Survey This
Survey This
Meet Your Host, Alan Weiss
Alan Weiss is one of those rare people who can say he is a consultant, speaker, and author and mean it.
His consulting firm, Summit Consulting Group, Inc., has attracted clients such as Merck, Hewlett-Packard, GE, Mercedes-Benz, State Street Corporation, Times Mirror Group, The Federal Reserve, The New York Times Corporation, Toyota, and over 500 other leading organizations. He has served on several boards of directors in various capacities.
His prolific publishing includes over 500 articles and 60 books, including his best-seller, Million Dollar Consulting (from McGraw-Hill) now in its 30th year and sixth edition. His newest is Your Legacy is Now: Life is not about a search for meaning but the creation of meaning (Routledge, 2021). His books have been on the curricula at Villanova, Temple University, and the Wharton School of Business, and have been translated into 15 languages.
Get to know AlanShow Notes
Have you noticed the increase in surveys from hotels, airlines, online retailers, and even medical practices? These are usually accompanied by requests for ratings on the internet.
This is related to “calls being recorded for quality purposes.” If anyone really listened to the calls, we'd have a lot better services.
Even restrooms have a computer screen asking how clean the place was. I really don't want to touch it with my finger.
Why not take care of my service problems while I'm experiencing them, not asking about how bad they've been after the fact?
I think many of these are a pretense for actually caring. They try to cheaply overcome the unhappiness of customers with a false promise to improve, when they are actually just a vent for unhappiness with no obligation to improve.
Executives have “executive assistants” so that they don't have to personally respond to calls and emails, even though they claim to lead “customer-driven” operations.
I love the representatives who tell you, “You'll receive a survey after this call, and I'd appreciate your giving me a strong rating.” You'll always receive one of these after every Uber trip, along with the tip suggestion.
I'm told that Uber drivers rate their customers, as well, and those customers who have given low ratings aren't responded to as rapidly as those who've given high ratings. I don't know if that's true, but I would suspect it is.
Please don't rate this podcast. But then again, no one is asking you to do so.
Alan Weiss's The Uncomfortable Truth® is a weekly broadcast from “The Rock Star of Consulting,” Alan Weiss, who holds forth with his best (and often most contrarian) ideas about society, culture, business, and personal growth. His 60+ books in 12 languages, and his travels to, and work in, 50 countries contribute to a fascinating and often belief-challenging 20 minutes that might just change your next 20 years.
Introduction to the show recorded by Connie Dieken
