Managing Expectations - Delivering Excellence

We have all experienced the great feeling that comes with delivering superior service. And as customers, we know immediately what constitutes good and bad service. Its like magic when things go smoothly and you get a giddy feeling when perfection reigns.  

The premise for business then, is to deliver service at some specific level of expectation. Perhaps the delivery is not always perfect or problem free, and perhaps it shouldn't be. Attaining absolute perfection means there is no room for improvement, and that quickly leads to complacency and ultimate failure. That, however, does not mean we should not strive towards delivering superior service.

Perhaps the secret is that we, as providers of organizational services, should spend more time managing expectations and ensuring that we deliver excellence to those expectations. 

A couple of weeks ago, I was told by my dog's vet that the dog needed rather urgent surgery to remove a dead tooth and subsequent treatment of an underlying abscess. The message I received was one of significant urgency; my dog needed surgery to remove the tooth and failure to seek treatment may well have serious and significant ramifications on the dog's life and health. 

Based on the message, my expectation was that the procedure would significantly improve the quality of my dog's life. Surprised was I when I picked the dog up! He did not need a tooth extraction, nor was there any sign of an abscess. What was delivered to me was a happy, tail-wagging dog with incredible clean teeth at the cost of a surgical procedure.

The message I had taken with me from the vet did, in the final analysis, not align with the expectations I had formed based on the original message. There was a failure to deliver to what I had perceived to be the correct message. Because the wrong message was delivered, incorrect expectations had to be managed after the fact. For me, the outcome will likely be searching for a new vet because I really don't like feeling that I have been taken advantage of. For the vet, failing to correctly delivering a message that correctly managed my expectations will be the loss of a customer.

As providers of services to our customers, we need to always ensure that the message is the correct one. Our customers should rightly expect us, as far as possible, to deliver to their expectations based on the message we provide them. We are in charge of the message and indeed the expectations themselves. Providing a basis for expectations means delivering excellence. Say what you mean, reiterate what you say to ensure that there are no mis-communications, and deliver to your message to the best of your ability.

Managing expectations is indeed delivering excellence. Agree?

The Complexity of Value

There is one thing most of us have in common. In some way or another, we all consume something we place a subjective measure of value on. 


We shop in stores or online, we sell something to someone, or buy some thing or service from someone else. It ought to be a relatively simple task. I want something you have, and in exchange for that something, something else changes hands. Simple! In theory that is.


Transactional exchanges, in their simplest form are based on wants and needs. The transaction has value for both the buyer and the seller, and the very act of the transaction should ideally be an exchange of mutually agreed upon value. 


The crux comes when one tries to define the value proposition and the specifically defined and/or implied variables associated with value. The further remove one gets from a simple transaction, where one can clearly define the item for sale and what one is willing to pay for it, the more complex the transaction itself becomes. This is often because subjective expectations associated with value grow exponentially in relationship to the complexity of the service being purchased.


Take the simple transaction of buying a loaf of bread in the grocery store. It is pretty straight forward in that you can see the loaf and feel the loaf. You may even know subconsciously how it is going to taste, because you have had that brand of bread before. In paying the grocer for the bread, you each receive an agreed upon value from each other.


Now let's take the same transaction, but have it take place in a bakery or bread store. You smell the bread, see the crust and imagine what is is going to taste like, and its going to be great! Again, you agree to the transaction, believing that you will get exactly the value you expect. And then, its not quite as great as you thought it would be.


The two transactions are pretty simple and straight forward, but the latter includes a whole host of additional, subjective parameters. Maybe the crust wasn't as crunchy as you expected based on what you saw in the bakery. Maybe the loaf was softer than you thought it was going to be. Maybe it tasted just like the loaf you usually buy in the grocery store. It just wasn't right somehow, and now you feel somehow let down. 


The problem with value, and our expectations of value, is that they rarely are completely in sync. Most of the time, we accept this for what it is and move on, but what if we are unable to reconcile our dissatisfaction? How do unmet value expectations impact us and our relationship with the supplier? 


The more complex a transaction, the more opportunity there is for dissatisfaction because we all measure value differently. Perhaps, somewhere along the continuum from very simple to very complex, there is an area where subjective valuation is greater than at either end? 


To the consumer, a quart of milk is a quart of milk, and a controlled nuclear reaction is a controlled nuclear reaction. But are we satisfied with how the more mundane, less spectacular, but yet important transactions in our life play out?  


Guess that depends on how complex our definition of value is.


Agree? Disagree? Let me know your thoughts on this matter!