Eyes on the goal (article from my Oct. newsletter)
Florence Chadwick was an ace swimmer. She set a world record in 1950 when she swam across the English Channel from France in 13 hours and 20 minutes. The following year, she swam from England to France and made history as the first woman to swim the channel from both shores.
But in 1952, Chadwick learned a powerful lesson when she decided to swim the 26 miles between Catalina Island and Palos Verdes, Calif. The water was frigid that day and sharks trailed her. But these factors didn’t diminish Chadwick’s resolve; something else did.
After 15 hours of swimming in rough waters, there was no sign of the coastline—there was no sign of anything because fog had shrouded the area. With her goal out of sight, Chadwick lost the desire to continue and climbed aboard an escort boat—not realizing that she was less than half a mile from shore.
When asked why she decided to stop, she explained, “It was the fog. If I could have seen land, I could have finished. But when you can’t see your goal, you lose all sense of progress and you begin to give up.â€
Her failure was only temporary, though, and a few months later, she made another attempt to swim the same waters. On that day, the sun was shining. And with her goal clearly in sight, Chadwick set another new swimming record.
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Do You ROCK with your clients??
 Jim Knight of Hard Rock Café gave a presentation on customer service at my recent recruiting conference titles “Service That Rocksâ€. He made some excellent points that apply no matter what business you are in. I will share a few of them with you today.
1)     “Assist your staff in creating a volunteer philanthropy groupâ€. What? What could this have to do with a corporate team? You or your Director of HR has probably at one point in time organized one of those famous “team-building†exercises. Maybe it was even the outdoor experience with ropes, tug of war, obstacle course, etc. where everyone has to work together. Same principle-better outcome. When they pull together to help a charity, not only do they get the “team-building†experience, they get the satisfaction and good feeling of helping others. It’s a lasting warm glow that will affect their attitude, level of service and performance
2)     Enforce standards but give out “permission slipsâ€. Want to demean your employees status with their customers, peers or co-workers? Give them no authority. Make them ask permission for the smallest of things. No- GIVE THEM the authority to fix things and they will be loyal to you and your company beyond the typical employee. And how efficient is that for the company? It just saves time and creates employee loyalty that is truly priceless
3)     Hire only “rock stars†and treat them like volunteers. Have you ever lead a volunteer team? How did you motivate them to do their job on their team? With praise and acknowledgement of a job well done. I bet you used lots of thank you’s. So why not use that same approach with your employees? It costs you nothing and gains you everything. Treat your employees like volunteers and watch the difference.
4)     Realize that people will only repeat what they like. Inspire them to repeat the right things. Help create patterns and systems that benefit both them and the company. And why not add an element of fun. There is enough on the outside of the company that can be challenging so make your environment upbeat, positive and FUN. Yes- you can successfully conduct business and have fun doing so. Ask any successful salesperson. My boss once told me, “Be the person they look forward to seeing that dayâ€.
5)     Do what you say you will do. If you don’t, you will never command the respect of your peers and employees.
Hard Rock Café has made an art of providing the ultimate experience to their customers. Are you?
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