1: In 2014, Veronica Block called Comcast. She wanted to cancel her internet service.
“She was immediately transferred to a ‘customer retention’ representative who argued with her for ten minutes about why she wanted to cut off the service,” Fred Kofman writes in The Meaning Revolution: The Power of Transcendent Leadership.
“Every time Veronica asked the representative to simply terminate the service, the rep argued with her,” Fred notes. “The representative insisted that it was all about improving Comcast’s service. ‘Tell me why you don’t want faster Internet service,’ the fast-talking representative kept saying.”
2: Exasperated, she handed the phone to her husband, Ryan, who decided to record the remainder of the call.
The eight-minute conversation that ensued was “painful, wheedling, circular, and irrational,” Fred observes.
“My job is to understand why you don’t want Comcast service,” the rep argued, his voice rising.
“I don’t understand why you can’t just cut it off,” said Ryan.
“It sounds like you don’t want to have this conversation with me,” the rep retorts. “I’m just trying to give you information.” And then: “I’m trying to help my company be better. . . That’s my job.”
“I can guarantee you right now,” Ryan replies, “you’re doing an incredibly good job of helping your company be worse.”
Ryan posted the recording on his blog. It was played millions of times. Then, it was picked up by the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times. There was even a segment on Good Morning America.
“It was definitely not the kind of publicity that Comcast was looking for,” Fred observes. “Comcast later apologized for the singular behavior of its panicked employee, but not until after the damage was done.”
3: Fred’s bigger point?
The behavior of the Comcast representative is “systemic and rational. As with most companies, Comcast’s customer retention group lives in its own silo: everyone in that group is evaluated according to a checklist of key performance indicators (or KPIs).”
Likely, the agent and his supervisor were compensated for the number of cancellations recorded on each shift.
“He had a script that he had to follow strictly or he would be reprimanded,” Fred suggests.
The representative’s goals and the organization’s goals were not aligned.
“To do the best for Comcast,” Fred observes, “the customer retention representative should have courteously terminated the customer’s service, even though that was not what his area’s performance is measured on.
“When he optimized for his subsystem (trying aggressively to retain the customer), he suboptimized the system (annoying the customer and eroding Comcast’s brand).”
The agent was doing “his job.” But the result harmed Comcast by creating a giant public relations blunder.
As leaders, one of our most important responsibilities is to see the bigger picture and not optimize for each specific area. Which is easier said than done.
More tomorrow.
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Reflection: Are there areas in my organization that are optimized for the specific function, but not the larger organization?
Action: Discuss with my team or with a colleague.
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