Enable the front lines for a great customer experience..

I just joined an awesome company called Salesforce. I am really excited to be part of the team and to get rolling. The anticipation of starting something new is exhilarating.

 Week one started great!

 On Monday morning my new, cool MacBook Air arrived, and I spend two hours on the phone with my boss, and another hour with a new hire overview. This is one impressive company. They know how to “on-board” remote employees!

The only big frustration I had with all the new systems and getting my new computer was all the passwords! To start, I needed a lot of them, and they all needed to follow a certain structure. One cap, one lowercase, one number, one special character, one big headache! I get it, security is important, but it is a pain. The new Mac had none of the Web logins I had on my old Mac – so I had to remember all the usernames and password! Banks, airlines, brokerage accounts, hotels, LinkedIn, FaceBook, – wow – so many passwords! Not to mention all the new corporate ones I had to create and remember.

On my second day of my new gig I was called into duty, a meeting, then a presentation in Ohio. I was really excited to get to meet a few customers and do a presentation in the first week. But first, I needed a hotel in Cleveland. It had been a while, but I was back on the trusty Marriott web site on my new Mac. But wait – lo and behold, I forgot yet another password! Then I had to go through the process — more than once or twice — of re-setting my password. It did not go smoothly. It all ended with some less-than-appropriate language, no hotel booked, and a nasty tweet on the @Marriott twitter address (they did respond quickly to the tweet).

I called from the road the next day, and booked via the 800-number, something I had not done in years. But I still could not get on the site or the mobile application. The customer service agents on the 800 were very nice, and did a good job getting me set up. I was still a little frustrated from the great password debacles of 2015, but I had a room.

 After a few 100 miles in the car, I checked into my Marriott Courtyard in Cleveland. All was well; there were some cold free waters for the room. I like the new Courtyard lobbies: look great, very functional & good Feng Shui. The room was the same as always – nice and comfy.

The next day, I had my first sales call with the new company in the morning. Later that afternoon I would be presenting to a team of their call center managers in multiple locations online. I stay up till about 2 AM getting the presentation together.

But I had a problem. The decision maker I met in the morning was going to be mobile in the afternoon, so I could not present from his office.

Long story short, I had no place to park my self in the afternoon to give the presentation. I really don’t like hosting web meetings from cell phones, and I didn’t want to do my presentation from a Starbucks on the highway somewhere between Cleveland and Cincinnati. I was at a loss.

Early in the morning I headed down to the front desk with a request that, based on experience, hotels really do not like. Late check-out — like a really late check-out. I approached a very professional receptionist Olisda, with my dilemma and my request. The response was not what I was expecting “Are you kidding me, it is no problem at all, you stay as long as you need too and I will let house keeping know not to disturb you. You would hate having someone banging on the door while you are presenting.” Wow – I knew she was not the manager, but she did not think twice. She was all over it. “Do you want some extra waters?” – sure, I get thirsty when I am presenting — I am a bit of a blowhard.

Well – my first presentation went off with out a hitch. I was locked in my room, well into the afternoon, undisturbed and well hydrated.

What started as a frustrated Marriott customer early in the week, turned into a very happy Marriott customer. They key was twofold – I ran into a Marriott employee who was engaging and really cared about customers’ having a good experience. Olisda was great and should get a lot of credit. But the bigger picture was evident in the way she reacted without giving it a second thought. Marriott, and her local management – enabled her to do the right thing. She did not have to worry about “Policy”, or “Room Census” – she knows when she makes a call that may be out of the norm that her management team, and Marriott, have her back.

I sell solutions that help enterprises give the frontlines tools to provide game-changing customer experience. But the tools are worth much less when management does not enable their employees to make the right choice for the customers. Marriott has got that down, and I am now going to be staying in them almost every now week for quite a while!