When people ask me what I do for a living I tell them I work for a technology consulting firm focused on providing service and support for small to medium businesses. It’s a fairly canned response, but it’s what we do nonetheless. Being in the service industry I understand that we are really in the “people” business and it is all about providing service that is of value to the client. No matter the solution…the end result must be a satisfied client. This being the case I must admit that I pay very close attention to the “service” I receive from others. Here is a story of GREAT service from my weekend.
I arrived home on Friday night, walked up the stairs to get ready for a rowdy night with the kids and to my surprise noticed that the temp was a balmy 95 degrees upstairs. The worst thing in a Texas summer is no air conditioner and to top things off all the bedrooms are upstairs and we had family in town staying with us. Makes for a great combination huh? I remembered that a husband of one of my wife’s friends was in the air conditioning business so we gave him a call. First great thing he said – “So I hear you’re having some problems with the A/C, sorry to hear about that…” EMPATHY, right out of the gate. He gave me a few things to try to which none of them worked. He then said he would be over about 9:00 that night to take a look. His comment: “Can’t go without air conditioning in the summer…let’s just take a look.” He showed at 9:00 and determined after an hour the unit was shot. We discussed the price of a new one and he said he would see if it could be done Saturday. Saturday morning he called and said he had a unit and would be over again about 9:00 PM to get it installed. I told him we could get by until early next week and his comment: “You can’t go without A/C in the summer; I will get it done tonight…no problem.” That night he managed to get out a little early, got it installed and we had a cool upstairs within an hour or so.
Why is this a great story about great service: The key word is EMPATHY. We could have gone a few days without A/C upstairs but Robert Miracle wanted to provide the service to get us back to a normal life. I would recommend Robert to anyone. He did great work and seemed to really care that we did not have A/C.
Being one of the leaders in a service based business, I want all my people to care and be empathetic to our clients’ issues. What may seem insignificant to us is a big deal to our clients. In most cases it is hampering their ability to work and this should bother Axxys. Our job is to provide service and equipment that allows them to work as efficiently as possible. While knowledge is a big part of resolving problems there is a personal side to dealing with people that need a resolution to issues. We strive to provide great service at Axxys, led by EMPATHY.
