A Leadership Rule: What You Do is So Loud I Can’t Hear What You’re Saying
Guest writer Floyd Jerkins takes a top-down approach to customer service in his blog post this week, “A Leadership Rule: What You Do Is So Loud I Can’t Hear What You’re Saying.”
How Effective Are Your Leaders?
You want employees to feel good to be working as part of a team that is working together – and everyone is improving. Many managers would be surprised to learn how little their employees believe management is walking the talk.
You can quickly scan the internet and find thousands of articles on leadership. Hundreds of thousands of terabytes of data on the subject are available. Why then are we still seeing fundamental leadership issues?
Leaders have to be the change they want to see.
Whether Bruce Lee or Gandi said it first, it’s a powerful metaphor for leaders. Yeah, I know, it sounds like a cliche statement, but a modeled behavior makes this a reality. You can’t fake it with lots of words or bravado. You have to walk the talk.
I helped a group establish a renewed mission and vision for their company. First, we had to talk through how they created their first set of statements, how they outlined the behaviors they expected staff to have, and then how they communicated this to their entire organization.
Previously, they discussed their competition many times but tended to over-analyze how they compare to the other companies. They were trying to be just like the other companies their customers touch instead of understanding how they made the customers feel and replicating the same feelings from their organization. Once everyone recognized this, it started a whole new discussion. You just can’t put words on paper and expect everyone to automatically adopt them into day-to-day behaviors.
Every time a customer comes in contact with your company, you have the opportunity to create value by managing these touch points. These “touch points” of interactions form the impressions of your business. Every front-line employee has to walk the talk because hundreds and even thousands of these touch points happen daily. Nearly all of them are manageable by leaders and create coachable moments.
Specific customer service behaviors should be in your mission statement and your employee’s job descriptions. When you include these into training sessions, you begin integrating them into the hearts and minds of your employees. When it is trained in employees and in their job descriptions, they remember it and work towards it. These ideals aren’t just going to happen by chance; they must be planned for.
There is a lesson on the importance of having things detailed, organized, fast service, doing what we tell the customer, etc. If we take care of our customers, they will take care of us. That is such a simple statement, but it has far-reaching consequences in the business.
Remove Pass the Buck Bill
Nothing upsets a customer more than having an employee tell them to see someone else in the business that created the problem. Putting a customer on hold only to wait and wait for the next person in line to start the conversation all over again doesn’t make those enduring experiences customers expect today. I call those employees, Pass the Buck Bill.
Passing on the responsibility to another employee or department is a common occurrence, yet; it drives customers away and makes your company just like all the other average ones out there.
Can These Touch Points Be Managed?
Yes, They Can!
Each employee is a manager of customer relations. Even the janitor, because they come in contact with a customer, so they create an impression of good or bad service. Everyone needs to focus on the customer’s needs even if they don’t deal with or come in contact with the customer. Even a ticked-off customer is everyone’s responsibility. The more you can include your employees in this leadership role, they are more likely will become committed to doing an excellent job.
Every Customer is Heard Through Many Ears
As a leader, you’ll sometimes get “employee ears” telling you all kinds of negative rhetoric about one department or the other. Someone in one department hears a customer say something about another department, etc. It is difficult to listen to these negative comments and not do something, but at the same time, you have to become aware that there are three sides to every story.
Implementing cross-departmental meetings to discuss customer service starts to create a deeper understanding of individual responsibility.
The idea of having different groups together within the business and discussing “how do we rate today on a scale of one to ten” starts the internal conversations about improving customer service. If one group says they are a seven at greeting customers with a smile, then ask why. This opens the discussion about how to get better tomorrow. Even if you start this out as once a week or once a month, it gives the employees their chance to have their say and make it more personal. This whole process intentionally gives them the power to try to improve.
It would be nice to have this just naturally happen between staff, but that’s not the reality. A leader has to set the tone for customer service. The leader has to walk the talk of leadership and be the change they want to see.
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Unbiased Customer Feedback
Unbiased Customer Feedback
Today, guest writer Alex Kraft explores customer comments in this blog post on the importance of unbiased customer feedback.
Customer surveys are all the rage these days. I wouldn’t be surprised if the kid’s lemonade stands down the street started texting a survey after each purchase made. I had a recent positive experience that caught my attention though and is the purpose of this blog. It isn’t necessarily about the frequency of surveys, its more about the employees’ communication to customers. It seems like in almost every instance, the consumer is told what scores are acceptable. It usually happens like this: “just to give you a head’s up, you’ll be getting a survey and it’s really important for us here. Anything less than 5’s across the board hurts us”. Of course, I don’t want this person negatively impacted by my answers. I understand that many companies use surveys as an incentive compensation opportunity, but doesn’t this practice contradict the entire purpose of surveying for customer feedback? Customer feedback is critical to understanding performance, market perception, and expectations. But this approach detailed above has become all too common and misses the mark. To me, identifying areas to improve is the most important part of customer feedback.
So, if customer surveys are largely pencil whipped, how can an equipment dealer get real critiques? What many do is go on a customer tour of their 10-20 largest accounts. I understand how important it is to stay close with your largest accounts, I’m not suggesting otherwise. But this won’t get you any closer to areas that you can improve. These customers get the best of everything from your dealership: best pricing, most attention, and best access to your senior level teams. When one of those 10 accounts has an issue, the fire alarm sounds and everyone within the dealership comes to the rescue. Funny enough, you don’t need to ask as almost everyone in the dealership knows exactly what these customers’ experiences are with your company!
I learned this lesson when I worked for a dealer and again once I started Heave. In my dealership days, I remember meeting a large account that rarely gave us business. We’d get the occasional rental and quote every purchase, but when it was time for them to sign the contract, the other dealer walked out with the signature. We had one of our top salesmen on the account and he was a true professional, calling on them weekly. I don’t remember what prompted us to ask the question, but I do remember the meeting when we just flat out asked, “what are we NOT doing that _______ dealer is doing?” The customer described their experience with one of our competitor’s service departments as the deciding factor. He mentioned that our competitor serviced their machines on the weekends and off-hours. When they showed up for work on Monday, their fleet was ready to go with invoice in hand and that is why they continued to buy from our competitor. He said, “no one else in the market has ever come close to this experience, and when we need service from the others it always interrupts our operation.” This was a great eye opener for me as a leader. I learned that day where the bar was for us if we wanted to earn, not only this customer’s business, but most likely many of the other top accounts in the area. This is not something I would have “learned” from reading customer surveys.
I visited many customers when launching Heave. We had a vision for what the platform could look like and how we could serve customers. There were two customer visits that stood out, as both customers told me that Heave ‘wasn’t for them’. If I was ten years younger, I probably would have gone into a pitch trying to convince them that they should use our marketplace. But the purpose of the visit wasn’t a sales call, it was an information gathering meeting. For me, this was an incredible learning experience to understand from their perspective why Heave didn’t provide value. These two meetings were pivotal in helping us shape our product and strategy. Without this feedback, we would’ve continued to struggle defining who Heave is built for and probably wasted a ton of time pursuing the wrong customers. I can’t thank those two individuals enough for the respect they paid me by being honest and unbiased.
Every dealership knows a group of customers who don’t really buy from them but that they know well. These are the customers who can be incredibly helpful if they’ll give you the time and be honest. One great quote I’ve learned years ago from an executive was, “customers vote with their wallet”. Maybe there’s a group of customers that have quietly shifted their buying behavior towards a competitor the past few years. We’ve all run through the list of customers parts sales- are there customers that buy parts from your dealership but don’t have corresponding service revenue? My point is that these are the perfect interview candidates. When you start losing business, the typical knee jerk reaction is always, ‘they must be solely buying on price’. Rarely is that the case. But it makes us feel better because our inner dialogue tells us that there was nothing we could do. Our job as leaders is to put the effort in and dig deeper to find out where we are falling short. The other thing worth mentioning is that it’s ok if you can’t put an immediate fix in to some of the issues that arise. For the example I gave above about servicing equipment on weekends and off-hours: our dealership didn’t have the manpower or expertise at the time to shift in this fashion. The point is that it’s much better to know where the bar is set than to make internal excuses or to simply not know what is driving market decisions. This feedback helps shape long term goals within the dealership. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised what people will tell you if you approach it in the right way and create an environment where customers feel that they can be open and that you’re asking for the right reasons.
And a quick reminder: when Ron sends out a survey asking whose content on his site you’d prefer to read more of, please don’t forget to rate mine near the top. “All 5s’” for this guy…
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If You Don’t Do It, Who Will?
If You Don’t Do It, Who Will?
Curriculum designer Caroline Slee-Poulos brings this week’s post on Lifelong Learning with “If You Don’t Do It, Who Will?”
If You Don’t Do It, Who Will?
I’m sure we have all heard the quote “If not you, who? If not now, when?” attributed to both Theodore Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy. Despite the hazy origins of the quote, it is relatable for most of us.
After all, if we don’t take ownership and get things done, then who will?
We take that ownership attitude throughout our businesses, right up until the moment a budget for training and employee development comes to the table.
We expect our employees to come in the door, armed with all of the knowledge they need to be successful in our businesses. We expect this when they come in with a freshly inked diploma, showing they’ve graduated from high school. When they don’t have the skills right off the get go, we bemoan the state of public education.
Here’s the thing: even if your brand-new hires came to you with the foundational knowledge they need in order to succeed and be an asset in your business, don’t you want them to continue to level-up?
We know that there is a skills gap for high school graduates. Due to budgets, some of the trade programs that were commonplace in high schools for years have been entirely closed down in some regions. Even if that were not the case, doesn’t your business need people who can use the new technology, whether it be on the shop floor or in the dealer business system, as it changes and updates over time?
Our businesses and our industry are not stagnant: they change and adopt new methods, systems, and technology. History has shown us that it can be tough to be an “early adopter” of technology. As a result, we can try to delay making necessary changes. Our customers need more from us. If we don’t provide the necessary training to keep up with what our customers expect and need, then how can we expect to retain those customers?
I propose that employee development – training and continuing education for your staff – is as critical to the success of your business as the work order process in your shop. It creates a team culture in your business, and shows your employees that you are just as concerned with the future as they are. Plus, it gives you the opportunity to see your employees receive the exact education you need them to. Don’t you think it is time to put the training of your employees into motion?
After all, if you don’t do it, who will?
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Friday Filosophy v.09.02.2022
Friday Filosophy v.09.02.2022
Founder Ron Slee shares quotes and words of wisdom from Winston Churchill in Friday Filosophy v.09.02.2022.
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, KG, OM, CH, TD, DL, FRS, RA (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945, during the Second World War, and again from 1951 to 1955. Apart from two years between 1922 and 1924, he was a Member of Parliament (MP) from 1900 to 1964 and represented a total of five constituencies. Ideologically an economic liberal and imperialist, he was for most of his career a member of the Conservative Party, which he led from 1940 to 1955. He was a member of the Liberal Party from 1904 to 1924.
Of mixed English and American parentage, Churchill was born in Oxfordshire to a wealthy, aristocratic family. He joined the British Army in 1895 and saw action in British India, the Anglo-Sudan War, and the Second Boer War, gaining fame as a war correspondent and writing books about his campaigns. Elected a Conservative MP in 1900, he defected to the Liberals in 1904. In H. H. Asquith‘s Liberal government, Churchill served as President of the Board of Trade and Home Secretary, championing prison reform and workers’ social security. As First Lord of the Admiralty during the First World War, he oversaw the Gallipoli Campaign but, after it proved a disaster, he was demoted to Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster. He resigned in November 1915 and joined the Royal Scots Fusiliers on the Western Front for six months. In 1917, he returned to government under David Lloyd George and served successively as Minister of Munitions, Secretary of State for War, Secretary of State for Air, and Secretary of State for the Colonies, overseeing the Anglo-Irish Treaty and British foreign policy in the Middle East. After two years out of Parliament, he served as Chancellor of the Exchequer in Stanley Baldwin‘s Conservative government, returning the pound sterling in 1925 to the gold standard at its pre-war parity, a move widely seen as creating deflationary pressure and depressing the UK economy.
Out of government during his so-called “wilderness years” in the 1930s, Churchill took the lead in calling for British rearmament to counter the growing threat of militarism in Nazi Germany. At the outbreak of the Second World War, he was re-appointed First Lord of the Admiralty. In May 1940, he became Prime Minister, replacing Neville Chamberlain. Churchill formed a national government and oversaw British involvement in the Allied war effort against the Axis powers, resulting in victory in 1945. After the Conservatives’ defeat in the 1945 general election, he became Leader of the Opposition. Amid the developing Cold War with the Soviet Union, he publicly warned of an “iron curtain” of Soviet influence in Europe and promoted European unity. He lost the 1950 election, but was returned to office in 1951. His second term was preoccupied with foreign affairs, especially Anglo-American relations and the preservation of the British Empire. Domestically, his government emphasized house-building and completed the development of a nuclear weapon (begun by his predecessor). In declining health, Churchill resigned as Prime Minister in 1955, although he remained an MP until 1964. Upon his death in 1965, he was given a state funeral.
Widely considered one of the 20th century’s most significant figures, Churchill remains popular in the UK and Western world, where he is seen as a victorious wartime leader who played an important role in defending Europe’s liberal democracy against the spread of fascism. He has also been praised for his role in the Liberal welfare reforms. He has, however, been criticized for some wartime events and also for his imperialist views. As a writer, Churchill was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1953 for his historical and biographical work. He was also a prolific painter.
The Time is Now.
The Importance of “Professionalism” in Recruiting and Retaining Excellent Technicians
The Importance of “Professionalism” in Recruiting and Retaining Excellent Technicians
Guest writer Steve Johnson addresses the important issue of hiring and retaining employees in this week’s post, “The Importance of ‘Professionalism’ in Recruiting and Retaining Excellent Technicians.”
Finding good people and employee retention have for years been tough, relevant issues in the equipment industry, especially with regard to technicians. This also applies to other jobs at your dealership. The “great resignation” has brought the issue of retention to even greater prominence. Now, some might say, “aw, they’re just lazy, want a handout, have had it too easy,” etc.
I don’t buy it.
I’ve seen too many motivated young people at career and technical colleges, at Skills USA and other venues to buy that. I’ve seen too many great employees and great employers who show me a different story to buy that. There are too many young people out there who make great employees at companies that re far-sighted enough to educate them well and provide great career opportunities. There are too many companies out there that manage their retention rates well through expert and informed “professional” human resource management. Here I am not just referring to the human resources department, but the entire organization’s management.
I remember once asking an equipment dealership owner what he pays beginning techs and mentioned what I thought was an average number. His reply? “Absolutely not, nobody can live on that! In a different mid-career job, I worked for a training organization, and one business owner was angry at me because he had trained all his people and they had all quit and moved on. He said it was my fault. In reality, it was because his shop was far less than desirable as a workplace. Another said he couldn’t find any good techs. Then he told me he was paying them a way below market rate at $8.50 / hour. Seriously? Which of the above was the more professional reaction?
There have been many articles I’ve read over the years as to why people want to leave their jobs and do leave their jobs. It seems to me that the reasons are not that different today from those years ago… an unlivable wage, no upward mobility, poor leadership, a negative company culture, below standard benefits, a chronically overworked staff, and so forth. I would never expect employees in today’s labor market to stand for that, and apparently many are not. In my opinion, the “great resignation” is largely more an issue of employer human resource management professionalism than an employee issue.
In summary, my belief is that running a professional organization has everything to do with dealer professionals treating people like the human professionals they are in a professional environment. What does that mean operationally? Here are some thoughts on employees staying or leaving.
My goal here is to urge you to think about “company professionalism” and how that impacts your companies’ human resource management as you develop a hopefully successful recruitment and retention plan. Yes, the above over-simplifies the issues greatly. However, I believe that if companies work to manage the career interests of new and experienced employees continuously and professionally and give them challenging and rewarding work opportunities in a professional environment, those employees will thrive. So will those companies.
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Can You Improve Your Employees’ Psychological Income?
Can You Improve Your Employees’ Psychological Income?
Guest writer Floyd Jerkins continues his series on customer service with part 3: Can You Improve Your Employees’ Psychological Income?
One of the most profound human characteristics centers around our need to be appreciated. When we are in a relationship where we feel appreciated and valued, our self-esteem rises, and we are much more open to making changes and being part of a team. Leaders know this and work to create an environment for people to be recognized.
Employees need economic income and psychological income. To reach peak performance, both are needed to have balance in life while the business pursues high profits. When employees enjoy the economic portion, a question is how much more commitment could they make if they had the psychological income to match?
Managers Becoming Experts in Finding the Things That Go Wrong
More often than not, managers are on the job to find the things going wrong and fix them. Many become experts at this. One of the most serious challenges in motivating people is that over time if all they hear are the negatives, it breeds a less than average mindset or one that goes all out to protect themselves from ridicule. It’s hard to build a team of high-performing champions if all they hear is what they are doing wrong all the time.
The “emotional bank account” is a theory and a practical application. The theory suggests that the more deposits you make into someone’s emotional bank account, their self-esteem increases, trust builds and makes them more open to changes. You are overdrawn in the account if you don’t make purposeful deposits. The person then closes down and isn’t up for much of anything because they are always suspicious of your motives. The practical application is to be well invested in the emotional bank account with your teams through your leadership and communications style and the consideration you show.
Catching Team Members Doing Something Right
Many times, all a leader hears in a day are the negatives. Some staff will bombard you with every negative there is. As a leader, you are often the center of communications, and this can become draining if you don’t frame these issues correctly.
This is one of the biggest keys to making happy employees. As a leader, we often forget to praise someone when they do a great job. Our heads are into other business-related issues. I don’t bet but only on sure things. And I’ll bet your business has all kinds of positive service points of contacts every day. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t last long in the business. Do you see them? Can you make it a daily practice to praise your staff when they perform the correct customer service behaviors you want to see?
A client of mine owns a few McDonalds. They installed the “thank you” process. Each employee was to say thank you when another employee did something for them, or they witnessed a fellow employee performing an uncommon act of service. All the managers started the process weeks before they rolled it out with all the staff. My friend said it was amazing how quickly this caught on and the improvement it made to the attitudes of the staff. It became contagious.
An example from another client. If an employee goes over and beyond to help a customer or assist a teammate, they will get a “good job card” with their name on it at their monthly manager’s meeting. These cards can come from managers, other employees or from customers telling management. They then would get to put their cards into a box. The manager would draw a card out of the box with a name on it. That person would then win a gift of $100 in value. A few of their people didn’t care about getting a card until they saw the same people winning. Then they joined in by trying to go over and beyond at customer service or helping another teammate to win. It became contagious.
Strategy to Make Emotional Deposits: The Magic of Dimes
Business owners go to great lengths and expense to recruit and hire the right people. I’ve always wanted people who worked for me to come to work and enjoy what they are doing.
As I mentioned in this article’s opening lines, we all have basic human tendencies. As a leader, we can nurture people through our leadership style and grow the talent we need to continue to achieve the goals and mission of the company.
Try putting ten dimes in one pocket and moving them to the other pocket one at a time with each positive message you give to someone throughout the day. The idea is to try and break old habits, and I am sure that is what many of us have. How many dimes do you have at the end of the day? Track this for a couple of weeks; you’ll be surprised. If you do well, you will also notice a change in the people around you. It is magical.
You can’t be fake about this, nor be insincere. Remember, in the absence of leadership; people will follow the strangest things. With leadership, ordinary people can do extraordinary things.
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Learning As a Way of Life
Learning As a Way of Life
In this week’s post on lifelong learning, Ron Slee tackles the difficulties of making time for ourselves in “Learning As a Way of Life.”
Should Learning be a Way of Life?
Over my career and involvement in training and teaching one thing has always stood out to me. The amount of time and effort that we devote in our lives to our own personal health and development seems always to come last. Imagine that. We spend our time working, in many cases the same job for years, and we don’t do much if anything to get to another level of opportunities.
A number of years ago my wife and I took a vacation. A nice vacation for a couple of weeks. During these two weeks, I spent each morning looking out at magnificent scenery while I was on a treadmill. That is when it struck me. I had not spent any time at all on my own personal health and wellbeing. I don’t think I am alone in this regard. We get into ruts in our lives. We have our personal lives and our professional lives and we get to a place where we have everything under control and we are comfortable with our lives. Or so we think.
So, when the vacation was over and we returned home I reverted to my normal life which left no time for me.
During the time I was teaching in a classroom, I always asked the class to tell me about the last book that they read. Rarely had anyone read a book in the last thirty days, or ninety days, a few had read a book in the past year. Does that remind you about the time I DON’T invest in myself? The people in my classes rarely did anything in the form of reading that helped them develop as individuals, either in their personal or professional lives.
I think it is long past the time when we should be investing in ourselves.
When I worked in dealerships, I regularly got a book for the members of my team. We all read the same book and set a day when we would talk about that book and share with each other our impressions. It was always enlightening to all of us. We were talking about our personal impressions, with no filters. No judgment, no one was right or wrong, we were just talking as people. I found that the team became much closer as a result of this exercise. You should try it, or something like it, with your teams. Maybe even in your family if your children are old enough.
Recently my granddaughter moved to Hawaii to take her Master’s Degree at the University of Hawaii. It is a real joy for us to have her this close. During the past six weeks or so we have spent a lot of time together and those of you who know me reasonably well can imagine the conversations we get into with each other. As you know I am a contrarian. I love debating. And it really doesn’t matter which side of the debate I am on. During this time my granddaughter has figured me out and we now can have some really vigorous debates about darn near any subject you want to talk about. That is also a joy for me as it shows me a person who is growing in their thinking and communications styles.
Recently I was talking with the President of a University and I was asking him what he viewed as the most significant elements of learning that the students coming to university were lacking. He was very clear in those three things.
I was intrigued and we talked about it for some time. It would appear that when the US introduced the “No Child Left Behind” program, the teaching became more about teaching to a score on a test than teaching people to think. Of course, in some parts of the U.S., a low test score was grounds for firing a teacher. Learning the subject matter should be the primary objective, of course. Learning to think and develop your own intellect was also a priority. It would appear that aspect of learning was less prioritized in the face of so much high stakes testing. To this University Leader it showed.
I would like for us to get much more serious about our own personal development. As you know one of the goals for us at Learning Without Scars is to help everyone identify their individual personal potential. Then to get on a path to achieving our potential. That applies to all of us. Caroline and I are in this mode constantly. She is much more effective at it than I am as she has held a full-time teaching job while at the same time involved in personal development with a mentor once a week and completing her own Master’s program in education. I feel like a slacker beside her. But think about that for a moment. Caroline has put embedded learning in her life.
Writing this blog has renewed my commitment to put learning into my day-to-day life. I read constantly. I recommend five books in each of our Quarterly Newsletters so each of you can be stimulated to do the same thing. The newsletters all have four main subject areas; parts, service, selling and business. They are in the form of a separate document which I wanted you to use for Continuous Improvement in your work.
I am very fortunate in that I am exposed to people that take me out of my comfort zone when I do Zoom calls and create our Podcasts and YouTube and Vimeo Films. I am challenged to explore a subject on which my guests are subject matter experts, and I have a conversation with them that can be helpful to our Learning Without Scars audience.
But I am entering a new phase in my life. It seems that the changes will never end. I am going to embed Learning into my day-to-day life, and I invite you to join me in this new phase.
The Time is Now.
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Friday Filosophy v.08.26.2022
Friday Filosophy v.08.26.2022
Founder Ron Slee continues with the theme of Greek poets and writers with Friday Filosophy v.08.26.2022, the final installment for the month of August.
Menander; c. 342/41 – c. 290 BC was a Greek dramatist and the best-known representative of Athenian New Comedy. He wrote 108 comedies and took the prize at the Lenaia festival eight times. His record at the City Dionysia is unknown.
He was one of the most popular writers in antiquity, but his work was lost during the Middle Ages and is now known in highly fragmentary form, much of which was discovered in the 20th century. Only one play, Dyskolos, has survived almost complete.
Menander was the son of well-to-do parents; his father Diopeithes is identified by some with the Athenian general and governor of the Thracian Chersonese known from the speech of Demosthenes De Chersoneso. He presumably derived his taste for comic drama from his uncle Alexis.
He was the friend, associate, and perhaps pupil of Theophrastus, and was on intimate terms with the Athenian dictator Demetrius of Phalerum. He also enjoyed the patronage of Ptolemy Soter, the son of Lagus, who invited him to his court. But Menander, preferring the independence of his villa in the Piraeus and the company of his mistress Glycera, refused. According to the note of a scholiast on the Ibis of Ovid, he drowned while bathing, and his countrymen honored him with a tomb on the road leading to Athens, where it was seen by Pausanias. Numerous supposed busts of him survive, including a well-known statue in the Vatican, formerly thought to represent Gaius Marius.
His rival in dramatic art (and supposedly in the affections of Glycera) was Philemon, who appears to have been more popular. Menander, however, believed himself to be the better dramatist, and, according to Aulus Gellius, used to ask Philemon: “Don’t you feel ashamed whenever you gain a victory over me?” According to Caecilius of Calacte (Porphyry in Eusebius, Praeparatio evangelica) Menander was accused of plagiarism, as his The Superstitious Man was taken from The Augur of Antiphanes, but reworkings and variations on a theme of this sort were commonplace and so the charge is a complicated one.
How long complete copies of his plays survived is unclear, although 23 of them, with commentary by Michael Psellus, were said to still have been available in Constantinople in the 11th century. He is praised by Plutarch (Comparison of Menander and Aristophanes) and Quintilian (Institutio Oratoria), who accepted the tradition that he was the author of the speeches published under the name of the Attic orator Charisius.
An admirer and imitator of Euripides, Menander resembles him in his keen observation of practical life, his analysis of the emotions, and his fondness for moral maxims, many of which became proverbial: “The property of friends is common,” “Whom the gods love die young,” “Evil communications corrupt good manners” (from the Thaïs, quoted in 1 Corinthians 15:33). These maxims (chiefly monostichs) were afterwards collected, and, with additions from other sources, were edited as Menander’s One-Verse Maxims, a kind of moral textbook for the use of schools.
The single surviving speech from his early play Drunkenness is an attack on the politician Callimedon, in the manner of Aristophanes, whose bawdy style was adopted in many of his plays.
Menander found many Roman imitators. Eunuchus, Andria, Heauton Timorumenos and Adelphi of Terence (called by Caesar “dimidiatus Menander”) were avowedly taken from Menander, but some of them appear to be adaptations and combinations of more than one play. Thus, in the Andria were combined Menander’s The Woman from Andros and The Woman from Perinthos, in the Eunuchus, The Eunuch and The Flatterer, while the Adelphi was compiled partly from Menander and partly from Diphilus. The original of Terence’s Hecyra (as of the Phormio) is generally supposed to be, not by Menander, but Apollodorus of Carystus. The Bacchides and Stichus of Plautus were probably based upon Menander’s The Double Deceiver and Brotherly-Loving Men, but the Poenulus does not seem to be from The Carthaginian, nor the Mostellaria from The Apparition, in spite of the similarity of titles. Caecilius Statius, Luscius Lanuvinus, Turpilius and Atilius also imitated Menander. He was further credited with the authorship of some epigrams of doubtful authenticity; the letters addressed to Ptolemy Soter and the discourses in prose on various subjects mentioned by the Suda are probably spurious.
Most of Menander’s work did not survive the Middle Ages, except as short fragments. Federico da Montefeltro‘s library at Urbino reputedly had “tutte le opere”, a complete works, but its existence has been questioned and there are no traces after Cesare Borgia‘s capture of the city and the transfer of the library to the Vatican.
Until the end of the 19th century, all that was known of Menander were fragments quoted by other authors and collected by Augustus Meineke (1855) and Theodor Kock, Comicorum Atticorum Fragmenta (1888). These consist of some 1650 verses or parts of verses, in addition to a considerable number of words quoted from Menander by ancient lexicographers.
The Time is Now.
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Gaining Business Success Through Your Employees
Gaining Business Success Through Your Employees
Learning Without Scars is pleased to introduce our new guest writer, Arlen Swenson. He makes his blogging debut with LWS in “Gaining Business Success Through Your Employees.” Arlen is a seasoned, dynamic, competitive, influencer, motivator Sales and Marketing Executive. Track record of success recruiting, building, motivating, and managing highly effective teams, developing and implementing product marketing strategies to capture market share.
Success includes being Vice President of North American Governmental Sales & Marketing for John Deere Construction Equipment with annual sales of $255,000,000 while increasing sales 17% annually and reducing selling costs by more than 15% and improved gross profit margins by more than $38,000,000.00.
Gaining Business Success Through Your Employees
Many equipment dealerships struggle meeting or exceeding their business goals due to unforeseen or unknown barriers within their organization. Sometimes top management will make adjustments based on their experience or knowledge only to see negative or lackluster results even though employees are doing as directed.
But the answer to improving business performance is available if management is willing to ask from the right sources and that starts with their employees – all of them – all departments – all branch locations. This will require an open door by management to receive employee input in a constructive manner without threat of consequences for providing input.
This can be accomplished by conducting an open employee meeting with representatives from all departments and branch locations at each meeting conducted. The basic rules of the meeting include hearing input and recording on a flip chart that input from each meeting participant. The other rule is when an individual is providing their input they cannot be interrupted or challenged by the other meeting participants. The meeting chair or person entering the comments can ask clarification questions to make sure they are recording the input correctly.
This part of the process will take some time to accomplish and when each flip chart is filled, and line separated for each person’s comments each filled flip chart is then pasted on the meeting room wall. At the end of the process, you will have several flip charts pasted on the wall. It now time to gain group consensus on what are the top four items recorded on the flip charts that should be addressed immediately and solutions obtained. The remaining items will be addressed and resolved in descending order later, and all reported back to the employees.
To obtain group consensus each meeting participant is given four different colored pasty dots to place on the flip charts entries they believe are the first importance (red dot), second (green dot), third (yellow dot), and fourth (blue dot). Placing of the dots is done in quiet and no talking among the meeting participants. Management will than assign the four dotted items to two meeting participants for each colored dot to work with management on the best solutions for solving the business issue successfully. Progress on completing the top four issues is communicated back through the organization with frequent updates and announcement of completions. The other issues in descending order will be resolved with frequent updates and announcement of completions.
This open exchange of solving problems will become habit and add to the success of the business.
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A Leadership Rule: What You Do is So Loud I Can’t Hear What You’re Saying
A Leadership Rule: What You Do is So Loud I Can’t Hear What You’re Saying
Guest writer Floyd Jerkins takes a top-down approach to customer service in his blog post this week, “A Leadership Rule: What You Do Is So Loud I Can’t Hear What You’re Saying.”
How Effective Are Your Leaders?
You want employees to feel good to be working as part of a team that is working together – and everyone is improving. Many managers would be surprised to learn how little their employees believe management is walking the talk.
You can quickly scan the internet and find thousands of articles on leadership. Hundreds of thousands of terabytes of data on the subject are available. Why then are we still seeing fundamental leadership issues?
Leaders have to be the change they want to see.
Whether Bruce Lee or Gandi said it first, it’s a powerful metaphor for leaders. Yeah, I know, it sounds like a cliche statement, but a modeled behavior makes this a reality. You can’t fake it with lots of words or bravado. You have to walk the talk.
I helped a group establish a renewed mission and vision for their company. First, we had to talk through how they created their first set of statements, how they outlined the behaviors they expected staff to have, and then how they communicated this to their entire organization.
Previously, they discussed their competition many times but tended to over-analyze how they compare to the other companies. They were trying to be just like the other companies their customers touch instead of understanding how they made the customers feel and replicating the same feelings from their organization. Once everyone recognized this, it started a whole new discussion. You just can’t put words on paper and expect everyone to automatically adopt them into day-to-day behaviors.
Every time a customer comes in contact with your company, you have the opportunity to create value by managing these touch points. These “touch points” of interactions form the impressions of your business. Every front-line employee has to walk the talk because hundreds and even thousands of these touch points happen daily. Nearly all of them are manageable by leaders and create coachable moments.
Specific customer service behaviors should be in your mission statement and your employee’s job descriptions. When you include these into training sessions, you begin integrating them into the hearts and minds of your employees. When it is trained in employees and in their job descriptions, they remember it and work towards it. These ideals aren’t just going to happen by chance; they must be planned for.
There is a lesson on the importance of having things detailed, organized, fast service, doing what we tell the customer, etc. If we take care of our customers, they will take care of us. That is such a simple statement, but it has far-reaching consequences in the business.
Remove Pass the Buck Bill
Nothing upsets a customer more than having an employee tell them to see someone else in the business that created the problem. Putting a customer on hold only to wait and wait for the next person in line to start the conversation all over again doesn’t make those enduring experiences customers expect today. I call those employees, Pass the Buck Bill.
Passing on the responsibility to another employee or department is a common occurrence, yet; it drives customers away and makes your company just like all the other average ones out there.
Can These Touch Points Be Managed?
Yes, They Can!
Each employee is a manager of customer relations. Even the janitor, because they come in contact with a customer, so they create an impression of good or bad service. Everyone needs to focus on the customer’s needs even if they don’t deal with or come in contact with the customer. Even a ticked-off customer is everyone’s responsibility. The more you can include your employees in this leadership role, they are more likely will become committed to doing an excellent job.
Every Customer is Heard Through Many Ears
As a leader, you’ll sometimes get “employee ears” telling you all kinds of negative rhetoric about one department or the other. Someone in one department hears a customer say something about another department, etc. It is difficult to listen to these negative comments and not do something, but at the same time, you have to become aware that there are three sides to every story.
Implementing cross-departmental meetings to discuss customer service starts to create a deeper understanding of individual responsibility.
The idea of having different groups together within the business and discussing “how do we rate today on a scale of one to ten” starts the internal conversations about improving customer service. If one group says they are a seven at greeting customers with a smile, then ask why. This opens the discussion about how to get better tomorrow. Even if you start this out as once a week or once a month, it gives the employees their chance to have their say and make it more personal. This whole process intentionally gives them the power to try to improve.
It would be nice to have this just naturally happen between staff, but that’s not the reality. A leader has to set the tone for customer service. The leader has to walk the talk of leadership and be the change they want to see.
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Training Is a Waste of Time and Money!
Training Is a Waste of Time and Money!
In this week’s issue of “Lifelong Learners,” guest writer Mick Vaught takes a strong approach to employee development with his blog post entitled “Training Is a Waste of Time and Money!”
That is, unless it is applied correctly within the scope of the company’s core values. I said this before and I’ll say it again…. training should be used as one of the last disciplines in developing a competitive organization. Herb Kellerher, founder of Southwest Airlines, built his success by hiring “Attitude” first, followed by putting the right people in the right position, and lastly, training the heck out of them.
Here’s an example of how most employers misuse training in their dealer organization.
“A very successful dealer organization has seen a continuous decline in revenue over the past year. What’s the first thing upper management does? Bring in corporate sales product specialists to launch a “sales” (Selling Process) training event.”
That brings me to the next point that must be addressed. Training is a waste of time if top management does not offer buy in. Checking off an item on the “To-Do” list just doesn’t cut it. If management thinks behavioral change can be accomplished in a one- or two-day session, they are totally not in touch with reality. A comprehensive perpetual training plan (to include follow-up, measuring, accountability and targeting the various levels of learning) must be executed if that organization will be successful.
Today more than ever, I see a tremendous deficiency in young people going out into our work force. Most problematic is their ability to communicate, collaborate, and the ability to solve real problems. One of the biggest reasons for this deficiency is our national public-school systems. Educators have morphed into paperwork administrators, dealing with a lack of student discipline, myopic support from administrators, and a lack of involvement with parent’s participation. This now leads us to take a totally new perspective on how we assimilate new hires.
Notice, training was the last initiative in the process!
In conclusion, those organizations who hire the right people in the very beginning, place them in the right position and are willing to invest the time and capital in offering effective and continuing training platforms will ultimately achieve greatness!
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