Surveys....

So I've become a bit of a junkie for completing the surveys on the bottom of receipts.  Sure, there are surveys that offer entries into contests.  Sure, there are surveys that give you extra points on your rewards cards, but I've been completing them all.  I know, crazy right?  Just follow me for a minute....

When I worked for the studio, we were constantly monitored for our customer service skills and the happiness of the customers.  If our studio had no surveys come in, we got crap for it.  If we got bad reviews, we (obviously) got crap for it.  If we got good reviews, we got a pat on the back and a "good girl/boy" from it.  The fact is that we learned very quickly that our reviews were not considered "good" unless we got the top score on every single question.  When I became the manager, I became dead set on meeting every standard from the surveys.  Reason being?  I didn't want to cheat the survey.  I wanted to give the customer the best possible experience (a value that still sticks with me today).

Recently, I've had some very extreme visits at stores/restaurants.  Some of them are FANTASTIC experiences with great staff.  Some of them are appalling experiences with awful staff.  I guess my point is that everyone has bad days BUT you should be held accountable and/or rewarded for your customer service skills if you work that sort of a job.  In my line of work, I can't go to work and half-ass it for the day.  I'm rewarded based on the work I do and the service I provide.  It's the same for most people.  It seems, however, that a lot of people in the customer service field have developed this attitude of entitlement.  It seems that they expect the customer to appease THEM before they behave politely.

Please don't get me wrong because I don't believe that it's a majority of the workers in this field.  I do believe that people that very comfortable in their job and stop making true customer service their top priority.  You can definitely tell the stand-out workers that really give a damn and work hard and I dig that.  I make sure to reflect that on surveys.  I'm  very honest and try to be as generous as possible on these surveys.  I try to add extra text when prompted to make sure that I'm genuinely attempting to help any issues that need resolved instead of just mindlessly checking boxes.

I guess my point in all of this is that I'm making my small contribution to attempting to reflect my great or really terrible experiences in the way that the businesses request.  If I get extra points or an entry from it, so be it.  Either way, I'm doing my part to review.