Sunday, April 24, 2011

The Black Magic of Kiducation

Photo taken in Waterford, CT
There are no words.

Saturday, April 23, 2011

Time Warner Cable: A case on how not to model a company's culture

Over a twelve year period, I moved about ten times, providing me the opportunity to deal with a number of cable/satellite companies, predominantly Time Warner, Comcast, DirecTV, and Cox. They're all bad. But TWC is the worst. Actually, the experience mentioned below was the original inspiration for this blog.


When I moved to my current location of Durham, NC, I signed up for a special promotion of $30 per month for digital cable. The price was to include an HDTV digital cable box, a remote, the basic cable channels, and one outlet. (Time Warner Cable, unlike all other cable companies I've dealt with, actually charges more per outlet.) I prepaid the first month and scheduled the installation.

It took a few weeks to have the service set up, and when I received my first bill, I was charged $60 - $45 for monthly service and $15 for a past due balance. I obviously inquired about this, and I was told that they were no longer running the $30/month promotion. I informed them that there must be a mistake, since I had signed up with the $30/month promotion, which could even be proven by my prepayment of $30. The customer service agent (who was pretty kind, relatively speaking) said there was nothing she could do, blaming it mainly on the computer. After I told her that I wouldn't continue the service if they wouldn't honor the original rate, she told me, in exact words: "Sir, I would do the same thing if I were in your shoes. Unfortunately, there's nothing I can do."

Of course my threat was empty, and I continued to pay the extra $15 per month to get my cable service. After one year, my price shot up to $80 per month for basic cable! I called and asked if I could get a better rate, and they offered me $75 - a $5 discount! Figuring that I could probably negotiate a better deal if I tried to cancel my service, I asked to be transferred to the cancellation department. The agent said that he could actually cancel my service himself, and before I could say, "is that what you really want to do?", my service was cancelled. And that was the end of that.

No worries, though. For a one time payment of $45, I bought this beautiful antenna:

Not your grandparent's old fashioned "rabbit ears."

I get all the stations I watch most in High Definition and for FREE. The only thing I miss out on is ESPN, but thankfully I have ESPN 3 through my DSL internet service.

Bottom line: Time Warner's complete inability to empower their employees and its company culture of not putting the customer first lost them yet another customer. You can't make this stuff up!

Sunday, April 10, 2011

Cell phones replacing airlines in the hospitality industry

Traditionally, hotels, airlines, and rental car companies have been considered the heavyweights of the hospitality industry since they compete solely on their level of customer service.  The argument is that there is limited ways to differentiate a Hyatt and Marriott hotel room, and margins are pretty much fixed.  Therefore, a company would gain its competitive edge through hospitality, or exceptional customer service.

Airlines once were considered part of the hospitality industry, but, today, no one would argue that they set
any standard for exceptional customer service.  In theory airlines should not have much to compete on: again, margins are fairly fixed, and success is binary (i.e., the plane either lands safely or crashes).  Unfortunately, heavy federal and state government regulation effectively cause an oligopoly in the industry.  The end result is that consumers are usually left with only one option at a reasonable fare.

Interestingly, cell phone carriers (e.g., Verizon, AT&T) appear to be replacing airlines' component in the hospitality industry.  If not already, eventually the service coverage of all carriers will converge, and they will have nothing to compete on other than hospitality.  This already seems to be the case, at least between Sprint and Verizon, who have begun empowering their employees to satisfy customers at all costs.


Friday, April 8, 2011

USA Jobs

Would you invest in a company that lost $2 trillion last year and has a negative net worth of $44 trillion? The “company” is of course the U.S. government, and this was the headline story of a recent issue of Bloomberg Businessweek. Now, I have a lot of correct opinions about politics, the economy, and government in general, but that is neither the point of this article nor the theme of this blog. Rather, let’s look at www.USAJobs.gov, the U.S. government’s primary source for hiring. If any corporation approached hiring in the same manner as USAJobs.gov, they would be out of business within months.


Those who have applied for government jobs are probably already familiar with the frustrations of the application process. Those who are not familiar can just click on any random job posting; you can begin to imagine the frustration by just glancing over the job description (if that’s even what you want to call it.)

Let me bring to your attention 3 complete absurdities about USAJobs.gov:

1) They apparently don't edit or review their work

Throughout the website, including on the “Advanced Search” page, there is an “Applicant Eligibility” question. Ignore for the moment the fact that the jargon it uses is meaningless to the average person (e.g., interchange agreement, competitive service by statute, non-competitive appointment, etc.). It’s basically a Yes or No question which asks you if you meet certain requirements, and it is actually very important and applicable to many government jobs. Yet some lazy bureaucrat has formatted the bulleted list wrong!

Screen shot taken in February 2011

The final 2 bullets (about veterans’ preference and appointment eligibility) are independent from Federal civilian employees with non-temporary appointments.  In other words, it should read like this:

Are you:
  • A current or former Federal civilian employee who holds or held a non-temporary appointment
    • in the competitive service in the Executive Branch or in a position not in the Executive branch specifically included in the competitive service by statute, or
    • in an expected service position covered by an interchange agreement, or
    • eligible for reinstatement?
  • A veteran eligible for veterans' preference or separated from the armed forces under honorable conditions after 3 years or more of continuous military service?
  • A person with non-competitive appointment eligibility?


In fact, if you don’t believe me, just look at the help menu.  It’s formatted correctly there.  You can also simply read it like a sentence and see that it does not make sense.  For example, it would read like this:

“Are you a current of former Federal civilian employee who holds or held a non-temporary appointment a person with non-competitive appointment eligibility?”

Why is this important?  Because the website which represents tens of thousands of government jobs can’t even figure out how to properly ask questions!

Being the good citizen I am, I promptly informed customer service of this several weeks ago (in February 2011).  All I received in return was someone explaining to me what the technical jargon means.  (Just for reference, I am one of the few who probably know what the jargon means.)  After exchanging a few more emails, I was eventually told: "Your comments and/or suggestions will be considered as we make improvements to the website" and that my request would be handled by the appropriate authority.

At least the website design is nice!


2) Your application may not even be reviewed by a qualified hiring manager

So let’s say you get past the difficulties of figuring out what a job description means and are miraculously able to submit an application.  Have you considered who actually looks at the resumes and applications?

A friend of mine works for a well-known government contractor, and he is currently assigned to a high-profile agency.  That agency had an online job posting.  Apparently the hiring manager at the agency didn’t feel it necessary to find the right fit.  Instead, he or she asked my friend (who’s been out of college for less than a year) to pick the new hire.  So there was this contractor, several levels removed from the actual agency, making a hiring decision.

3) The turnaround time is an embarrassment

Sometimes when you apply for a job you hear the bad news right away or within a few months.  Sometimes you may not hear any bad news at all, and so assume no news is bad news.  However, my wife recently received bad news about a position she applied for at the Justice Department … SIX years after submitting the application.

You can’t make this stuff up!