Spector Robert - The Nordstrom way to customer service excellence the handbook for becoming the Nordstrom of your industry

Contents

Copyright 2012 by Robert Spector and Patrick McCarthy. All rights reserved.

Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

Phase IIIApplications: How to Become the Nordstrom of Your Industry Copyright Robert Spector Consulting. All rights reserved.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data:

Spector, Robert, 1947

The Nordstrom way to customer service excellence : the handbook for becoming the Nordstrom of your industry / Robert Spector, Patrick McCarthy. 2nd ed.

p. cm.

Includes index.

ISBN 978-1-118-07667-5 (pbk); ISBN 978-1-118-22266-9 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-23653-6 (ebk); ISBN 978-1-118-24309-1 (ebk)

1. Customer servicesUnited StatesHandbooks, manuals, etc. 2. Nordstrom (Firm)Management. 3. Department storesUnited StatesManagement. I. McCarthy, Patrick D. II. Title.

HF5415.5.S626785 2012

658.8'12dc23

2011039735

In loving memory of my parents,

Fred and Florence Spector,

who taught me The Spector Way:

Work hard, be good, do well.

R. S.

In memory of Ray Black,

who first showed me The Nordstrom Way

P. McC.

Introduction

This is not a book about selling shoes or clothes or cosmetics or jewelry.

This is a book about creating a corporate culture that encourages, motivates, and compensates your employees to consistently deliver a superior customer service experience for your customers.

Customer service is like the weather. Everybody talks about it but nobody (well, almost nobody) does anything about it.

And yet each one of us is an expert on customer service. At one point or another during the course of our day, we are all customers. We know good service when we see it, and we know bad service when we see it. You dont have to read a book to have it explained to you.

Picture a metaphorical customer service counter. On one side of the customer service counter is you, the customer. You know exactly what your expectations are: a good product or service at a fair price. If theres a problem, you want it taken care of as quickly, seamlessly, and painlessly as possible. Simple stuff. We all know this.

So, then, why is good customer service so rare?

Because a funny thing happens to people when they are on the other side of the customer service counter or the front desk or the reception area or on the the other end of the telephone or Internetwhen they are in the position of having to give service as opposed to receiving service. Most often, their only concerns are the rules, the process, the manual, the bureaucracy, the way its always been done. It is as if they hit the delete button on their customer service memory. They forget about the Golden Rule, about empathy, about the customer.

Youve heard all the excuses: Sorry, thats against our policy. Sorry, we have a rule against that. Sorry, my managers off today. Can I get an answer to you next week?

We customers dont ask for much. We want to be taken care of. We want to do business with a company thats going to make our life easier. Most companies, large and small, are based on a business model that is set up to make life easier for the company, not for the customer. Thats where Nordstrom comes in. Nordstrom people will do whatever it takes (within reason, of course) to take care of the customer.

We dont determine what good service is; the customer does, wrote Blake, Peter, and Erik Nordstrom in the employee newsletter, Loop . When you hear the many amazing customer service stories taking place on our selling floor, the one thing they share in common is a spirit of doing whats right for the customer. From the sales floor to support, no matter where we work, our challenge is to constantly put the customer at the center of everything we do. If something is important to the customer, find a way to deliver. If its not, we need to question if its worth our time and focus.

Nordstrom urges new employees to be kind. Nordstrom management still believes that the Golden Rule has merit. Management empowers its employees to treat others as they would want to be treated. Nordstrom believes that great service begins with showing courtesy to everyonecustomers, employees, and vendors.

Becoming the Nordstrom of Your Industry

When The Nordstrom Way was first published in 1995, it struck a chord with many companies in a variety of industries. Several hundred thousand copies and six iterations later, it continues to serve as an inspiration for many different types of businesses.

Although more than 110 years old, Nordstrom continues to be the standard against which other companies and organizations privately (and often publicly) measure themselves.

Nordstrom has long been a popular subject for study among authors of customer service books and educators at business graduate schools such as Harvard and Wharton. Roll Call , the newspaper of Capitol Hill, once advised press aides for U.S. congressmen to use the Nordstrom approach when trying to sell producers of political talk shows on the benefits of booking their bosses. The New York Times Magazine once quoted a minister in Bel Air, California, who told his congregation in a Sunday sermon that Nordstrom carries out the call of the gospel in ways more consistent and caring than we sometimes do in the church.