As more of my writing energy flows toward work (82,000 words on our internal blogs this year) I find less for these posts. I have a half dozen drafts, but each resists my attempt to create better shape and quality. So rather than send half-baked ideas I’m going to pause my bi-weekly schedule of posts. Call it a summer vacation of sorts.
This week, instead of a post, I’d encourage you to read this Seth Godin post from 2015. It remains one of my absolute favorites about customer support. The core of his idea is that:
Customer service succeeds when it accomplishes what the organization sets out to accomplish.
This also means that when we do something new we have to think about how it supports our organization’s goal. Impact comes when new ideas match a company’s definition of customer support. This is as true in strategy as it is in individual support replies. No matter our role, our work is better when we connect it to what our organization sets out to accomplish.
No tactic, approach, or strategy is true for all (or even most!) teams. But that also means we can learn from organizations that take steps we would not. Instead of brushing off an inapplicable idea, learn to ask why it works for some other company. If it won’t work for your team, try to figure out why it’s successful for another.