CHESTNUTS IN THE FIRE

Mazher was super delighted with the service provided by an agency he had dealt with for the first time. The agency had agreed to adhere to his crystal clear instructions to dispatch the documents through a particular courier service at the applicable charges. After such a delightful experience of a good job carried out by the agency, Mazher was shocked and hopping mad when he received a soft copy of the shipment’s airway bill showing the name of a different courier service. Below the image of the airway bill was a text message saying that the documents were put “on hold” as they were mistakenly assigned to a courier service different from the one he had instructed to be used.

The message arrives in Mazher’s chatbox silently at 9.30 pm on a Saturday night when nothing could be done to correct the situation and the next day being Sunday, he’d have to wait until Monday morning for them to take any action whatsoever. To further deteriorate Mazher’s experience with them, the person who coordinated with him right from the beginning did not answer his phone calls the next morning just because it was a Sunday and she chose her prerogative to not respond to her client on a holiday.?A holiday she chose to enjoy after messing up the happiness of a client! On Monday morning, Mazher insisted on speaking to the Unit Head of the location who intervened, and the situation was resolved with Mazher acquiescing half-heartedly to go ahead with their preferred couriers to avoid further delay.

?“People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.”

~Theodore Roosevelt

After checking this task off his “To-Do List”, Mazher sat back and reminisced how he had dealt with “services” and how his reputation for being service-oriented had helped him in the acquisition of new clients in every organisation he had worked for. He recalled one of his most charismatic acquisitions...

Here’s how the story unfolded in his mind:

Mazher had been trying to tap one of the highly reputed MNCs in the city but wasn’t able to break the ice even to present his organisation’s credentials and make a proper presentation to the decision-makers. One morning as he was on the way to his office, Mazher answered a phone from an unknown number. The caller identified himself as a person whom Mazher had been trying to get an audience with, at the coveted MNC. He said, “I’m aware that you’ve been trying to meet us but we’ve been busy. We have a problem on our hands and we were hoping that you’d be able to help us out.” Mazher heard him out and responded, “But you have an officially appointed service provider. Have they not tried to help?” The answer from the other end surprised Mazher even more. “They said that it was beyond the scope of their services, and we cannot take any chances with the outcome of our predicament today.” Mazher’s voice sounded confident when he said, “Rest assured, we will give it our best shot.” The caller said, “We’ve come to understand that you do!”

With that, Mazher turned his car towards the place of action, used all his expertise to accomplish the task, called up the person concerned and said, “The job has been done. Your person will be able to travel tonight as scheduled.” The answer from the other end did not surprise Mazher, “Mr. Syed, why don’t you take over the rest of the job from your organisation as you’ve salvaged our business plan from running into a disaster today.” Mazher was tempted to say “yes” but he never believed in compromising his ethics to leverage a business opportunity. He shut his mind and responded from his heart, “No, that would be unethical on my part and unfair to your officially appointed vendor.” That opened the door for Mazher to go and give a full-fledged presentation of his Offer to the MNC he had been chasing for a long time.

“If you are not taking care of your customer, your competitor will.”
–?Bob Hooey        

Mazher came to the close of his presentation along with his key team members on the scheduled day at the MNC of his dreams. It was a “Q & A” round and the last question of the day to Mazher from the key stakeholder would have probably got a different answer from anyone else standing in Mazher’s place. The question was, “Would you guarantee zero-error services if we choose to go with your organisation?”

Mazher gestured towards his colleagues sitting with him and answered, “We are a team of dedicated Human Beings and therefore we are vulnerable to err sometimes. In my opinion, you ought to judge a service provider by his ability to correct his error, and his agility to pull the chestnut out of the fire without allowing it to be charred to ashes.” That answer nailed the deal for Mazher with a Client that made his organisation proud and his competitors envious.

“Customers don’t expect you to be perfect. They do expect you to fix things when they go wrong.” ~?Donald Porter        

Author's Note: Never hide behind the “Scope of Work” in the Service Level Agreements you have signed with your Clients to avoid going where the devil doesn’t dare. Remember that your signature style of going the Extra Mile to create an experience of awe in your business or personal relationships becomes your investment for the future with unforeseen benefits. So, make it a habit to go the Extra Mile every time.

Mazher H. Syed

November 17, 2022.