Chris Zane is founder and CEO of Zane's Cycles which has achieved an average annual growth rate of 23% annual since 1980 when it opened.
How?
"Zane credits his success to giving 'extraordinary customer service with the help of an empowered team of employees...The whole thing is about having a good time. Being positive. People have to be happy at work.' "
His book, Reinventing the Wheel: The Science of Creating Lifetime Customers, shares his story, his journey, to reinventing the wheel for his business and along the way creating lifetime customers over 3 or 4 recessions, three wars, 7 presidential elections....and achieved that stunning growth rate selling bicycles.
We talked about that and more during our recent conversation. You can listen here. You can read more transcripts here.
Chris is a leader in so many ways on so many levels. I asked him:
You're a leader. Leaders are readers. Jim Rohn says that; I just quote him. On your website, you have a page where you have a recommended reading list. One of them caught my eye. The Offshore Nation. How do you offshore or outsource your customer experiences? Where do you draw the line in that dynamic?
And he answered:
I certainly believe that readers are leaders. One of the reasons I promote this book on my website is because we all need to know what is out there and what’s changing.
There are a lot of books out there that are talking about looking at the global economy. When you look at the US economy as whole, we’re not in the manufacturing business, we’re in the service business. IBM is spending time promoting that you’re going to get an academic degree in service management or service science like you can get a degree in service science.
People need to read books on potentially what’s happening out in the marketplace, or the world, that will challenge our existence to be successful.
And The Offshore Nation is a great book to know what is potentially coming down the line.
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Leaders are readers. Read what they are reading. Learn what they are learning. And then you can catch up with them. Then you can start to lead from that starting point.
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