Sybil Stershic is the author of the excellent book Taking Care of the People Who Matter Most: A Guide to Employee-Customer Care.
Sybil is President of Quality Service Marketing, a marketing & organizational advisor with more than 30 years experience helping service providers strengthen relationships with customers and employees. She’s a leading authority on engaging employees through internal marketing, helping build Human Resources connect with Marketing for bottom-line success. She is a frequent conference and business speaker on how managers can maintain a 'high touch' approach in today's 'high tech' workplace.
She was a guest earlier this year on my radio show. You can listen to our conversation here.
Employee engagement, or its lack, is a national problem. And employee engagement, or its lack, has been a national problem for a long time. So, it made sense then to ask Sybil, a solutions-provider for companies seeking solutions to increase employee engagement, this question:
We’ve reached the point in the show called Imagination Moment. Let’s imagine for a moment waiting for you right now is an email from President Obama, sent from his Blackberry. Personal. And he says:
Sybil, he gets all personal because he’s the president and he can, Sybil, our economy reflects our failure to take care of the people that matter the most. I want you to come to the Oval Office and present your three ideas to reverse this trend, nationally.
What would you say to him in that meeting?
And Sybil answered:
Before I respond, I gotta tell you for all the interviews I’ve done I’ve never had a question like this. Wow. How do you put it together?
“What an honor, Mr. President. I suggest that business and industry associations and academia partner with each other.
Collect examples of effective customer care and employee care. They have members and they can collect this information. Get everybody to collect these examples.
The 2nd thing this partnership can do is create awareness...among their members about the positive relationship between engagement and the bottomline.
The 3rd thing and the most important is provide education and training on how to engage their employees and customers."
The lack of management training is cut the first thing in a recession. They are not soft at all. It’s crystal clear they make a bottomline impact.
1. Gather the examples.
2. Make people aware of their importance.
3. Provide training in their skills.
See? Answers like this are what make Sybil a much sought-after solutions provider for companies who recognize two things:
1. the power of engaged employees;
2. they can raise their level of employee engagement;
3. they're willing to ask for help.
Want More from Sybil Stershic?
- Read her blog
- Follow her on Twitter
- Buy her book!
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Some may say this is inappropriate.
This is politics! And you never discuss politics at Thanksgiving Dinners, backyard barbecues and on a business radio show.
I disagree.
As long as only politicians can discuss solutions for our country then those solutions and their interested audiences will remain off-limits, political, for those who make this brand, our country, run. And only politicians, these days that's only career politicians, can discuss those ideas and spoon-feed solutions to the public.
I see our times as an all hands-on-deck opportunity and not a crisis. That opportunity is for each of us to lend our hands, our conversations, our ideas to find and share solutions. In our absence those challenges are left to ideologues, vested interests often hidden and politicians of all stripes and partisan persuasion.
We...are the only ones with valid vested interests. And now we have, with social media and the urgency of today, the opportunity to reclaim our place at this table and discuss our ideas to solve our challenges. At the very least, we can listen to a discussion until we are ready to speak up.
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