Protecting a Good Customer Experience

Company leaders are responsible for cultivating and preserving high customer service standards, and Ace Hardware offers some examples of how to do it, according to a recent article.

“[I]f an employee, a group of employees, or maybe even the entire company is not delivering on the stated customer service promise, the leadership must step in to defend the culture and get it (back) to where it should be,” Shep Hyken, a customer service and experience expert, writes for Forbes.

David Zeigler, who owns Ace Hardware stores in Chicago, feels “that one of the most crucial things he could do for his organization and his employees … is to define and defend the culture,” Hyken says in the article.

Zeigler and another Ace Hardware store owner, Art Freedman, both personally intervene when they spot customer service problems, according to the article.

At one Ace location, Freedman saw employees who were socializing and didn’t notice a customer who needed help, so Freedman helped the shopper and then confronted the workers.

“He treaded delicately between a reprimand and a teaching opportunity. When he was finished, not only did the employees understand what to do, they also became defenders of the culture, as well,” the article says.

To read the entire article, click here.