Quality Service Marketing

New Book Integrates Marketing, PR and Social Media

Just released – Marketing Public Relations: A Marketer’s Approach to Public Relations and Social Media by Gaetan Giannini, a new textbook that covers a truly integrated approach to promotion using both new and traditional media.

Wait – a textbook? Why would I be excited about a textbook? Two reasons:

1. While the subject of public relations (PR) is usually taught in schools from either a communications or journalism perspective, this book covers PR from a marketing perspective. Gaetan, a former marketing exec who is now an assistant professor and department chair at Cedar Crest College, wrote the book because he was unable to find a suitable text that integrated current PR and marketing practice in the new media landscape.
2. It’s a great reference for business practitioners – those new to marketing and marketing generalists who know the value of PR but don’t apply it everyday.
   According to Gaetan, this book “recognizes the similarities between PR, word-of-mouth, and social networking media and creates a framework for constructing marketing strategies that incorporate these highly credible and cost-effective tools.”

The book explains current PR applications (“Non-Media Connectors and Word-of-Mouth”) and updates traditional PR practices (“The Press Kit and Press Release,” “Selling the Story,” and “Crisis Management”). It also features a full glossary (in addition to defining key terms throughout each chapter) and index.

The book is reasonably priced for a textbook - around $90. Quite a bargain for a business reference book considering the price of a costly PR mistake.

To learn more, check out Gaetan’s book-related blog on Marketing Public Relations.

Just in Time for Boss's Day: How to Be a Better Boss

In honor of National Boss Day (Oct. 16, 2009), I’m delighted to feature this interview with Allison O’Neill, author of The Boss Benchmark and blog about how to be a better boss.

QSM: It’s unlikely a person in management aspires to be a bad boss (at least I hope that’s the case for most managers!). So why do you think there are so many bad bosses out there?

Allison: I think it’s because they kind of get swallowed up by the role – they are so busy doing, they don’t see the bigger picture. They don’t get to see themselves from the perspective their staff do. Often there are things staff feel left out of/want to know more about but the boss doesn’t pick up on this, so the team are excluded. Some bosses have a bad attitude and refuse to believe they could ever be wrong about anything (!) and that doesn’t sit well with the team! Others might be quite unapproachable, so the workers are not comfortable discussing things with them, so communication is very lacking.

Overall I think it’s the inability to step back and evaluate themselves really truthfully. It’s also not realizing that they need to be continuously growing and learning (many times a day) and not being afraid to say “I was wrong” – workers trust you when you are that humble and unafraid of honesty.

QSM: Other than learning from examples in the workplace (what to do + what NOT to do when in a supervisory position), what advice do you give most often to someone who’s a first-time boss? 

Allison: Your #1 key responsibility is to see the big picture of yourself as a boss – evaluate everything you do as if you are a third party who is watching and see if you find yourself thinking “that guy is acting like a prat!”. Ask yourself EVERYDAY how you could have been a better boss today – keeping a notebook of your thoughts on this would be good.

QSM:  What do you advise someone who’s been around for a while and wants to become a better boss?

Allison: Don’t be fooled into thinking that because you are the boss (and may have been one for quite some time) that ‘you have made it’ and that you have all the skills required. You need to keep your eyes open constantly for opportunities to learn, change and develop – especially if you’ve been a boss for ages as the workplace is constantly changing – bosses need to be aware of different things/have different skills than they did even 5 yrs ago.

QSM: What are your suggestions for observing National Boss’s Day for employees fortunate to work for a great boss?

Allison: Tell them you think they do a good job – and explain why – be specific!

QSM: And for employees whose current boss is in need of serious help?

Allison: Buy them a copy of my book!

QSM: LOL … Anything that will help develop a better boss is appreciated. Thanks, Allison!

Re-energize Employees and Organizations

As a follow up to my recent series Re-Charging Employee Morale, here’s an approach that helps employees re-energize themselves and their organizations.

“To effectively re-energize their workforces, organizations need to shift their emphasis from getting more out of people to investing more in them, so they are motivated-and able-to bring more of themselves to work everyday. To recharge themselves, individuals need to recognize the costs of energy-depleting behaviors and then take responsibility for changing them, regardless of the circumstances they’re facing.”

The excerpt is from the article:  Manage Your Energy, Not Your Time by Tony Schwartz and Catherine McCarthy of The Energy Project, a consulting firm focused on building “sustainable high performance cultures by teaching people to manage their energy rather than their time” -- the latter being a finite resource. Their approach helps employees better understand and better manage four energy sources:

• physical – involving nutrition, fitness, and sleep/rest
• emotional – the ability to cultivate positive emotions
• mental – being mindful and maintaining focus, including dealing with multiple distractions
• “human spirit” – a clear sense of purpose and meaning in one’s work and life.

Check out The Energy Project’s blog: Changing the Way the World Works to learn more.

Judging by their client list, The Energy Project has helped many organizations and their employees. If it’s unlikely that your company will find itself on that list, don’t wait … start by exploring how you can better manage your energy.

Re-Charging Employee Morale: Organizational Tips

This wraps up my series of posts in which I feature coaching tips from business consultant-coach-authors Dawn Lennon, Phil Gerbyshak, and Michelle Gall, who graciously shared their suggestions for coping in this chaotic climate.

Leadership and Performance Improvement Coach, Dawn Lennon, who is the author of Business Fitness: The Power to Succeed - Your Way, gives us an organizational perspective in her response to my question:

In organizations where employees are experiencing low morale, low motivation, general malaise, etc. – due to workplace pressures and current economic conditions – what do you suggest to help people re-energize themselves and their co-workers? 

“Relentless negative messages are suffocating. When people hear or read nothing but discouraging news day after day in the media, at staff meetings, in company e-mails, and at the water cooler, they develop a feeling of powerlessness that can sap even the strongest spirit. The truth is that the glass is always half full and half empty at the same time. How we see the contents of the glass determines how we proceed. When the spirit of our employees flags, management needs to look at the messages it’s sending.

“Employees get energy, motivation, and optimism from a clear understanding of the state of the business (how it’s doing financially, what the market needs, how costs impact operations) and what the business needs them to do to make a difference.

“People want to feel in control of their work life. They don’t want to feel like they are sitting in wait for something awful to happen. They don’t want to live in dread of unseen inevitabilities. Employers owe their employees the information they need to make good choices each day about what they do, how they work, and what their options are.

“Businesses that see a pall falling over their employees need to do three things:

“Deliver a balanced (upside and downside) state of the business message face to face to employees—Use the existing leadership (executives, managers, and first line supervisors) to communicate these messages in ways that connect with employees and allow for candid questions and answers.

“Develop specific performance initiatives with each employee that aligns his/her work with the needs of the business—Give employees a clear understanding of how their contributions are helping to drive the success of the business by having each person meet with his/her supervisor to set priorities.

“Meet with work group employees together each week to review progress—Build a sense of team camaraderie where each person’s efforts are applauded in the context of the broader needs of the business. Reinforce the state of the business messages, showcasing how the positives are beginning to impact the negatives.

“The engagement of team effort around a central challenge is a strong antidote to malaise. It brings fresh air into the workplace, builds optimism through shared involvement, and helps people to focus less on their individual concerns and more on the power of the team. Together we generally feel stronger and safer than we do alone.”

Thanks, Dawn!

Re-charging Employee Morale: Team Tips

This is the second in a series of three posts in which I feature coaching tips from business consultant-coach-authors Michelle Gall, Dawn Lennon, and Phil Gerbyshak on how to cope in this chaotic climate.

Today I feature Michelle Gall, executive coach and the author of Keep Your WITS About You: Work Smart, Be Happy, Feel Great. Here’s what Michelle had to say in response to the question:

In organizations where employees are experiencing low morale, low motivation, general malaise, etc. – due to workplace pressures and current economic conditions – what do you suggest to help people re-energize themselves and their co-workers? 

“You’ve heard it all. The market value of everyone’s retirement savings has plummeted while insomnia has soared to new heights. The economic meltdown has ridden roughshod over college funds, nest eggs, and employee morale. Just a year ago, employees had their sights set on upward mobility and corner offices, but now they’re hanging on by their fingernails just to keep what they have. Everyone knows someone who has been fired or laid-off in the last year; if you don’t, you either travel in rarefied circles or you’re out-of-touch with the American workplace.

“It’s easy to have a good attitude when things are going well, but it takes someone special to stay positive during trying times. Not just anyone can turn lemons into lemonade. That’s why bad times call for good people. You don’t need a lot of money to have fun –– just the right people. Here are a few of my favorite tips for building camaraderie and improving workplace morale:

• Cookie Exchange: Everyone brings in a plate of one dozen homemade cookies and a paper bag. Employees then fill their paper bags with one dozen different cookies (each cookie from a different plate). In this way, employees arrive with their own cookies, but they leave with an assortment of different cookies baked by their colleagues. Everyone gives and receives. The only rule: everyone leaves with a full bag so that there are no leftover cookies.
  
• Thank You Notes: This team-building exercise is a more meaningful version of “Secret Santa,” where everyone ends up with positive feedback. Each employee writes his/her name on a piece of paper and drops it into a large manila envelope. Each person then reaches into the manila envelope and picks out a colleague’s name at random. The employee then has 24 hours to write a thank you note to the colleague for behaviors and actions that s/he appreciates in that person. It’s extra convenient and fun if a variety of blank note cards are available to employees for this exercise. The notes can be unsigned and typed if desired to preserve anonymity. The next day, all the thank you cards are placed in a large manila envelope, retrieved randomly, and distributed to each employee by name for their reading pleasure.
  
• Catch ‘Em Doing Something Good: The two exercises described above reward everyone, but perhaps you prefer to reward only those employees who demonstrate a particular desired behavior. Cedars-Sinai Medical Center faced this challenge when it wanted to increase hand-washing among its doctors. Their solution? The hospital empowered a posse of nurses to award a $10 Starbucks card to every physician they caught in the act of hand-washing. It may be hard to believe, but this low-cost incentive increased hand-hygiene compliance from 65% to 80%. If a $10 Starbucks card can reinforce good behavior in high-paid doctors, just think how effective it could be with lesser-paid employees at your organization for whom a stop at Starbucks is now a rare treat. [Here’s more info about the Cedars-Sinai case.]

“There are lots of variations on the above team-building exercises, and you can adjust or tailor them easily to fit your particular industry or workplace norms. These morale-boosters deliver a big bang for the buck. They cost little or nothing, and they’re easy to implement. What’s more, they also offer employees the opportunity to be creative and have fun, which helps reduce stress and enhance morale. Bad times call for good people. Be one of the good guys.”

Thanks, Michelle!

I’ll have more tips in next week’s post …

 

Re-charging Employee Morale: Individual Tips

How can employees stay motivated in today’s chaotic business climate? I asked business consultant-coach-authors Phil Gerbyshak, Michelle Gall, and Dawn Lennon to share their suggestions for coping strategies in the workplace.

I’ll start with Phil Gerbyshak, management and identity consultant, who is also the author of 10 Ways to Make it Great! and the Slacker Manager blog. Following is his response to my question:

In organizations where employees are experiencing low morale, low motivation, general malaise, etc. – due to workplace pressures and current economic conditions – what do you suggest to help people re-energize themselves and their co-workers? 

“First, avoid commiserating with co-workers who are not energized. Negative people will suck the absolute life out of you. Instead, invest your time on the folks who lift you up, who breath life into you, and who are willing to lend a hand when you need it.

“Second, focus on what you can control and not what you can't, and encourage others to do the same. You can't fix the economy by yourself, you can't make your 401(k) suddenly go up the 40% you lost last year, and you can't make the news broadcast positive stuff instead of always focusing on the negative. What you can do is bring a lunch to work one more day a week to save a few dollars, you can bring coffee from home, you can contact a financial planner to make sure you are still investing the right way, and you can turn off the TV and stop buying the newspaper.

“Last but not least, find something new that you've always wanted to learn about and check out a book from the library about it. Dedicate one hour a week to learning more about this new thing, and at the end of the year, you'll be 52 hours closer to being an expert in whatever you chose to study.

“Things may stink right now, but remember: it's always darkest before the dawn. If you make a few small changes now, to your thinking, and to your life, when things get better, you'll be well positioned to make your life GREAT!”

Thanks, Phil!

Stay tuned for more great advice in my next two posts …

“Take Their Breath Away” New Customer Service Guide

Want to develop devoted customers? There’s a new book out that can help you.

Take Their Breath Away: How Imaginative Service Creates Devoted Customers, by Chip Bell and John R. Patterson, describes twelve strategies and tactics to enhance your service delivery and extend customer loyalty to customer devotion. These strategies - including “Camouflage” (seamlessly inserting magic into the customer experience) … “Decoration” (engaging customers with thematic and sensory embellishments) … “Air” and “Air Defense” (critical reminders that service fundamentals can't be taken for granted) - are packaged and presented informatively and entertainingly.

In addition to detailed descriptions and examples of each Take Their Breath Away strategy, the authors provide suggestions on how to execute these strategies to maximize competitive advantage. I particularly like their segmentation model of companies with customer service levels ranging from “customer centric” to “customer indifference.” (Too many of us have had the misfortune of dealing with companies on the lower end of this spectrum.)

While Bell and Patterson mention the importance of engaging employees in creating devoted customers (such as instilling a service vision, listening to employees, and recognizing outstanding service providers), I would have liked to have seen more depth on this topic. Nonetheless, this book is a solid guide for new customer service providers; it’s also a great reference that offers new insight for more experienced service providers.

Blog Milestone & Motivational Quote

This is truly a special week as it marks my 4th anniversary of blogging and my 250th post! Thanks to all my blog readers and fellow bloggers for your continued support and inspiration.

It’s time to refresh this blog’s looks, and I’m excited to announce my blog redesign is in the works and should be ready soon.

To honor the start of my 5th year blogging about internal marketing & communications, I chose to quote Frances Hesselbein about the underlying elements of an engaged workplace.

“Our behavior as well as our words build a climate of trust, a climate of respect, and a climate where mission, values, and equal access permeate the organization.

That is how we build the healthy, inclusive, and embracing relationships that unleash the human spirit. We can dismiss this as soft management and soft talk, but I challenge us to measure the performance of a team whose work is underscored by trust, civility, and good manners against a team where mistrust, disrespect, and lack of consideration are the rule of the day. No contest. Spirit, motivation, respect, and appreciation win every time. Dispirited, unmotivated, unappreciated workers cannot compete in a highly competitive world.”

This excerpt is from her 1992 book Hesselbein on Leadership, and her message is as relevant as ever.

What I Hope to Accomplish This Year

New Year’s resolutions, best intentions, and assorted goals for 2009 – here’s a sample of what’s on my list for this year.

Professional

• Update the look of my blog – watch for this sometime in February with the help of Karin Choi, Choice Designs, and Yvonne DiVita & Tom Collins, my publisher & friends at Windsor Media Enterprises..
• Write an e-book or series of special reports that provide additional tools and ideas on how to engage employees with internal marketing. This publication (whatever form it ultimately takes) will continue to build on the foundation, strategy, and tools provided in my book Taking Care of the People Who Matter Most: A Guide to Employee-Customer Care.
• Determine if I’m going to be a “late adopter” of the Twitter phenomenon. Lots of colleagues are encouraging me to tweet, but I’m still not sure whether it’s right for me or not. (Pardon me, but my technophobia is showing.)

Personal

• Keep up with my walking for both physical & mental health. (No treadmill for me, I prefer walking outside in the fresh air where I can also get my vitamin D naturally.)
• I also want to get back to yoga and/or learn meditation. (I attended an intro yoga class a number of years ago and loved it; I just need to find a local class that I can fit it into my schedule.)
• Get serious about executive downsizing – that's solopreneur-speak for wanting to lose weight. (I prefer to think of myself as "upscale" rather than overweight.)

What are you planning to do in this New Year? Equally important, how good are you at keeping to your resolutions? (Hint, hint: suggestions are welcome!)

A Special Anniversary Calls for Thanksgiving & A Special Offer

This year I’m celebrating my company’s 20th anniversary. It was 20 years ago this month that I officially registered Quality Service Marketing as a business and, thanks to my many clients and colleagues, it’s been an incredible experience.

Perhaps this longevity is the reason I’m not panicking over the current economy, even though my business has been affected this year. I’ve made it through difficult economic times before.

Reflecting over the past 20 years, what has changed the most? Two things stand out:

1. Technology and its impact on the workplace – in extending my communications reach (e.g., blogging) … in providing faster, more expedient ways to communicate with clients and colleagues … and in providing instant access to an overwhelming amount of information. I can remember working off a large, non-portable desktop computer with a bulky monitor and dot matrix printer. Technology has made a major impact on how we all work these days, not to mention how much!
2. I’ve also changed – I’m older, wiser (not to mention a little wider), and more confident in my abilities and value as a trusted business advisor. In addition, I’m delighted to have added “published author” to my credentials.*

What hasn’t changed since I’ve been in business?

1. The need to take care of employees and customers. Given a global economy with more competition and more choice, it’s harder than ever to attract and retain customers and effectively engage employees in the process. A “high tech-high touch” approach is still relevant.
2. My respect for and relationships with my clients, past and present. It’s a mutually beneficial relationship where we learn from each other. I feel privileged to have worked with so many wonderful people, many of whom I’m still in touch with regardless of whether we worked together for many years or on a once-and-done project basis.

What I’m thankful for

In honor of my business milestone and in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I’m thankful for many things:

• My clients – for the opportunity to serve them + grow both professionally and personally in the process. 
• My colleagues – for their peer mentoring, advice, and sharing of ideas. 
• My blog readers and fellow blogging buddies – for their continued interest in internal marketing & communications and inspiring new posts. 
• And my family – for their continued love and support.

Best wishes for a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday!

*In honor of this 20th anniversary, and in time for the holiday season, I’m happy to offer a special 20% discount off the purchase of my book, Taking Care of the People Who Matter Most: A Guide to Employee-Customer Care, from now through Dec. 31, 2008, when you order online from WME Books. Be sure to enter special discount code QSM109 in the coupon code box.