Great leadership skills are hard to come by. If you are in a management or leadership position, be sure to let your employees know that customers really don’t care about their bad day and they certainly don’t want to hear about it. Especially when they’re reaching into their pockets to give you their money.

I called the hotel chain’s corporate headquarters and told them this story. I told them about Perceptual Reality. Here’s what I mean. Even though the cup is literally clean, it’s still very dirty. Why? Because that’s the way I and many others perceive it. Here’s another dangerous slope this high-end hotel is now slipping on. The restaurant is independently owned, leasing space from the hotel. However, in my mind and the minds of others, this is a “Hotel” issue. The “Hotel” is dirty.  The ”Hotel” doesn’t care if they serve food and drinks in dirty cups and plates.  The “Hotel” doesn’t care enough about their customers to clean their kitchenware. The “Hotel” brand is being damaged. Not the restaurant.

What would it cost to throw this cup away and replace it with a new one? A couple of bucks? What will it cost if their reputation gets tarnished and potential overnight quests, or corporate conference planners decide against this hotel and others associated with it because of dirty restaurants?  What would it cost if I blogged this story and gave you the “Hotel’s” name?  It would cost a lot more than replacing a “stained” coffee cup. 

There are a couple of lessons to be learned here.  First, know what your customers or clients are thinking.  How do they perceive you and your service?  You may perceive it one way, but I guarantee you - they are perceiving it a different way.  Use their perception as reality, not yours.  Second, if you use outside vendors or suppliers to serve your customers, keep them tightly within your brand strategy, brand integrity and service commitment.  Anything “they” do is a reflection on “YOU.” 

Perception is reality. When you’re dealing with the public, the public’s perception always wins.

The hotel headquarters is now contacting this particular location and hopefully remedying the situation.

I’m proud to receive this award. It’s gratifying to know my message and my mission to greatly improve business cultures and to transform the way people serve others is having an impact.

To learn more about my “Cult Branding” and “Innovation” programs, please contact our offices.  If you are going to compete in today’s tough economy laced with commodity products and services, you better figure out a way to differentiate - I can help!

Back to the trip. Since I was familiar with Hertz, I decided to rent with them again. I flew into Denver and took the shuttle bus to the Hertz center. When I arrived, I was sixth in line. I remained in line for over an hour, watching the people in front of me go through great pains to rent a vehicle and listening to everyone in line complain loudly about the wait and the horrible service. There were four extremely slow, casual and uncaring “customer service” representatives behind the counter. I overheard two representatives complaining about how busy it was. One of them even joked about getting out of there. “I’m done. I’m outta’ here!” is what she said. When I finally made it to the counter, I told the rep that people have literally left the line to go to another rental company. She said - “Nobody else has cars. It’s not our fault. We don’t have enough people and we’re short on cars.” I was left speechless. “It’s not our fault?” Whose fault is it? Mine? When I gave her my reservation, she told me they didn’t have that car available. I waited another twenty minutes for them to find a car for me.

This person did apologize when I left, but she did so without looking at me and making it very clear that she didn’t feel she needed to.

I have a few trips coming up where I’ll need to rent a car. I was going to renew my Club Gold membership, but not anymore.  I will most definitely make this experience part of my keynote presentations, seminars and training programs. You can bet on that!

I’m also on Facebook.  This is a great way for me to show the world my other side - including family, friends, and hobbies.  If someone wants to know the type of person I am, beyond the “Customer Experience and Emotional Branding Guru,” they can now simply check me out on Facebook.

So, stay in touch, follow me around, and ask me some questions that you’ve been dying to get answers to - relating to business of course!  I have some very exciting stuff that I will be introducing in the near future.  In fact, you’ll most likely be seeing it all over You Tube and the major networks.  It’s going to rock the business community!

More on this topic in future blogs.  In the last two weeks, I presented for one of the world’s largest software companies, a statewide health care volunteer association, an international manufacturer and a financial group.  They may all be selling different “STUFF” but they’re all trying to achieve the same thing - Sustainable Success.  Stay with me on my future blogs and I’ll show YOU how to do just that.

Until next time, thanks for reading.

Scott