A passion for Customer Service

A passion for customer service earns Astro another TGI Friday’s award

I planned on publishing a blog about customer service entitled ‘What Disneyland Can Teach IT Teams’. However, earlier this year my daughter Sarah was awarded with a TGI Friday’s Passion Pin and a meal voucher in recognition of her passion for providing excellent customer service. So, I thought Disneyland can wait as it would be more apt to lead with this as the start of a series of blogs on customer service, which is also a passion of mine and everyone else in Astro.

TGI Friday’s do not hand out their pins without good reason. They have to be earned. TGI Friday’s have many pins, each with a different meaning and they are awarded to their staff and business partners in recognition for their excellence, value to the business, passion and more. Next time you are in TGI Friday’s you will almost certainly see members of the TGI Friday’s team proudly wearing their pins. The words accompanying TGI Friday’s Passion Pin state:

“There is a real energy and passion in everything we do and everything Fridays stands for. Our culture has always been one of uncompromised service and that’s still the key thing about us that makes such a big difference. It’s our people that really set us apart. Everyone plays an important role in delivering that very special Fridays feeling and the wow factor for our guests.”

As our Service Desk Customer Advisor, Sarah is a key member of our Service Desk team. She is often the first point of contact for our customers when they have a service affecting issue, or require any adds, moves or changes. In addition to her role on our Service Desk, Sarah is also an active member of our out-of-hours ‘on call’ team. Even when she is not on call she is always available to support our engineering team to enable them to support our customers effectively and efficiently.

When Sarah joined us a couple of years ago it was a total change of career for her. Her passion for customer service won the day over her passion for teaching and she made the change from a career in teaching to a career in customer service. Within a month or two we were getting amazing feedback from our customers about Sarah’s customer service and in particular her passion when dealing with our customers. As a result, we know Sarah’s Passion Pin award was earned and is very well deserved.

“They want to be part of the team. In fact, it is more appropriate to say they want to be part of the family.”

We all know when we have received great customer service. Karen Forrester, TGI Friday’s MD, has said on many occasions’ “When we experience great customer service we ‘feel’ it”. For me that sums up great customer service perfectly. You don’t have to wait for something to go wrong. You feel great customer service from the moment you cross the threshold and it is maintained until you leave, creating a lasting memory.

To feel great customer service, it must be ingrained in the organisation from top to bottom. When viewed from this perspective, our staff are customers of the management team. If our staff are treated well and empowered they will in turn treat their customers well. And that is when you start to feel it. Team members going the extra mile. Not because of fear but because they want to deliver a great customer experience. They want to be part of the team. In fact, it is more appropriate to say they want to be part of the family. They treat the organisation they work for as their own and they are individual enterprises in their own right, each representing the brand and each driven to deliver excellent customer service.

“I consider it a great honour for our team members to be recognised by an organisation that takes customer service so seriously.”

Sarah’s award was not the first TGI Friday’s award bestowed on a member of our team. TGI Friday’s has been a customer of ours for several years now. Over the past two years our Head of Network Services and our Operations Manager have both won TGI Friday’s awards for their excellent customer service. It is a great honour for our team members to be recognised by an organisation that takes customer service so seriously. Excellent customer service is ingrained in the TGI Friday’s family from the top down and it is very evident whenever you step into a TGI Friday’s restaurant or attend a TGI Friday’s event.

A couple of years ago Mr Hodges (our MD) and I dropped in to TGI Friday’s in Bluewater for a meal. It was 8pm on a Monday evening in the school holidays and it was busy. We were told the earliest available table would be 9pm. We had Mr Hodges son and daughter and my daughter Sarah and my grandsons with us. My grandsons were 6 and 4 at the time and we thought this might be a little late for them. However, we decided the wait would be worth it.

When we arrived back at 9pm we were taken to our table. One of the waiters immediately started to entertain the children. Within a few minutes they had pirate hats and swords made out of balloons and it was carnage around our table. While we were waiting for our food the waiter came back several times to entertain the kids to make sure they were not getting bored and to mop up the drinks that were going over in the sword fights. He even came back to restore the light fitting when that got knocked for six. We left the restaurant at 11pm and all of us had such a good time. It is a meal that I will never forget, not because of the food (that was good too) but because of the memories. Memories created through great customer service.

“Well done Sarah and thank you TGI Friday’s!”

Sarah’s passion for customer service has been rewarded by great customer service creating more memories. Sarah put her voucher to excellent use when she took her sons (now 8 and 6) for a meal in the new Covent Garden TGI Friday’s after going to the theatre. When I collected Sarah and the boys – with balloons in hand – from the station, it was obvious that they all loved the theatre, and their visit to TGI Friday’s. While the boys were telling me all about their trip to London I was listening excitedly to the last England game in the Six Nations but the boys’ excitement outdid mine. And that is saying something, as I had just heard England had won the Grand Slam. A very happy day on many fronts.

Anyone that meets Sarah realises very soon that she is passionate about customer service. It is fantastic that she has been recognised for her passion in this area. Well done Sarah and thank you TGI Friday’s! And yes, I am (and I make no apologies for being so) a very proud Dad!