Planning for the Unexpected
- Dec 30, 2016
- 3 min read
Challenges are a normal part of business so why aren’t more businesses planning for them?
It is easy for your business to shine when conditions are perfect. The real test of your business approach and your team is how you perform when there are issues/interruptions, higher volumes, or when things are slower than usual. It is inevitable that these conditions will occur, often they are seasonal, so I wonder why so many businesses continue appear unprepared.
Over the last month I have had many opportunities to experience businesses struggling to meet challenges that, quite frankly, should have or could have been anticipated.
Shops where there are not enough employees to keep the merchandise looking presentable, which makes it hard for customers to view the merchandise. The line ups are also long when staffing is inadequate, which must discourage people from buying.
Airlines that end up cancelling flights in a location with good weather, due to poor weather in another city, causing a chain reaction of problems for passengers and supporting businesses. Specifically:
Airports that are not equipped to accommodate delayed passengers with appropriate seating or dining amenities. Typically, there are not enough cleaning staff, so the entire airport experience becomes even more depressing immediately.
Airport hotels that cannot cope with room service orders because their bookings increased at the last minute due to flight interruptions.
Restaurants that have many staff with few customers can still fail to exceed expectations because the employees have not been properly trained and/or do not employ appropriate procedures or service standards.
And my personal favourite, an online retailer that could not offer gift wrapping because it was Christmas and they were “busy.” Seriously!
These kinds of experiences result in a variety of negative impacts on the businesses involved, including lost revenues and erosion of brand loyalty.
Most customers understand that your business cannot anticipate every problem but how you handle the issues when they arise is critical. So the advice for this week:
Your customers should know what to expect from your business. Are you defined by your consistent product, personal service, reliability, value, or something else? Your brand promise should be clearly understood by your customers, so they know what to expect and how to assess their experience.
Commit to communication with your customers. If there is an issue that will impact customers, let them know as soon as possible and what you’re doing to solve the problem.
Of course, before you arrive at the moment when you are addressing operational issues/challenges, you need to ensure you have a plan.
Plan for the worst. Be grateful for the best. Assess your team and performance not just in optimal conditions, but both when you are quiet and when you are busier than usual.
Conduct post mortems after significant events or peak periods, or when results are either below or above expectations. Engage your entire team in this process, making sure to include front-line employees who have the most customer contact.
Make your work scalable, by which I mean to say: plan to make the experience seem as a fun for 50 customers as 100, or look after 500 customers as effectively as 1,000.
Engage your employees in scheduling, so they are willing to be flexible and assist with the peaks and troughs of your business.
Empower employees to make decisions and remediate client issues.
Consider traffic flow at various points in your operation.
Work together with related businesses, or your neighbouring businesses, to plan for adverse events.
As we move towards the New Year, it’s a great time to pause and reflect upon our ability to succeed in unplanned but inevitable conditions. The moments of challenge are when the customers are most aware of your efforts, and you can build serious loyalty – if you handle the unexpected difficulties in a controlled and professional manner.
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