Kidding – take as long as you want. But just know you have a fan base for your weekly leadership musings!

Cheers

Adam

HBS’ competetiveness project should take a close look at all these companies that hide from and lie to their customers. The fact that they can continue to exist and pay huge salaries to their “leadership” really says something about the state of US competetiveness.

As with most Sears Automotive centers, the store manager is assigned a corporate credit card which is in turn put in the POS system at Advance. Should something change with the strore manager (in this case the manager was placed on extended medical leave) the stores card is cancelled and a new card issued to the person substituting for the manager.

We were called to send parts to Sears on Friday. The sale was declined. The Asst. manager contacted corporate and found out that the card had been cancelled. Why Sears cancelled the card before they got a replacement to the store is a good question but not germaine to the issue. The situation existed and needed to be handled. The Asst. Manager at the Sear’s store told us that he had an email from corporate telling him that the card would be at the store within 3 to 5 business days.

The situation was presented to the store’s general manager, he was told the expected time frame to resolution and it was suggested that we “suspend” each transaction, make a hard copy print out showing the Sears purchase order number and get a signed hard copy returned to the store for each transaction. Yes, outside of company S.O.P. but offering a temporary solution to the problem until the situtation could be corrected. The store manager agreed and both the District Manager and Commercial Account Manager for our district were notified. Neither had a better solutuion to offer and agreed, reluctantly. The expectation was that the new card would be in hand by Tuesday.

As it turned out, shipping delays found us going into Thursday afternoon working with the temporary fix. At this point, the district manager arrived at our store, quite incensed and informing both myself and the stores manager that our jobs were on the line and added that “every person in this store could be fired for this.” We were instructed to contact Sears and inform them that any further transactions were to be on a cash basis until the card situation was remedied. I made the call.

Ironically, five minutes after the call to Sears, the Asst. Manager contacted me at the store and told me that he had been in touch with his corporate offices and they had gotten the earlier card re-instated. Within 20 minutes the previous four days transations had been run through and finalized. It seems that the Sears Asst. manager had been on the phone and making waves to get his suppliers paid the whole time and had finally been successful.

The fact that we had been the only supplier to Sears that hadn’t pulled the “corporate policy” card and been the ones to offer a temporary solution ended up being a near doubling of sales for the period in question. Furthermore, as some may be aware. Sears corporate policy is to have Auto Zone as the stores “first call.” The Sears District Manager informed his store’s management that until further notice, Advance should be that store’s first call.

Here’s the upshot to the story and the final analysis on the part of the people on the front lines.

1.) Our actions helped to solidify and improve the relationship between Advance and our customer.

2.) The customer needs were put first (at very slight risk to Advance) and increased sales became the final measure

On the down side the whole thing could have un-wound had the store management not held fast and followed through, without questioning, the time frame as it was stated. While Sears had said they expected the card to be delivered on Tuesday, things happened. They were still within the agreed “3 to 5″ working days. As it turned out the call to tell them that further transactions would be on a cash basis was the only mistake in the entire process.

The lesson to be taught here is that company’s can and do set up situations whereby staying entirely within guidelines can cause lost sales. It certainly caused problems for our competition. Sales to this Sears have remained strong since this incident.

Of course every corporation’s employees must adhere to policies and procedures. It is just as important that the same employees be listened to and occasionally offer deference to their judgement. There are exceptions to every rule, like it or not. The question that has to be asked is not only as the article states, “Do your employees serve you or your customers?” but moreover, when they, the employees are representing your customers, are you listening?

1) It can, and should, be easily be supplemented with the other two questions (satisfaction and intention to repurchase).

2) Where NPS and other measurement systems go wrong is losing site of the real purpose. Raising the score isn’t really what a company should be after. Creating NEW value for customers and shareholders alike is what keeps the firm in business.

When adopting NPS, the focus should really be on transforming culture to a customer centric model rather than increasing an arbitrary number because it should get you a higher stock price.

Andy Perkins
The Satisfaction Questionnaire Blog