I pull up to the five-minute passenger pick-up area at the airport. I've been there many times before, and I'm used to hearing a harsh directive: "You've got to move your car now!" Not this time. A woman comes over to my car and introduces herself. Evelyn asks me whom I'm picking up. "My wife," I answer. "Where has she been?" Not what we're used to from security officials in our post-9/11 world. She leaves, and about five minutes later returns and nicely asks me to please move the car. She says that she'll look for me when I circle back through. She even asks me what my wife looks like so that she'll be able to alert her that I'm circling. When I circle back she's having a chat with my wife on how her vacation was! When I think about my experience with Lambert International Airport, it's colored much more by my interaction with Evelyn than how many runways they have. (Does the airport care about what Evelyn's done to positively further their service image? Given the fact that this interaction was a rare exception - doubtful.) The WOWEDFactor doesn't happen until it's happened. Notice, we don't call it the WOWFactor. It's past tense intentionally. It doesn't exist until a customer perceives it to have happened to him or her. A business can only say its objective is to build its value by having its customers experience the WOWEDFactor with its employees. A customer doesn't experience the WOWEDFactor with ACME Tool and Rental; she experiences it with Pete, Judy or Tom who work for ACME Tool and Rental. It's a personal experience and people have personal experiences with people - not businesses. Thus, the extent to which businesses and organizations deliver the WOWEDFactor has everything to do with their employees and their crucial interactions with customers.
Firestone
firestone@wowedamerica.com
314-863-4000
