Hey! Thanks for stopping by today. I’m talking about a recent experience and how it changed my perspective. I hope you’ll leave a comment to chime in!
~ S
So the other day DH and I ventured out to a new Starbucks. Everyone else in town had the same idea so the drive thru line was around the block. DH, sweetie that he is, says “I’ll just go in” so he hops out of the car and leaves me to catchup on some writing. (Yes, I write on my phone. Writers, I use Evernote.)
He’s gone forever.
Seriously, it was more like fifteen minutes, which to my croissant deprived stomach equals for.ev.er.
When he finally comes back, my croissant is cold. Cold I tell you. They actually toast them up for you so I’m confused as to why it’s barely luke warm. He explains that they toasted the croissant immediately but it took them another ten minutes to get to my green tea lemonade. So I have an icy fresh drink and a cool croissant. Not a good impression. But hey, it’s a new Starbucks. We’ll cut ’em some slack.
And I did. Five more times. And they never got a Perfect 10 from me.
- One day they gave me a Grande instead of a Venti.
- Another day they handed me an ice cold croissant. Then immediately asked for it back (after I’d already pulled it out of the bag to see that yes, it was fresh out of the freezer and therefore had gotten my hands all over it.) They handed me a toasty one, which was nice, but still…
- There was the day they forgot to put lemonade in my Green Tea lemonade.
- One day they didn’t give me any napkins.
- Another day they didn’t sweeten my drink like I’d asked.
At that point I was pretty much done with the new Starbucks. I mean, it’d been four weeks and their service wasn’t gelling. But I’m a firm believer in that you can’t fix what you don’t know is broken, so I intend to write to Starbucks to let them know that they’ve got issues.
This whole situation (and yes, I’m now hungry for a croissant!) made me wonder where I’m lacking. Do I not reply to email quickly enough? Do I not put out books fast enough? A dear reader wrote to me the other day to remind me that I really should update my coming soon page so that readers can stay up to date.
I’m not sure anyone likes to hear that they’re failing, but if we don’t, we can’t improve.
Consistency is a big issue for me. I suck at it. Yeah, I’m putting that out there. I’ve never been one for schedules and routines no matter how much I try to convince myself that I am.
But I do think consistency is a key to a happy life and a successful business. Who was it that said the devil is in the details? They were right. It’s remembering to offer napkins every.single.time. Chick-Fil-A is really good at this whole consistency thing. Pollo Loco, not so much. In fact, they were so inconsistent that they went out of business even though their food was good.
Little things, but important because little things add up.
Now Over to You…
Where do you fail? And for that matter, where do I fail? Let me know. It’s important to me to always be improving. Please leave me a comment. I love hearing from you!
