WHY YOUR CUSTOMER SERVICE IS GOING OFF TRACK

© 2008 Linda Feinholz.

This past week I spotted a trend among my clients. You might call it the ‘dash’… everyone is sprinting to prove they’re making changes in their business’s productivity as if that is a badge to earn all by itself.

And too often they are speeding down a track that is taking them to actions and solutions that will cost a lot of time and money and not even solve the issue at hand.

You may be caught in the same sense of urgency, starting an unnecessary race. So I thought I’d share the steps I use with my clients to get them focused at the right pace so that they get the full result they’re hoping for to grow their business.

Step 1 – Define The True Issue

One of my largest clients asked me to sit in during the first presentation by a tech team to address improving the Customer Services function at their company. Sure enough, the team ‘presented’ the issue by quoting back 35 interviewees’ concerns and then went straight into the proposed solution. Fortunately the COO paused the conversation and identified that he hadn’t heard the actual ‘need’ for which the proposed project was a solution.

Make sure you’ve defined exactly what is being ‘fixed’ and be sure the users of the solution are at the table defining what is needed.

Step 2 – Research the Options for Solutions

We all fall in love with our area of expertise. And the tech team members showed it clearly. They were proposing ‘web based’ technology and mega databases to gather all the interactions with clients… and they completely neglected the more familiar automated phone options and even email exchanges. Not to mention the non-tech solutions that could be created by realigning customer service personnel roles.

Take the time to flush out at least three options and run those ideas past the potential users to see if you’re staying on track.

Step 3 – Check that the Solution Matches Your Business Model

For this particular client, the end user will never be the person contacting Customer Service. Their distributors are the ones who will report issues and 20% of them are not computer users. That doesn’t mean they might not find technology solutions useful, but it won’t be sitting at their desk. They need solutions they can use when they are standing on site at a client, or get a phone call while driving between appointments.

All the technology in the world won’t solve your key challenge: make it easy for your customers to communicate with you the way they are ready to today. OR make it even easier!

Step 4 – Double Check That The Solution Works ‘Inside’ AND ‘Outside’

Not only does my client need to make it easy for their customers to be heard and responded to… They also need to capture the information so they can check internally to identify trends in their products and services and decide what may need to be redesigned. The tech team will need to design a system for gathering information easily, and passing it to those who need to know immediately, and summarizing it in reports for periodic trends analysis. At each stage, the information may look very different to each audience.

Sort out how you’ll store information over time so that you can be sure it serves improving your customer’s experience AND your own organization’s performance.

Step 5 – Design How You’ll Test And Adjust The Solution

Just like a rubber band springing back into place, changes in systems and people’s behavior can melt away when you assume it will all come together as needed. Nothing takes you off track more predictably than designing and instituting changes and then walking away from the project. Never assume the ‘design’ is the solution.

Before you invest time and money in permanently changing processes, and policies, and roles and responsibilities test the proposed system with all the users.

Commit to the project’s long-term success by assigning responsibility for testing your chosen solution and evaluating how it’s working… AND commit to adapting it as you learn what is working well and what needs to be tweaked.

Step 6 – Test And Adjust, Test And Adjust

My client is bringing together a task force of six disciplines to talk through all of the steps above. They’ll be guiding the tech team’s focus to be sure it meets all the users needs and stays on track with the Issue identified back in Step 1.

Now it’s your turn on the track.

June 2, 2008 | Filed Under Managing, Organization, Processes | Leave a Comment 

Change 1 To Do And You Can Change It All!

OK – You’ve got a list. We ALL have a List. Now’s the time to take control of those To Do’s and turn them into Ta Da’s!Ask yourself.

What single thing will I absolutely get “DONE” today?”

Write it down.

Now write down 3 items you’ll take off today’s calendar so you can keep your focus. Take those items and delegate, dump, or time block them so they’re off your To Do list and you can celebrate what you got DONE today and the rest of the week. Ta Da!

January 28, 2008 | Filed Under Goal Setting, Organization, Processes, Productivity Tools, Time Management | Leave a Comment 

SHIFT YOUR TO DO LIST TO HIGH PAYOFF TA DAs!

© 2008 Linda Feinholz.

You’ve got dreams and you’ve got your attention on what it takes to achieve them. You’re ready to roll up your sleeves and eager to start producing massive results.

The problem is, you’re dragging. You put in tons of hours, your desk is piled with papers, and no matter how hard you work, you’re plagued by a To-Do list a mile long and growing. You’re constantly busy yet you get to the end of each week before you get to the end of your list.

Important things fall through the cracks. In fact you’re feeling frustrated, drained and overwhelmed. And you’re doubting what you’ve actually accomplished.

I started coaching this month with two new business leaders and that’s exactly what they were facing, every day. They were wondering how they’ll ever achieve their big goals when they can’t seem to dig themselves out from under their avalanche of tasks and ‘have to get done’s’.

So I gave them a To Do list Makeover. We turned that time and energy sucking list of “To Do’s” into “Ta Da’s!” they can smile about. And you can use it too!

So what’s a Ta Da! List?

Have you ever noticed that your To Do List is a never-ending list of everything you think you should be doing?

We’re all so adept at creating lists of things that need doing. But not all items are created equal—some are simple items to get done, others take major effort. As a result your To Do list is full of busy work all mixed in with the important stuff and even the urgent and critical things your success depends on.

A Ta-Da! list is results focused. It’s a list of High Payoff tasks, that when completed have immediate impact on your results and success. Completing items on your Ta-Da! List results that in energy focuses you and each next effort on accomplishments.

A Ta Da! List is a declaration of what you are committed to getting done. And that means getting it done in the most effective way possible.

Here is a 5 step plan to tame that To Do list:

Step #1: Declare Your Top 3 Priorities.

Your Ta-Da! List needs a clear focus. Every day, start a fresh list with your 3 most important projects or priorities. Don’t let your High Payoff Activities get buried – keep everything else off this list. Clearly focus on the 3 priorities that must get done, no matter what else happens. Let this focus your actions.

Step #2: Dump The Lowest Priority Items.

If everything is equally important then nothing really is. Take a fresh, honest look at your To Do list. Now filter your list for the things that you dream of getting done ‘someday’ and write them down on a separate piece of paper – out of your sight, permanently. Ask yourself “What items on my list fall in the ‘great idea’ category but have very little payoff if I do them? What items have absolutely no consequence if I DON’T do them?” If you’re finding “shoulds” that you keep stalling on because they aren’t aligned with your top priorities, cross them off and be done with them.

Step #3: Delegate. Delegate. Delegate.

Identify anything and everything that must get done, yet could be done by someone else. That means handing it to someone and overseeing their accomplishing it so you stop being the ‘only one’ who could get it done. I teach my clients to use the “If I Ran off to Fiji Test”. If you decided to catch a plane tomorrow, and it still needed to get done, who ought to have it on their list? If you’re concerned it won’t get done to your standards, set-up a formal hand off with a ‘check in’ dates and times to review progress and provide input. But commit to letting someone else handle it all the way to completion.

Step #4: Pencil Out The Week.

Take another look through your list. If there’s anything on your list that doesn’t have to be completed today, but does need to be completed within the next 7 days, pencil it onto the appropriate days. Just knowing you’ve created a time and space for them will free you up to focus on other, more important, priorities right here and right now.

Step #5: Time Block The Rest.

All that should be left on your list are those items that (a) must be done today, (b) are linked to a top priority item and (c) must be done by you and only you. You may want to break them into 45-minute blocks of time, alternating with 15-minute breaks, so you know you’ll accomplish them and also give attention to quick fix items that crop up. Write those blocks of time in your calendar.

And anything else that crops up during your day? Take them through steps 1 through five and get your attention back on your declared focus for the day!

That’s it. 5 simple steps to create your Ta-Da! List. Watch how much more focused and productive you are.

January 26, 2008 | Filed Under Delegation, Goal Setting, Managing, Organization, Processes, Productivity Tools, Time Management | Leave a Comment 

Creating High Payoff Focus That Accelerates Your Results

By Linda Feinholz, “Your Success Catalyst”

I kicked off coaching with one of my Platinum Private Coaching clients, Brad, this week. As we discussed the High Payoff Vision that he is setting for himself, he mentioned that one of his goals is to ‘level’ his week.

When I asked him to say more about that, he told me “Well, it’s sort of about getting better handle on my time and how I’m using it. Managing my time. It feels out of balance and out of my control.”

I really appreciated that he didn’t say “I need better Time Management.” It’s a jargon phrase that I have lost patience with. I have to bite my tongue when people use that expression. Twenty-plus years of working with solo-preneurs, executives, and business owners has proven to me over and over that there is no such thing as Time Management. There is Attention Management and Action Management, but not Time Management.

Time just courses and flows. There is no such thing as lassoing and saddling up time and steering it down the trail you want it to take. It takes you on the ride and it’s up to you to get comfortable with that fact and to put your reins on what you actually can control and steer.

So I’ll be working with Brad on techniques that increase his focus on what really needs his attention, and eliminating his distractions, and our starting point is going to be using the following 5 steps:

1 – Set Crystal Clear Goals

Make sure your goals are measurable and observable. If you find yourself saying things like “I want a better handle on my time” you aren’t setting a goal you can actually achieve. Why? Because “better” can mean anything to anyone. I often have to do my ‘Vague Words’ exercise with business teams I work with and this word is one of our gems, along with “I’ll take care of it.” Be very specific with how you’ll be using your time when you reach your goal and how is that different than today? What will ‘done’ look like when you achieve that goal?

2 – List The Actions That Will Get You There

For each goal you can name, list the first actions that will move you towards having it accomplished. My small business clients are often running from one meeting to another, from one problem to solve to another. What is often missed is the critical first step: Design what needs to get done. If you’re moving straight into action, you’re likely to spend twice as much time fixing and cleaning up what didn’t go the way you expected. So take it from the best managers in the world. Start your action list with quiet uninterrupted thinking and planning time.

3 – Calendar Your Time – ALL Of It

Many of my professional clients set meeting times with other people. They then assume they’ll fit in the ‘work’ they need to accomplish for themselves around those meetings. Boy have they got it wrong! Your work time is often five times as valuable as what you are actually giving your attention to. So block off time on your own calendar for meetings with yourself to get your own work done.

4 – Have Boundaries and Stick To Them

When you set time-bound goals, such as the start time for meetings, the delivery date for a project, or the length of time you’ll work on something your productivity soars. Stick to it. Go beyond just putting the name on the calendar. Have an intention for how that time will be spent and write that intention on the top of the page you have in front of you as a reminder you can check in with during that time.

5 – Deflect All Your Distractions

Are you irritated by interruptions? Mauled by email? Nabbed by newsletters? Set specific standards for how you’ll handle phone calls, email, and people at your door. So many of my coaching clients are in the habit of answering questions anytime one is posed. They’re working on a task and someone comes along in the middle of it with a burning issue. Is the building in flames? Probably not (grin).

My clients learn to pause only long enough to set an appointment for people to come back at a set time when they’ll focus on their specific question. Commit to checking with your intention for how you are using your time. Then you’ll know how you’ll respond. That includes turning people away so they get none of your attention while you’re working on the items you’ve got your attention on right now.

Brad is going to start using these techniques this week to gain control over his attention and actions. He’s going to create blocks of time, each day and each week, for using laser like focus and he’ll love every moment of his un-distracted productivity for hours every day!

Now go get focused on what really needs your time, attention and energy and enjoy the flow!

September 13, 2007 | Filed Under Organization, Productivity Tools, Time Management | Leave a Comment 

Change 1 Habit And You Can Change It All!

Are you using the same business systems and processes you’ve used for years… or new ones?

If it’s been more than three years in your successful business, then it’s time to look for High Payoff changes you can make to boost your productivity.

You don’t have to take on everything at the same time. Pull your team together and ask them:

“What’s one change you’d love to see to boost our productivity?”

You’ll find a flood of great ideas to sort through, prioritize and pick one to get everyone engaged in getting further, faster and easier.

August 19, 2007 | Filed Under Organization, Processes, Productivity Tools | Leave a Comment 

High Payoff Lessons From Luggage – Time to ‘Let Go’

By Linda Feinholz, “Your Success Catalyst”

Personal productivity is a topic that we all explore, sooner or later. Pick up any magazine or newspaper, tune in to your local radio, and you’ll receive a flood of material on work productivity. Get on an airline and the articles will be slanted to luggage productivity of the rich and famous. It all can weigh you down instead of lightening your load.

In my 20-plus years of consulting and coaching business owners and entrepreneurs, I’ve found that how we handle our physical luggage is practically the same as how we handle our travel luggage. And there’s a better way to handle our suitcases and our mental baggage.

If you’re anything like me, preparing for a vacation or business trip is a real test of how to pack. You know – you find yourself with your luggage out and more things to put in it than you really can use on your trip. The six extra tops, four extra pants, and fifth pair of shoes ‘just in case’ you go out to a nice restaurant.

The same thing holds for tools you use in growing your business. Nothing is more tiring than carrying obsolete, unusable and hindering stuff with you on your journey.

Your goal is to be efficient and nimble and so it’s worth your time to figure out what will serve you, and to limit yourself to the tools you actually need.

Just like those extra unnecessary items you’ll fold and leave behind, there’s an art to letting go of the ideas, assumptions and old decisions that are slowing you down.

Today I’m going to share with you four important tips to help you lighten your load and carry the High Payoff productivity tools you can really use.

Decide what you need next
Just like carrying a winter jacket to Europe in the Summer, old work processes in your company may be slowing you down. My promotional products client suspected that his division’s workflow wasn’t as efficient as it could be. We designed an intensive work session with all of his team to map out their Vision for what they should be accomplishing. I had them pinpoint each place where an old way of doing things was actually slower than one they could imagine, right there. We got those changes turned into projects and the 80% of the improved work processes were in place 60 days later.

Make sure what you’re using now fits
Can’t get the extra sweater or pair of gym shoes jammed into the bag? Once the work flow was posted on the wall, the entire team could see that it had worked when they were a start-up, but it was getting in the way now that they were doing millions of dollars of business. It wasn’t interpersonal issues that were holding things up, it was legacy systems that no one had taken a fresh look at. It was clearly time to test new ways of doing things!

Sort out what isn’t serving you any longer
I left that third pair of shoes at home. Well, actually the fourth pair. That same client was able to identify nine different times where more than eight people had to sign off on decisions. That sure got in the way of decision-making and action by the people doing the work. You can bet that, once everyone saw it, a new decision-making process was agreed to by all hands in under fifteen minutes!

Plan where you’ll store what you’re not taking with you
Sometimes I’m tempted to store what needs to be tossed, and toss what needs to be stored. Just because I’m traveling off-season doesn’t mean that parka won’t be worth taking along on another journey. And the same goes for you and your business as it grows. My client decided that their innovative way of conducting meetings when the company was young, did not work for middle management’s project status meetings. But it’s perfect for their creative team that has to solve a unique problems on an ongoing basis.

My luggage stays light when I’m traveling and my clients baggage gets sorted out so that they can stay nimble as they face their business challenges.

Use these lessons from the road to lighten your load and ensure there’s a high payoff to carrying your experience, know how and skills into how you’re running your business.

August 16, 2007 | Filed Under Organization, Processes, Productivity Tools, Time Management | Leave a Comment 

High Payoff Lessons From Luggage – Step 1

By Linda Feinholz, “Your Success Catalyst”

Have you ever stopped and asked yourself if the ‘baggage’ you’re carrying with you in business is serving you well or diverting your attention?

I spent six weeks on the road on vacation this year. All in a single trip. And I did it with one carry-on suitcase, a briefcase and shoulder bag I hand carried through 7 cities. On planes, trains, metros, buses and ships.

I’m all about being nimble and this luggage actually was. I knew I was likely taking too much. Other people who saw what I was taking thought I was bringing much too little with me.

Packing for trips says a lot about how we live our business lives.

I’ve been working with a family business for the past few years. When I started working with them, the partners said they wanted their business to grow 40%. They all stated that goal.

However, when I asked what that growth should be composed of? Well back to that in a moment…

The load I carried on planes, buses, trains and ships came to 37.5 pounds for the carry-on suitcase alone. If I could have left the 3 skirts, two fancy outfits, assorted jewelry, and a heavy long-sleeved top out of the suitcase, I sure would have. I expected to need the latter for the walk on the glacier in Zermatt, and the rest for the time spent on the cruise ship. I thought I might also use them for dinners in various cities.

My itinerary? Paris, Barcelona, Avignon, Livorno, Chittavecchia, Naples, Mykonos, Istanbul, Kusadasi, Athens, Venice, Florence, Rome, Switzerland, Paris.

My clients’ itinerary? They didn’t know what market they wanted the business growth in. They couldn’t decide which niche they wanted to expand. As a result, they had no way to make decisions about the direction to give the sales team or the marketing department.

They had empty suitcases waiting for their decisions. And they didn’t have any idea what they needed to prepare and carry with them to grow their business.

In addition to my suitcase, my shoulder bag with the lap top computer and cell phone and back up drive and cables and papers weighed in at 15 pounds. And 6 pounds for the purse and its contents that included the last of the tour books.

My trip took weeks of thoughtful planning. Decisions about where we would be going and where we would not. What that would be worth carrying and using, and what not to take. What resources I already had, and which needed buying.

Until I got my clients focused on setting their destination they couldn’t figure out the luggage they needed on the journey to build their business. They were completely stalled.

As a result of their work with me, they set clear goals on providing services to a specific type of industrial building and size of business hotels. By taking the time to research their choices and settle on High Payoff ones, they knew which training materials to develop for their sales team, what sales targets to set for each market, and the new resources they needed to give their operations folks to deliver on those sales.

They also knew which old baggage to leave behind – which unprofitable clients they would stop going after, which sales materials would stop being used.

In 5 meetings they defined their market. In 4 months they scripted and delivered the new training to their sales team. In 6 months they had lightened the luggage their folks were carrying by closing their relationships with unprofitable customers. And they had repacked their bags by giving their staff the new skills and materials that supported their sales and marketing folks closing exactly the type of clients they wanted.

Now that’s the right kind of luggage to take when your company sets off on its growth trip.

July 26, 2007 | Filed Under Ideas, Inspiration, Organization | Leave a Comment 

Change 1 Emergency and you can change it all

Warm up your ‘Avoidance’ muscles. Set aside 15 minutes each day on your calendar for the next fifteen days and label them “Contingency Planning.” On the first day, answer the following question:

“What are the top 10 external changes that could occur?”

Use the next ten days to explore each one. Then use the following four days to introduce the issues to the rest of your team and assign their thinking the issues through further.

July 16, 2007 | Filed Under Organization | Leave a Comment 

5 Steps Get Low Pay-Off Out of Your Life

By Linda Feinholz, “Your Success Catalyst”We each face the same issue when we’re immersed in a topic or a challenge: We get lost in a forest of low pay-off ideas that show up and lose sight of the High Pay-Off choices right in front of us. And the more lost we feel, the less certain we become of what path we should be taking, what activities should get our attention.Successful leaders and managers don’t escape from running into low pay-off opportunities, they’re just very effective at keeping their attention on the High Pay-Off activities that will get them to the results they’re set on. Highly responsive management teams may look like they’re racing to their success, but don’t mistake this speed for reaction on the fly.

The reason they can act with such velocity is the clarity of their goals and their ongoing system of step-by-step techniques is keeping them on track and avoiding distractions.

Here are a set of steps that will boost your own effectiveness and accelerate your getting those results you’re seeking.
Step 1 – Set your goal

High Pay-Off results depend on having clear goals to use as you plan your day, week, project and so on. 
Make sure your goal is written down and keep it where you can see it. Put it in your electronic day-timer as the first thing that comes up on your screen every day or tape it on the front of your phone. Memory can be fleeting and attention is easily distracted. Use that specific goal to start every day with a fresh look at how each planned activity will serve to get you to that destination.

Step 2 -Set your ‘alarms’

Highly effective people get their results because they track when they are drifting off course. AND they do it rapidly. They set up mechanisms that signal when they are being pulled away from their destination, distracted by new information and ideas. You’ll observe them get meetings on topic and stay there with ‘ease’ and watch them continuously carve distractions out of complex projects. You can adopt the tools they use and have them become your own skills too.

Create ‘alarms’ so that you can quickly check where you are in your own work. One technique is to use the last 5 minutes of each hour to ask if what you’ve been paying attention to is keeping you heading toward your goal or not. Then reset how you’re using the next 45 minutes. Do this at the beginning and end of every meeting and  to pre-set the start of your agenda for follow-up meetings and over time you’ll be the one others model themselves on as well.
Step 3 – Assess The Situation

At times new information being presented really is worth the attention and evaluation to see if you should be resetting your efforts in ways you didn’t expect. The High Pay-Off approach is to gather all the available information and carefully assess whether any of your activities, and even your goals, ought to change. But even this action should be done in a focused way.

Be sure that you have gathered all the information that needs to be considered. Then, calendar uninterrupted time to go through that information in a systematic fashion, reviewing all the information, discussing it with everyone who might have insights on the value and impact of the potential change in action and direction so that all the relevant ideas make it onto the table at the same time.

Step 4 – Simplify, Sort & Select

Once you have the information out on the table, it’s time to evaluate it all from the top, starting with the goal. If there is no compelling reason for the goal itself to change, then the goal becomes the first element of your assessment tools. Every next idea and opinion needs to be judged against the question “Will this increase how effectively we reach our goal?”

Every idea can then be listed, prioritized and assigned the energy it warrants for getting you to that goal!

Step 5 – Take Leveraged Action

Highly successful entrepreneurs, executive and professionals know they cannot do it all themselves. They practice Do-Delegate-Discard sorting rapidly so that they are focused on their own High Pay-Off list, and so are the folks they’ve delegated to. They understand that it’s impossible to accomplish every single thing that could be listed as a To Do. Not only do they discard the low pay-off from their own list. They also encourage and reward others on their team for doing the same.

Make these steps techniques that you use and that you set for your entire team. You’ll create the systematic process for keeping everyone focused on “High Pay-Off.”

May 24, 2007 | Filed Under Ideas, Organization, Processes | Leave a Comment 

Change 1 Tool And You Can Change It All!

Forget what you’ve invested in time and money in a system that isn’t working for you. That’s a sunk cost and it’s wasting your time and attention in frustration trying to fit yourself to the tool.
Let’s get back to basics. Do you know how you do your best work? Think back over many situations, jobs, environments you’ve been in and ask yourself:

“What system was I using when I was my most effective?”

Now look at something that’s been taking way too long to get accomplished. How can you use the system that you found effective in the past to get more productive results today?

And if your answer was ‘the system I’m using now’ but you’re not being effective, go ask 3 other people how they’re doing it, or give me a ring. We’ll find the one that gets your results soaring!

May 14, 2007 | Filed Under Organization, Processes, Productivity Tools | Leave a Comment 

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