Reliability

Good Afternoon Everyone! 

Have you ever questioned why things work?  Or are you like me and just assume that when you turn the ignition in your car that it will start or that when you flip a wall switch the lights will come on or when you call the hotel lobby and request a wake up call for six that that is when your phone will ring.  Expecting the car to start, the lights to come on and the phone to ring are all examples of reliability.  Reliability is a system or an attribute of any system that consistently produces the same results, preferably meeting or exceeding its specifications or the customer's.  And what is our reaction when what we expect to happen does not... we are generally disappointed or even angry. 

So what do you think that your customers expect from you by way of reliability?  Is it to close their deal, close it on time and not make any errors?  Or is it something more?  Think about the whole concept of reliability for a minute as it applies to a car.  If you do all the things necessary to keep your car in its best running condition, your expectation of reliability goes up.  But if you never change the oil, or check the fluid level or the battery your expectation of reliability should go down, but in reality it does not.  Even in these conditions we are surprised when our car stops working and even though we might have a thought deep in the back of our minds that we could have done something to prevent the breakdown we still blame the car or the people who made the car.  Car manufacturers have done a number of things over the years to help us consumers like installing warning lights and service messages that appear while we are driving, but it is still up to us as customers to do something about it.  I mean unless a representative from the company comes out and takes our car in for servicing giving us a warning or an alert is about all they can do. 

The good thing about our business is that we have the ability to get in front of our customers and make sure that they are hearing our updates.  It is not a passive alert system.  Think of the weekly sales update as a check engine warning and think of a good news call as service update message.  The more of these communications you give to your customers the higher your reliability factor will go.  But be adaptable.  Be ready to have to improvise if things do not go according to plan.  Your customer will not care why they did not get the alert, they will only be aware that they did not get it. 

I will end with a "feel good" example of what I am talking about.  Last week, I left a message for a six am wake up call.  The next morning at six there was a loud knocking on my door.  When I asked who it was, I was told that it was the Front Desk and they were sorry to be knocking on my door but the phone system had gone down and the automatic wake up calls were not going to happen that morning.  The fact that they went the extra mile to knock on my door was impressive but what was even more impressive was the fact that they called in extra staff so that everyone in the hotel had a door knock within five minutes of their requested wake-up time.  Talk about reliability. 

Have a great week! 

Mary K. Garmo 

Mary K. Garmo Title Connect www.title-connect.com mgarmo@title-connect.com 248-763-1913