The past days and nights have been long – finishing paperwork that’s essential for my son, and continuing to deal with a data snafu from a service provider that has rippled through more areas of life than I could have imagined.
In trying to untangle that issue – a mistake made by the institution I’m dealing with – I have lost at least 40 hours of my time in the past week – not to mention lost income, lost sleep, stress that has made me sick on more than one occasion, and considerable ongoing worry.
With good reason.
Let’s just say that I’m ready to rock and roll – when it comes to some quality ranting on ineptitude.
But I won’t.
What I will say – calmly – is that even escalated issues seem to move at a snail’s pace with this large organization. The left hand has no clue what the right hand is doing, and I am reminded that there are times not only when small is beautiful – but small is superior.
The Little Woman
I am a petite woman. I like “small” in many areas of my life. I also like “big” – big dreams, big imaginations, big men. Big Man, Little Woman? What’s not to love about that? He can reach what I can’t, in the pantry or kitchen. (And it’s more fun than dragging out a step stool!)
We all know that size matters. But it’s contextual and relative. I’ve never minded being small. I am everything I need to be (always wanting to become more) – in a tiny package.
The Cozy Home
I live in a small home. I could do with more closets. But otherwise?
My surroundings are cozy, charming, and perfectly fine. I don’t need the cleaning headaches, the higher taxes, or the hassles of a large space. Personally, I think families do better when you don’t require an intercom to speak to each other.
Corporate America – Too Big?
In recent years, I’ve worked with entrepreneurs and smaller organizations. But for most of my career, I worked for large companies. The differences are notable. As for monolithic institutions that result from merger and acquisition, I understand the way they function. I understand that they aren’t nimble. But with smart procedures and processes – and an efficient structure – eventually, they get the job done.
In the past 9 days I’ve been dealing with an elephant. Only it appears to be a prehistoric variation – one that is so gargantuan (and half frozen) that communications from one part of the beast never seem to reach another. A toe twitches, an ear flicks, the tail swats at a fly – and then – nothing. I feel as though I am the fly, though technically, I’m the customer.
It’s been a nightmare, with no signs of improving anytime soon.
Friendly Service is Pointless if Nothing is Resolved
The people? Most of the them – extremely professional and doing their best. But they are so tied up in nonsensical procedures that “big” is simply blundering, and nothing has been accomplished.
Once upon a time – 20 years ago – this was a regional organization. Not tiny. Not gigantic. Those you dealt with could pick up the phone and get something done. In growing big, bigger, biggest – this absorbed and patchworked behemoth has lost its agility and – in my case – its ability to serve the customer. Put with more precision – they’ve fucked me up but good.
Big Headaches
Bigger is not always better. Sometimes, it is – without question – worse.
I’ll take small.
Small is beautiful.
© D A Wolf
I think all organizations should take the Zappos approach: Every employee is empowered to use his/her own mind and initiative to do whatever they believe is the right thing to help solve customer problems. No policies. No procedures. No hierarchies. They just hire good people and tell them to do good work. Novel, right?
As for the big man-small woman thing? GAP is 11 inches taller than I am. I wear heels a lot, but it works. And he can reach anything, which, as you say, is much easier than a step stool.
Sounds like Darwin meets Kafka… I too have often thought that huge corporations (in Hollywood and on Wall Street, both places where I have been a fly on the wall on some rather big money matters) are like teetering dinosaurs, while the independent spirit is like an emerging mammal.
Still, I’d rather you not liken dinosaurs to elephants, as elephants have enough troubles as it is—and you’re better off with Ganesha in your corner than with a T-Rex (unless you’re ready to go postal, but even then…).
The ideal of organization that we want, internal and external, is a connected rather than monolithic sort of communication structure. Just as we cannot have ten thousand best friends, huge corporations cannot seem to be both intelligent/adaptive and anti-socially competitive. And here, I sense, is where the ethic of unity meets the avarice of shareholders and stock-prices and fear and greed “win,” only to further itself, and the system it depends on, toward the extinction of irrelevance (think publishing industry that must reinvent itself now, or die).
So, BLW, I say, humanly, that I am sorry for your painful Kafkaesque week—and I send All Good Wishes for you to triumph like a Goddess version of David over the Goliath of a Philistine that passes for our current “culture.”
Namaste
My goodness, is there something going around? A bad customer service pandemic flu? Because I’ve been dealing with it the past few weeks, and I’ve heard other stories of late too. Yikes. Big is not always better? I couldn’t agree more.
Oh how I wish for smaller everything – especially taxes! And you say it well about how good customer service is indeed pointless if it doesn’t resolve anything – hence my cancellation of Comcast. Enough was enough. It’s unfortunate when you get in a situation where you are forced to deal with it.
I am right there with you. I have always preferred smaller, cozier. My house is small. I have enjoyed working for smaller companies. I however am not so small. I am thin, but I am taller than most I come across at 5’7″ and let me just say.. the bigger, taller men, really do prefer the tinier more petite women and the shorter men in my experience preferring the taller women. You win! haha
Now if only I didn’t have to ask all the cute, single, tall guys in the supermarket to help me reach something. . . anything. . . 😉
I really try not to deal with big businesses if I don’t have to especially these days when it’s likely they’re on the verge of collapse. Except with banks. My pragmatic side prefers the security of knowing I can access money quickly anytime.
All I have to add is that that? “Put with more precision – they’ve fucked me up but good.”
Cracked me up! (But, seriously, hope this mess is worked out and you can recoup some of those losses.)
These days, that’s my kind of precision. 😉
I was so hoping this situation would right itself over the past week, but it sounds like it’s getting worse! Corporate America bureaucracy just might be this nation’s demise if it doesn’t get under control…in every aspect! But, I’m afraid small town America with it’s emphasis on customer service is forever gone.