There’s an old saying “It’s Like Rearranging The Deck Chairs On The Titanic” meaning that the task being carried out is irrelevant and in the meantime other more important things are being neglected, but is that always true?
In previous blogs we have looked at the importance of setting a goal and setting a priority and dealing with that priority first. Rearranging the deckchairs never seems like a priority. However in my blog Small Things Matter we considered that small changes can bring big results.
In his book “Alchemy” Rory Sutherland talks about a cafe local to him which failed twice and when it was taken over a third time the first thing the new owners did was to change the benches outside for proper tables and chairs and put a windbreak around the area. The theory being that any cafe owner who is prepared to take the trouble of putting nice tables and chairs out every day and bring them in every evening takes care of their business and therefore is likely to take similar care of their coffee and food. It is also an extremely good advert that the place is open for business, something that is very important if you are reliant to some extent on passing trade that has to make the effort to find a parking place. The business succeeded.
Thinking outside the normal and looking at the small things can often make more of a difference than big expensive projects. People internal to the organisation like the grand gesture as it is more likely to lead to promotion or at least to get them noticed but often little things mean a lot to the customer.
That’s why rearranging the deck chairs is not always a waste of time. What small gesture would your customers appreciate? Try rearranging the odd deck chair or two today and see what happens.
If you want to look at this further we have both manufacturing and service simulations to enable everyone to be more effective then please contact us for details – Contact Form
If you want to receive our regular blogs please subscribe at Subscribe