Discordant notes — Steve Dennis
Earlier this week, after my youngest daughter’s college graduation, I had to fly back from Portland. Upon arriving at PDX, as an Executive Platinum member, I was able to check-in quickly and I practically glided through security. When I got to the gate I learned that I had scored a first class upgrade (#winning). Once I was on board, our assigned flight attendant turned out to be super attentive and extremely friendly. And unlike coach, not only did we get a meal, it was actually pretty decent.
After a nearly four hour flight, we landed and I headed to our designated baggage carousel-which many a road warrior will remember are unusually close to the arrival gates at DFW-to wait for my checked bag. And wait. And wait. And wait.
After about 40 minutes and zero communication from the airline several of us migrated a few hundred yards down the way to the baggage service desk. The on-duty clerk was clueless about the delay but she did get on her walkie-talkie to inquire about what was going on. That quickly revealed no useful information. I then tried tweeting to American Airlines to see if they could help. They responded rather quickly, suggesting I check with the baggage service desk at the airport. Gee, thanks. If only I had thought of that.
Anyway, finding my zen, I accepted the things I could not change and shuffled back to the gate. About ten minutes later (so about an hour after we landed) our bags finally emerged.
Now, to be clear, I am quite aware that this is very much a first world, highly privileged problem.
Nevertheless, the broader strategic points for those who are tasked with delivering a remarkable customer experience are four-fold:
- Good enough no longer is.
- More and more, our customers compare us to their last great customer experience, regardless of whether it happens to be in the same product or service category.
- A well harmonized experience is comprised of (minimally) meeting the table-stakes of a customer journey, amplifying the wows where possible and eliminating the discordant notes.
- If the discordant notes are annoying enough-and particularly if they are the very last thing the customer remembers about their journey-all the good we might have done is quickly forgotten.
Originally published at https://stevenpdennis.com on May 26, 2019.
