Delivering on the promise
Is your core value proposition actually at the core of your business?
I moved into my new home in the Blue Ridge mountains of Asheville, North Carolina last week. It feels amazing to be setting down roots in a beautiful, vibrant community after living quite nomadically over the past several years. And, I arrived just in time to catch the glorious Fall colors on display!
In the process of the move, I had an experience with a business that is suffering from the effects of the old-paradigm systems and structures.
I contracted with U-Haul to ship the contents of my storage unit in Boulder, Colorado across the country in two small containers. The process was smooth from loading to shipping, and I received text messages letting me know my containers had shipped and when they would arrive.
I arranged to have the containers delivered to my new home the morning after they arrived in Asheville. I was given a delivery window of 9:15-11:15am, and planned my move-in day accordingly, including lining up friends who had volunteered to help with the unloading.
I arrived around 10:30am and was a bit surprised that the containers were not yet there, given that I’d been told there were only a few deliveries that day and I would likely be the first. Still no containers by 11:15am, or by 1:15pm, or by 3:15pm….
I called multiple times throughout the day to inquire when my stuff would arrive. Each time, I had to go through their cumbersome phone vectoring system, be put on hold for 10-20 minutes, then speak to a person who would tell me that they needed to get me to a different division - and I’d have to repeat the process all over again.
Throughout the process, I was given a variety of phone numbers to call but nobody who could actually tell me where my containers were or when I could expect them to be delivered. A few times, I was told that they needed to put me on a brief hold to look into it, only to be sent straight back into the original vectoring queue.
Twice, I was told that a message had been sent to the delivery driver, who would soon be calling me to let me know. Late in the day, a woman in a different regional division took pity on me when I pleaded with her to not send me back into the queue. She said that a photo of the delivery had been uploaded to my order. After she described the scene in the photo, we figured out together that it was for a different customer’s containers. Sigh…
Finally, I received an automated text letting me know that my containers had been delivered around 6:15pm. Given the mix-up with the delivery photo, and the inability to connect with a human who could confirm my delivery, I couldn’t be sure until I returned the next morning to see that my containers were actually there.
All in all, this was certainly not the end of the world. Highly inconvenient and unproductive, yes. But in the grand scheme of things, I was all good. I had friends to stay with that night, and who could rearrange their plans to help me unload the next day.
I did think back, though, to the many moves during my childhood {including several cross-country moves in U-Haul vans} when a snafu like this would have presented a much greater impact ~ a day of lost wages, additional expense for another night’s stay in a hotel room and meals out, four young girls and pets to keep occupied and safe throughout the day, and so on….
For most people, a move to a new home can be a highly stressful experience. Conditioned to derive a primal sense of safety and security from having a roof over our heads and our ‘belongings’ around us, it can be very unsettling {and expensive} to suddenly not know where your things are, when they’ll arrive, and where you and your loved ones will be spending the night.
Founded in 1945, U-Haul is in the business of residential DIY moving, and is one of the oldest and most trusted brands in America. Their website boasts this trademarked slogan: “Moving made easier.”
What they are really selling - their core value proposition - is peace of mind, at an affordable price, during a time of significant transition. This is the impact they are uniquely positioned to make for their customers.
View from the Roundtable
In a whole-systems Roundtable model, this ease and peace of mind for U-Haul’s customers would be at the center of their entire business. Every strategic decision to refine or implement a new system, key initiative, team, department, or technology would begin and end with the question:
How does this make moving furniture and belongings easier, less stressful, and more affordable for our treasured customers?
In the conventional model, where profitability and growth are at the center of every decision, businesses move further and further away from their core value proposition ~ delivering less and less on the very reason they exist in the first place.
My experiences in attempting to speak to a human being at U-Haul on my move-in day gave me a glimpse into how segregated and siloed their business has become. Despite today’s technology solutions - including not only robust CRM systems but, you know, the telephone - not one person could speak to the driver, find out where my containers were, and tell me when they would be delivered.
Beyond the labyrinth of their systems, it was also clear that they had not prioritized customer service training. Not once throughout the day, from the several people with whom I spoke, did I hear anything close to “I’m so sorry you’re experiencing this. Let me figure this out for you.” In other words… “Let me give you some peace of mind and do what our entire company has promised to do: Make your move easier.”
What about profit?
In a regenerative organization, where your focus is centered on the impact you’re here to deliver, profit is seen as a by-product of a healthy ecosystem rather than its overarching goal.
When you are actually delivering on your core value proposition, profits are generated with far greater ease. Revenue increases as your customers become raving fans who trust you, sing your praises, and return for more. Expenses decrease when you no longer need to constantly throw more resources at fixing problems, resolving complaints, and bridging the widening gaps between the silos of a top-heavy, fractured organization.
Are there ways you can bring the focus of your business or initiative into greater clarity, placing your unique impact more solidly in the center of your decision-making and operational systems?
WORKSHOP REPLAY!
I delivered this presentation to a group of entrepreneurs in Asheville, North Carolina in late September 2023 ~ exploring ways we can work with the recurring patterns in nature to operate more efficiently and joyfully in regenerative roundtables.
It was so much fun, and there were several fantastic questions at the end of the 30-minute presentation.
In this workshop, I shared practical ways you can align yourself and your business with nature’s principles to:
lead an organization that is beyond sustainable;
make a truly meaningful impact; and
foster greater well-being for yourself, your organization & stakeholders, and the planet.
Now I’m happy to share the recording of the workshop with you.