by Skyler Wolf Jones

Created on: December 04, 2008   Last Updated: June 13, 2009

In order to best assist in working out customer dissatisfaction, leaders must understand what dissatisfaction looks like.

Often time dissatisfaction can be doing the minimum of what is asked and from a leader looking in from the outside it can be somewhat difficult to address because your team did nothing wrong. Let's take a look at several forms of dissatisfaction and how to get to the root of the cause to solve the problem, not band-aid it.

What if I were to walk into a training or learning event and taught straight from the book not leaving any room for modification or specification to make it more catered to your needs? It doesn't tell me I need to be personable, for all I know I just need to read this information to you and I will have done my job.

How satisfied would you be if I just kept clicking through power point slides over and over while I read off the material?

OK. So we have discovered that just doing your job isn't necessarily getting the job done. This is the most important form of customer dissatisfaction because it is the one that is rarely addressed and often overlooked because it's not a crisis or recovery problem.

Why address it? Simple math. What does 1 + 1 = Of course 2. And what does 2 + 1 = 3. And three strikes and you're out. You didn't know you were going to learn math in this article. Three times is the magical number that customers will most likely not return to your establishment if they do not receive the quality they are expecting. Sometimes it will be only two or one if they have taken time to speak or write about the concern to management and the concern is still not addressed.

As supervisors and managers it is essential to empower your teams to make good decisions on their own under the guidelines of your policies and procedures. If situations arise and are new, address them immediately as to what is OK for them to handle and what needs approval. This saves time, money, resources (which is both of those), and improves the overall satisfaction for customers.

How do you empower your team? Inform them on their capabilities. Usually team members enjoy the ability to problem solve and deliver good service. By letting them make good judgment calls and supporting their decisions you are allowing them to take control of the situations. If bad judgment is used, curb it immediately and give them an example of what should have been done instead.

Questions to ask. What could I do immediately to help my team be empowered to take care of situations? What situations have occurred in the past that I had to approve that could have been approved at the front-line level had they known?

It is crucial to empower your teams to do the right thing.

We know now what just doing your job doesn't necessarily equal the best outcome for customers. What about doing your job strictly under the policies and procedures?

How many times have you heard, "it is our policy?" Better question. How many times have you heard that and been pleased and just said, oh it's their policy, oh well? Yeah right. The policy is like a brick wall that cuts the line between problem and solution leaving customers dissatisfied.

Customers want solutions, not policies. I am not asking you to break rules or to bend what the policies enforce. Not at all. Just next time your team has the urge to speak in tongues and policy, ask them to create solutions for the customer.

Even if you absolutely cannot accommodate a customer's request, giving them options is a much softer way of saying no.

Sometimes there is nothing you can do, but exercise your creativity and come up with options first. Even though it might not be accepted right away, often times customers will look back and realize you were doing your best to help.

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