Decisive BBC & Lessons For Life
Another week and another BBC presenter getting into taste/decency/offensive water.
A couple of things strike me about this.
- how the management have handled the situation
- your ‘customers’ are not only at work
Management Handling
The decisive action taken by the management is in stark contrast to the Brand/Ross saga. A quick look at some of the online forums shows that the vast majority of opinion is that this behaviour - even though not done at work & not broadcast - is not acceptable.And quite right too.
As a result the sting has been taken out of the potentially volatile situation. On the back of Wossgate it could have been a dragging through the press that the BBC really didn’t need. I doubt that there has been time for ‘lessons to have been learnt’ internally about dealing with this kind incident. It has been the right response to the situation in a timely manner.
The fact that it was a decision not involving the corporation’s highest profile and best remunerated talent must have helped as well.
You Are Always ‘At Work’
Especially in a business where you have public profile your actions in the normal course of life will be expected to live up to our social norms.
But this is true for all of us.
Our dealings with others will influence their feelings about the organisations we represent - generally the one we work for but can include sports, non-profit etc. as well.
An uplifting encounter with someone out of work whether it is because they go out of the way for someone, take part in some good banter or use a pooper scooper will add a small mental flag in our head that predispose us to choose them or their company in the future.
This is more powerful than any marketing message
We are all in the customer service game. What we do out of work can impact what we get back in the future
A good customer/people attitude isn’t just for work but for life!
Now where’s my damn taxi
Tagged as BBC, crisis, management, presenter, sacking, service + Categorized as service
You are always at work - so true. Also true is that if you craft a brand for yourself, you must live by it.
In the company of one Ande Macpherson as we watched a sensational Neil Finn gig a good few years ago now. His on-stage persona was warm, accessible, friendly, relaxed - like you could bump into him in the street and he’d give you the time of day. At one stage in the gig, a certain section of the audience were going to be unable to see him as he played the piano - so he got a plate of biscuits handed around to them, to make up for the inconvenience.
Genius, and genuine.
So - being in the company of the well-connected-Ande-Mac, we got backstage passes and began the serious business of trying not to feel like fish out of water. Ande - much more practiced than I at such events - guided me through it perfectly, and then the opportunity presented itself to have a word to Mr. Finn and let him know how much I enjoyed the gig.
When I finally got the chance, I moved forward, reached out to shake his hand and say the things you say at such moments, and he drew his hand back and simply stared at me. The only thing genuine about that particular moment is that I felt genuinely humiliated.
Maybe he’d had enough of playing Mr. Nice Guy. Maybe I was naiive to expect anything other than a blank stare, but what I do know is that such demeanour differed hugely from the brand he had portrayed on stage.
As is my wont, I’ve told this story to any number of people, and they are all very surprised that he’s not ‘that guy’.
Whether you’re back stage, or at the staff Christmas party, your guard may be down, but you are still at work.
As for Neil Finn? As punishment to him, I refused to listen to his albums for a full 6 months.
That’ll learn him.