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A Leisure Service Paradox:
by
Small town America comes to mind when I think of ideal customer service. People treated each other decently because it was the right thing to do. It was important to be respectful to the person who wanted to purchase your services. In a small town, if customers were treated poorly they had two choices: approach the merchant and negotiate satisfaction or stop patronizing the business and share their story with their friends. It's clear that was to a merchants advantage in fostering excellent relationships within the community. It was a way to encourage repeat sales. The nineties may be recognized by business and the public service agencies as the age of customer service. Warren Blanding, editor and publisher of Customer Service Newsletter, states that "the trend toward consumerism, the changing competitive climate and the recent recession all have forced companies to reexamine their relationships with the consumer." People are tired of foul treatment in their dealings with business, merchants and bureaucrats. They demand service, with a smile, please! For a long time, customer service was not a high priority among merchants and businesses. In leisure service agencies, it may not even have been considered. This may be because leisure is an easy sell. Before tax revolts, tax caps and the loss of nonreferendum bonding authority, it was pleasurable to sell the intrinsic and extrinsic value of leisure. People did not question the value of leisure and the role the public agency played in the provision of leisure services. The notion that public agencies should become disciples of the customer service philosophy is interesting. In parks and recreation textbooks and journals, one seldom finds the discussion of customer service and its values. In most instances, there is a great amount of attention devoted to practices commonly found in the business world such as marketing, promotion and product development. Then again, public agencies have a tendency to adopt and follow trends that the private sector establishes. The adaptation of the likes of management by objective, quality circles, strategic planning, and assessment centers are but a few trends that have been successfully implemented in copycat fashion by public sector managers. Unlike previous practices, public bodies may not be able to follow the lead of the private sector in the provision of customer service. It may be that public agencies, in an attempt to address customer service, do so without realizing that they are entrenched in a bewildering paradox. The paradox begins with the bureaucracy that we are unavoidably a part of, and ends with the inability to apply customer service within the organization. It is worthwhile to consider the improbability that public entities, as bureaucratic organizations, can successfully engage in customer service in its purest form. To clarify this, it is necessary to dissect the paradox and thus gain a greater understanding of bureaucracy and customer service. Although bureaucracies can be traced back to early Chinese societies. Max Weber is recognized as the founder of Western beliefs on the subject, and he provides an understanding of
modern-day bureaucracies. He identifies the following characteristics as those most commonly found in bureaucracies: 1) They are fixed jurisdictional areas which are ordered by rules or laws and administrative regulations. 2) They have a hierarchical structure with levels of authority that insure a firmly ordered system in which higher offices supervise lower ones. 3) Administrations are based on written documents. The body of officials are engaged in handling these documents and files. 4) They are administered by full-time officials who are thoroughly and expertly trained. 5) They are administered by rules which are stable and comprehensive. In Weber's research he found that "bureaucracy develops more perfectly the more it is dehumanized." He also said the bureaucracy is a specific organizational strategy for giving social service. It is characterized by "rationally organized action," not by "social action." One may ask how this fits in with local government and its operation. It is best to explain this by considering entry-level staff in the agency. The receptionists and registrars within an agency are arguably the most important people an agency employs. One way to illustrate this is by measuring the number of customer contacts that a registrar encounters on an annual basis. According to the 1992 budget document of the Arlington Heights Park District, registrars will handle nearly 270,000 contacts in the recreation department and 153,795 contacts in the revenue facilities department. These numbers are represented by those people who sign up for a class, "drop in" activities, rentals, club participation, lessons and league play. These numbers don't account for the class cancellations, refund requests, and questions of various kinds, from "Where is my son or daughter?" to "Why can't I have a particular issue my way?" The point is that it is impossible for these staff to provide good customer service with such volume. Weber's notion that bureaucracies are rational organizations and not social action organizations is worth noting because it would be impossible for these staff to become personally involved with the customers and still competently handle this number of people. Because of the rules, regulations, forms, documentation of use, receiving revenues, required accountability, and customer demands for efficiency, we are unavoidably "the bureaucracy." The aforementioned guidelines exist in order for the receptionist to accurately respond to the questions elected officials and leisure professionals have all heard. "Did I get the right class?" "Do I have the same opportunity to register for a program as the other person did?" and "Why do I have to pay this amount for the program?" Thus, the rules and regulations, which help supply the answers to the hundreds of questions posed daily to front-line staff, justify what public service agencies do. Receptionists would not feel comfortable answering these questions without the support of the rules. It's not likely managers would give them the freedom and flexibility to operate without the security and guidance these rules and regulations provide.
The receptionist staff aren't the only people negatively affected by rules and regulations. The bureaucratic structure affects all levels of a system. The elected official uses the system when requests are submitted for special park uses or to answer complaints from the community. How many times have people heard, "this is an issue that needs study by the board and staff"? The administrative staff use rules and regulations when the board should be included in the decision-making process. The staff might say to the consumer, "we can't take action because we don't have an enabling policy or procedure which will allow us to take the action." The supervisory level staff utilizes the rules and regulations when they need the advice of the superintendent. Thus, the rules become a system of checks and balances. While checks and balances may be necessary, they are also a cause of poor customer service. The other end of this paradox is customer service and defining what it actually means to provide customer service in the public sector. In recent years, public service agencies have been feeling that customer service, in the eyes of the consumer, means to give them whatever they want. To operate in this manner, however, could be very disruptive. It could cause practices that would establish dangerous precedents affecting the efficient operation of an organization for years to come. A couple of examples that come to mind include the business practices inherited when the Heritage Tennis Club was purchased by the Arlington Heights Park District. Because of the management practices of the previous owner, it was amazing how many "deals" had to be denied to customers because they expected the same treatment from the district as they had received previously. Free court time for top-ranked juniors, the ability of members to close the building without management in attendance at the end of the day, variable and inconsistent membership costs were just a few of these practices. Another example is a person who wanted a refund for two tennis classes. Her two sons went on vacation and missed two, one-hour classes, which she felt should be refunded. Is giving special deals at the tennis club, or refunding partial fees to parents because of their conscious choice of a holiday in the summer, providing customer service? Ron McCann, who wrote The Joy of Service, describes service as the way people used to be served in gas stations and hamburger diners, or the service we once received in the grocery from the cashier. A similar twist to this in the tennis club may mean that the customer is given a tube of new balls if one of their tennis balls should get wet in a sump pump. When the lights fail, staff are authorized to give free court time if they aren't restored in a reasonable amount of time. These practices are essential
Quality customer service in the public sector will probably never equal the system that exists in the private sector. Bureaucrats live with too many old paradigms that block the way for effective change. The systems are too large, in many cases, to allow independent action by staff who are temporary fixtures in their organization. To re-examine the hierarchical structures and to empower the receptionists and registrars will result in total disruption of our traditional views of organizational structures. In the book, Service America, Albrecht and Zemke state that "the unconscious view of managers is that front line people are the least important ones in the organization. They typically draw the lowest pay, get the least training and development and have the lowest potential for growth and advancement. Hence, the most turnover. If these people do count, it is not apparent in the reward systems in most organizations." This practice will need to change if public park and recreation decision-makers are truly committed to the notion of customer service. The question for these decision-makers is. "what am I willing to give up in order to make a total commitment to customer service, knowing that the greatest dividends may be gained with the receptionist and the registrar and not the leisure professional?" It's clear that service is not just a smile and a hello. A strong organizational customer service program can only be established with an organizational strategy. One that, if developed, may be costly to implement. It seems that the plan would encompass what Albrecht and Zemke call the "service triangle." It encompasses the service strategy, the systems, and the players. The service strategy is the comprehensive organizational approach to what service means in the organization. The systems are what the organization implements to accomplish the goals of the strategy. Systems low in friendliness tend to subordinate convenience of the public and ease of access for the customer in favor of the convenience of the people who work in the system. In contrast, a customer-friendly system, by its basic design, makes things easy for the customer. This is where the job gets difficult in a typical bureaucracy. It may be difficult to rid ourselves of the policy and procedure that encumber the staff and customers yet, paradoxically, serve as the guide. The final point on the triangle is composed of the players within the system. It begins with the right leisure people at all levels who understand and are capable of customer service. "Characteristics of this kind of person include traits such as high self-esteem. Moody, depressed or angry people won't work. These staff need to possess social and communication skills to a high degree, and be able to establish and maintain a rapport with a customer. They also need a high tolerance for contact on a daily basis. " Most importantly, customer service comes from the heart and soul. Some people have the ability and others don't and never will. One has to feel customer service as if it were a sixth sense. Frankly, too many agencies are encumbered with people who cannot commit themselves to the customer service model. They don't have the old-fashioned "people skills" to get the job done effectively. Given this, the paradox is complete. Public service agencies operate within the vacuum of a bureaucracy, and because of this, may not be able to provide customer service in the same fashion as the private sector. There may be alternatives that will benefit the agency and the user, such as: providing friendly service and consistent answers to all questions, regardless of their complexity, and instituting state-of-the-art technologies that will benefit the user through program registration, facility use, and provision of accurate agency information. Although policy and procedure are the stabilizing forces of a bureaucracy, they should be "enabling" to those who administer the rules and those affected by them. These are but a few methods that, if practiced, can improve customer service in a bureaucratic setting. While public agencies will be unable to completely empower employees to fully engage in an ideal customer service program because of preexisting circumstances that are difficult to change, perhaps an effort could be made to adopt the following pledge: "Although this organization may not be able to grant you everything you request, it will make every effort to appraise you of what you can and can't do, encourage you to understand why it is done that way, help you to leave with a smile and every intention of returning to enjoy the opportunities available, because you know they are the absolute best that money can buy. " Customer service is a valued commodity that businesses must practice in order to be successful. While public agencies can't participate in customer service as desired because of the unavoidable bureaucratic structures, the best efforts possible should be put forth to leave the customer with the same satisfaction that many remember being provided by the diner waitress, the gas station attendant and the grocery store cashier. About the Author Terry G. Schwartz is President of the Illinois Park and Recreation Association and superintendent of revenue facilities at Arlington Heights Park District.
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