Seth Godin has a take from the Gel conference (also posted on Ted.com) about things that he sees as broken. Systems or regulations that are in place that don't work and no one seems to be making an effort to fix them. I have something for Seth's list: Best Buy.
My laptop broke and I needed the information backed up by Geek Squad (note to everyone: get an external hard drive and back up your data NOW!). I take it to the store and they are able to do it that day. I go in the next afternoon to pick it up (Monday at 3pm), I am the 2nd person in line and I wait nearly 20 minutes for the 1 Geek Squad member to help me.
That's not the broken part. If you have never been in Best Buy, Geek Squad is the computer repair guys and they are at the same very large area as customer service. At customer service are 3 employees who are doing NOTHING except chatting with each other. They all made eye contact with me at some point, but never bothered to come over and see if they could help me. I very clearly was not carrying a computer in my hand so I wasn't look for them to fix a technical issue. But never once did they make any effort to come around and help me. The store manager even walked by and never glanced in my direction.
Basically what I saw was a "It's not my job" situation. Customer service felt it was the Geek Squad's job to handle people in that line, not theirs. If Geek Squad is backed up, it is Geek Squad's job to get the line down.
BROKEN!
And I am disappointed in a company like Best Buy to train their employees like that. It is everyone's job to make the customer happy regardless of what department he is in. Going above and beyond every day should be your normal job duties.
My laptop broke and I needed the information backed up by Geek Squad (note to everyone: get an external hard drive and back up your data NOW!). I take it to the store and they are able to do it that day. I go in the next afternoon to pick it up (Monday at 3pm), I am the 2nd person in line and I wait nearly 20 minutes for the 1 Geek Squad member to help me.
That's not the broken part. If you have never been in Best Buy, Geek Squad is the computer repair guys and they are at the same very large area as customer service. At customer service are 3 employees who are doing NOTHING except chatting with each other. They all made eye contact with me at some point, but never bothered to come over and see if they could help me. I very clearly was not carrying a computer in my hand so I wasn't look for them to fix a technical issue. But never once did they make any effort to come around and help me. The store manager even walked by and never glanced in my direction.
Basically what I saw was a "It's not my job" situation. Customer service felt it was the Geek Squad's job to handle people in that line, not theirs. If Geek Squad is backed up, it is Geek Squad's job to get the line down.
BROKEN!
And I am disappointed in a company like Best Buy to train their employees like that. It is everyone's job to make the customer happy regardless of what department he is in. Going above and beyond every day should be your normal job duties.
This is a systemwide issue with Best Buy. Probably why the losing money and closing stores. Won't be long until they go the way of Circuit City.
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