It's My Pleasure

Articles from Boomer Magazine in Richmond, VA

It's My Pleasure

Written by Lori Ross

Tuesday, 13 July 2010 10:30

Have you noticed that “It's My Pleasure” is the new mandated customer service slogan?

About a year ago I attended a training event where the speaker told the group how to achieve better customer service. He cited his love affair with Chick-Fil-A for having their order takers say “It's my pleasure,” to every customer in the drive-thru line. I don't frequent Chick-Fil-A all that often and took note.

I've noticed recently that’s the slogan du jour instead of “Have a nice day.” Everywhere I go these days people say without enthusiasm that it’s their pleasure to sell me a taco or a burger or yes, a "chick filet." Today I found it humorous to be in line inside the Taco Bell and look over at the wall at the drive-thru window and saw in huge print the flyer looking for 100% participation with THANK YOU and IT’S MY PLEASURE written huge and bold.

When customer service becomes mandated in such a false way it has the opposite effect. We can play the game in the world we live in that we don’t know that robots are being robots, but we know it. All this makes “corporate” look stupid that they don’t believe that the people they hire in the window aren’t capable of an honest and simple interchange with the customers without being told to say the most trite sayings. I like it when I have a real conversation with somebody that feels like an honest connection between the two of us. By mandating the canned ham lines corporate has taken away our chance for that to happen.

Who are these customer service experts and how dumb do they think their employees are? And how dumb to they think their customers are?

Maybe I was dumb enough to think that “Have a nice day,” was a nice way to say good bye, but I’m not dumb enough to think that my $4.27 purchase caused them all that much pleasure.