The Secret of Lousy Service and How to Fix It

Last week I promised the answers to why lousy service occurs and how to fix it. If you didn’t read part one, stop now, and go here.

The answer revolves around four words you already know: positive attitude and personal pride.

Let’s start with a little background…

Here are the reasons or feelings that negatively affect your attitude, and reduce or eliminate the power of your ability to serve at a superior level:

My boss is a jerk.
I hate my job.
I hate my coworkers.
I’m too good for this.
They don’t pay me enough.
They don’t understand me.
Benefits suck here.
I have my resume in five other places.
I can’t wait to get out of here.

ANSWER ONE: There’s a two-word secret to service response: positive attitude.

Positive attitude, defined as the way you dedicated yourself to the way you think, is the beginning point of service.
Positive attitude is not what happens to you. It’s what you do, and how you respond to what happens to you. That is the essence of service.
Positive attitude must be the first part of any training program, or the rest of training will fall on deaf ears – or worse – existing negative attitudes.

ANSWER TWO: There’s a two-word secret to the service process: personal pride.

It’s not how you feel about the customer, it’s not how do you feel about the circumstance. It’s all about how you feel about yourself. Your personal pride.
Personal pride should give you the incentive to be at your best, respond at your best, and serve at your best at all times.
You’re not doing this for other people, you’re doing it for yourself. Once you understand that, great service not only becomes easy, it actually becomes fun.

Here are a few guidelines to make personal pride more easily understood:

Personal pride must be more powerful than feelings about boss or company
Personal pride must be more powerful than pay
Personal pride must be more powerful than existing job

REALITY: If positive attitude and personal pride are present, then service, even great service, is possible. And vice versa.

MAJOR POINT OF UNDERSTANDING: It’s not a job, it’s an opportunity. And your attitude, combined with your personal pride, will determine your short-term and long-term fate.

Yes, I realize there may be extenuating, outside circumstances that affect attitude, pride, and even performance. There are too many possible issues to deal with in this short piece, but I do want to acknowledge it’s not always work related.

KEY POINT OF UNDERSTANDING: It’s likely that most people reading this will not be in the same job five years from today. But between now and then, the thoughts you have, the personal pride you build and display, and your level of performance will dictate the quality of job, or advancement, you’re likely to secure.

Why would you risk lousy performance at your present job, thinking you’re going to get a better job based on resume or desire? It doesn’t make sense. And it’s a fantasy with an unhappy ending.

KEY POINT OF UNDERSTANDING: Once you understand that you’re serving for yourself, once you understand that your attitude will determine your communication excellence, and once you understand your personal pride will dictate your actions – at once you see your possibilities, and will have the ability to better improve your performance.

Don’t be mad at the world, don’t be mad at your customers, don’t be mad at your boss, don’t be mad at your coworkers – be happy about yourself.

NOTE WELL: If you’re the boss, or you’re in HR, or you’re the trainer, stop training a bunch a crap about your company and how to fill out the silly papers, stop telling me all about how great the company is, how you have a great reputation, and that I should be happy to work here. That’s a bunch of baloney! You can email me that.

START YOUR TRAINING SESSIONS LIKE THIS: Here are two things most people don’t know about themselves AND their success.

HR REALITY: Train me about me. My attitude, my personal pride, my happiness, my opportunity. Information I can use NOW and LATER. Information that applies to ME.
BIGGER HR REALITY: Most employees disdain training, they just want a paycheck.
BIGGEST HR REALITY: The more you help the employee succeed, the more they will set the standard you’re hoping for. They will have a better attitude and serve with pride because you helped them.

That’s not just a challenge, HR – that’s YOUR opportunity.

Reprinted with permission from Jeffrey H. Gitomer and Buy Gitomer.

About the Author

Jeffrey Gitomer is the author of The Sales Bible, Customer Satisfaction is Worthless Customer Loyalty is Priceless, The Little Red Book of Selling, The Little Red Book of Sales Answers, The Little Black Book of Connections, The Little Gold Book of YES! Attitude, The Little Green Book of Getting Your Way, The Little Platinum Book of Cha-Ching, The Little Teal Book of Trust, The Little Book of Leadership, and Social BOOM! His website, www.gitomer.com, will lead you to more information about training and seminars, or email him personally at [email protected].