In an everchanging world where public opinion is driven in part by consumer-generated media, the Customers' trust in Southwest Airlines is contingent upon our ability to deliver effective communications about a situation before, during, and after an issue goes public. Customers commit themselves to our Company when they sense that we truly care about their individual needs, and that our Employees will protect their best interests every step of the way. To this end, maintaining our Customers' loyalty depends upon whether or not our Employees are willing to uphold our Customers' high hopes and deliver more than what they expect.
Providing truly proactive Customer Service requires a careful understanding of how our business process works; a sense of ownership about our Company's success; a determination to create win/win solutions for all involved; and the intuition to provide the appropriate followup communication. This is particularly important to keep in mind if there is a highly unusual disruption of our scheduled service.
Over the years, we've never been afraid to say we're sorry. And being able to apologize proactively requires the foresight to evaluate the nature of an event. Our proactive efforts in this regard have evolved over the past eight or so years, and we realized that it had become necessary to designate a Leader to implement and uphold the Company's proactive service initiatives and to build a support structure that would consistently monitor our operations on a 24/7/365 basis.
To help the cause, I have the distinct privilege to lead a Team of four Fun-LUVing People who are dedicated to providing proactive communications. Our Mission is simple--focus on delivering consistent, helpful, and timely information to make sure our Internal and External Customers are on the same page about what's happening with our operation.
(Over the next four installments, I will outline the basics of our Company's approach to Proactive Customer Service and how my Team gets the job done.)
Comments
Good morning, Fred! Thanks for givng us a peek into your world. I know y'all work hard to make "doing the right thing" look so easy! Looking forward to the next 4 installments.
The boarding process is a joke. You may have passengers stand in line in groups of 5 however as you board you board in groups of 30 and most passengers are inconsiderate and move in line in front of the boarding numbers. If you going to make it work you will need to call groups of 5
Speaking of doing the right thing ...
When I came to Southwest more than 12 years ago, I was a contractor on the SWIFT project ... a computer system used by our Dispatchers and several other operations groups.
Anyway ... when you make the final confirmation of an operational change in SWIFT, the button you click is labeled DO THE RIGHT THING :-)
I would say that concept is pretty well ingrained around here !
B
Speaking of doing the right thing...
These blog comments seem like subliminal advertisements for a recently published book. ;)
Speaking of a recently published book...
I'm on chapter 40 and have yet to read where doing the right thing requires labeling buttons as you describe, Bob. Perhaps that will be mentioned in the new foreward that accompanies the paperback. :D
I appreciate you all's hustle in getting late checked bags to their destination. Keep up the good work!
How are you proactive when a customer writes in to say that the gate agent didn't properly police the gate area (having people line up properly in their groups of 5) during boarding?
Great article.
Your readers might want to try www.Measuredup.com a leading customer service review website where people share reviews with other users and with companies. Companies that are involved with and value customer service read Measuredup to keep up on what people are saying and to be able to improve customer service.
It is free and easy to use.
Keep up the great work. Your company is one of the best when it comes to this.
This is great! Do you know when we will see the next four installements?
Thank you
Hello Everyone!
While IÃ
Why do you not provide schedule between Tulsa & Boise?
You do for MCI & OKC and TUL is between both and TUL flighs
connects to the same flighs that OKC & MCI do at LAS & PHX..
Would be just the stroke of computer input and just might
add revenue $$ to WN.
This does not take additional aircraft, the aircraft and flights are there,
just a matter of a computer entry showing the connection.
I'm sure you can use the revenue....
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