'...where the F have you been?'It’s been two months since my last blog posting. I know I’ve broken at least half of the blogging ten commandments. Chuck Hemann has let me know, personally, how disappointed in me he is.
In fact, it’s been so long, just look at what’s happened in that time:
-The Gulf wasn’t a ‘giant ball of oil’
-The Cavaliers were favorites to win it all
-Jan launched a blog – Jan Exposed! - and has out-blogged me 4-1 at the time of this posting (read it - it's REALLY good!)
Trust me. I’ve made good use of my time. And while the result won’t directly impact many of you, it is something I feel is very important.
Over the last two months I’ve taken a hard look at one of the most sacred attributes AKHIA offers – our service model. I’m happy to report it’s running as smoothly as ever, but isn’t that when you should look at something? When nothing’s wrong?
I didn’t have a Jerry Maguire moment – filling all of my co-workers inboxes with a mission statement – but I did settle on one quote from that movie. It comes from Jerry’s mentor, Dicky Fox:
‘The key to this business is personal relationships.’
There it is. Pretty simple. But pretty complex. At the end of the day this could be the only thing we have keeping us warm at night. It could be the only thing keeping gas in your car. Food on your table. Do you protect them every chance you get? Is your gratitude – your personal appreciation for every single one of them – written all over your face? Because if it’s not – and you disagree with Dicky – then get out of the business.
At AKHIA we are committed to service, yes. But greater than that, we are committed to the relationships that provide the roadmap to service. There is no one recipe to service. How we bring value fortunately differs with every client – I say fortunately because I don’t think our clients would like us very much if they thought we recycled ‘old’ service plans. We start with the relationship first, and build everything else from there. I always say agency business is like cooking – not baking. Baking you have to follow a recipe to the T, and I'll leave that to Amanda Vasil; but in cooking you can sprinkle a little of this with a lot of that. And then make it completely different the next time around – and still have it come out perfect.
So, yes, I feel terrible I’ve been gone so long. But I feel great about the time I took to look at what inspires me to go to work – heck, what allows me to have this forum. All without having to write a mission statement.
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6/21/2010 11:08:08 PM
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