outstanding service that gets everyone on the same page.

We used the process outlined in The Service Culture Handbook. The first step is gathering input from all employees via a survey that asked, "What do you want our customers to think of when they think of the service they receive?"

The museum's more than 800 volunteers were asked to weigh-in, too.

The feedback was overwhelmingly conclusive. Employees and volunteers alike were already using the organization's mission statement as a guide when serving customers:

Preserve the historic USS Midway and the legacy of those who serve; Inspire and Educate future generations; and Entertain our museum guests.

When a cross-functional group met to draft the vision statement, everyone agreed the mission should serve as the customer service vision. There was no need to craft a separate statement. One thing that makes the Midway so special is how people are aligned around the mission.

Hiring for Culture Fit

It's not surprising that a lot of people want to work at the Midway.

Liane Morton, the museum's director of human resources, told me the organization is developing a reputation as an employer of choice. "The number of applicants sourced directly through our website, versus a public posting on Indeed, for example, has steadily increased over the past seven years." Current employees are also eager to recommend the Midway to others. "Our number one source of candidates is through employee referral."

The Midway shares a lot of information about the culture on its website. This lets potential applicants know up front what they can expect from working there.

My friend, Jaime, is a great example. I remember her excitement when she went through the application process and she couldn't have been happier when she finally landed a job. The enthusiasm you see from Jaime in this promotional video is absolutely real.

The biggest challenge for Morton is finding people like Jaime among such a large pool of potential applicants. "People are complex," says Morton. "Some people are really good at interviewing and will say all the right things, but they aren't really a great culture fit. Others are not good interviewers even though they would make a great addition."

Morton tries to overcome this challenge by getting people comfortable so they reveal their real selves. "I like to walk people out of the room after the interview. It feels like the formal interview is now over, so people often loosen up and are more themselves while we walk and talk."

Another technique is what Morton calls the "Garometer." 

Prospective applicants check in with an employee named Gary at the visitor information center. Successful applicants must make a good first impression. Morton explains that the way you treat the person who greets you is a good indicator of how you will actually interact with people. Feedback from Gary’s interaction with candidates proves very useful.

Onboarding New Hires

New employees are quickly indoctrinated into the culture.

Most of new hire orientation focuses on the culture, rather than rules and work procedures. Countless stories and examples are shared to help people understand what's expected. There's even a section that explains why the culture is so important to the Midway and how it helps the organization succeed.

Employees also take the museum tour. "We want every employee to have had the experience of being a customer," says Morton.

The museum's approximately 400 volunteer docents are also a key part of the service culture. They go through an eight week training program (one day a week for eight weeks) that includes several hours spent on how to interact with customers.

Leadership

The service culture at the USS Midway Museum starts at the very top, where CEO John "Mac" McLaughlin is a culture champion.

Morton explains that McLaughlin is constantly talking about the culture with employees. "He is the best leader I have ever worked for. He makes my job in HR so much easier because his is always promoting the culture."

It's essential for leaders like McLaughlin and Morton to model the culture since employees will take their cue from them. 

Occasionally, a leader at the museum might struggle to emulate the culture. Morton describes a proactive approach. "It’s so important to address leaders working against your culture and ultimately help them transition from the organization if they cannot align with the organization's values.  A leader makes such a big impact, and employees will not embrace the culture if their leader doesn't embrace it."

Service Culture Challenges

Every organization faces challenges when trying to build and maintain a service culture.

At the USS Midway Museum, one challenge is the bad habits new employees bring with them from past employers. A lot of employees are taught in previous jobs that rules are more important than customers.

"We have policies, too," says Morton, "but we break them when we need to. For example, museum members can get into the museum for free when they show their membership card. Members sometimes forget their cards, but we just let them in anyway. We trust them.

"New employees will sometimes have difficulty just trusting the member like that. That's because they would get in trouble at their last job if they didn't follow the policy precisely. We really have to work with employees to let them know its okay."

Another challenge is maintaining employees' passion for the job. 

Morton and other leaders work hard to identify and fix any issues that might make employees unhappy. There are sometimes, though, when passion just fades and working at the Midway is no longer a fit for the employee.

"If you are no longer having fun and enjoying working here, that’s okay, and we can help you transition," says Morton. "It doesn't do the employee or the USS Midway Museum any good for the employee to stick around if they are unhappy."

She will often help employees move on to another role or even another organization with no hard feelings.

Conclusion

I must admit I'm a big fan. I've spent countless hours exploring the museum and its one of my favorite places to send people who are visiting from out of town.

If you're in San Diego, I encourage you to visit the museum and see for yourself!