Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Business Storytelling: Harvey Mackay Again

I just read an article by Harvey Mackay in the Hartford Business Journal. Once again he expressed how he uses stories to make his business point. In this article he was talking about customer service, or more accurately the lack of customer service.

He told a story of a bank that was stingy and would only validate parking if you were making a deposit. The man was making a withdrawal and the teller and manager refused to validate. So the customer, instead of withdrawing $100 withdrew 1 million dollars. The next day he returned and withdrew another million dollars to deposit in the bank across the street.

Penny wise, pound foolish? Or is it just not getting to know your customers? Or maybe it is having strict rules that really don't make a lot of sense. If you want someone's business it can't be all about you (deposits), it has to be about them.

Stories stick and are powerful for teaching the correct customer service values.

2 comments:

Sue said...

Great blog! I love Harvey Mackay's columns. I used to look forward to them every Monday but the paper stopped carry them about a year ago. I never thought about it before, but all of his columns were stories! How cool.

Carol Mon said...

Harvey is still being published in our business journal so if you have a similar publication maybe you can start reading his column again.

Yes, he is my hero because his columns are always stories.