Quality Service Marketing
Pandemic-induced stress and other reasons have led to decreasing workforce numbers and increasing pressure on remaining employees. Demanding, rude, and uncivil behaviors by some customers – and employers – only exacerbate the situation.
Please be patient, understanding, and considerate. Thank you.
[Note: I’m happy and humbled to re-post the following written many years ago by Jason Stershic, digital marketing professional, blogger, podcast producer, host of The Palmer Files Podcast, and (best of all!) my son. Thanks, kid!]
Sybil Stershic is my mother and, for most of my conscious life, she’s been the proprietor of Quality Service Marketing. When she founded the business, I was 5, and it has had a profound impact upon both my personal and professional life.
Personally, she was around more than most, as she worked from home. I was the audience for her as she practiced her material to a room of one, and she was there to take breaks and be a mom.
As I grew up in a world of advancing technology, I became her “Chief Technology Officer,” a title I still hold today. I came to set up computers, fax machines, modems, tablets, smartphones and introduce her to the world of social media – and I now jokingly take all credit for her social media success.
Professionally, I have to give her credit for my views on internal marketing. I assume I came to most of them by osmosis, due to the fact that I was her audience in the beginning and I don’t recall having great conversations about them until well after I established my own views. I’m fortunate – for several reasons – that they coincided with hers.
Those views have allowed me to be successful. I know to treat internal marketing and communication with the same importance as external. This was completely evident as I worked in retail for a company that had a good idea of internal marketing but horrible follow through.
Almost five years ago, I set upon my own business endeavor, Spectyr Media, Ltd. I do consulting for social media and internet marketing as well as branding, graphic design and website design (this one included).
My mother is now a treasured business associate, taking the time to answer any questions a small business owner may have and being supportive of my business. When I can, I urge those of my clients who could use her services to do so.
My mother has a great marketing mind and she is also a great mom! Happy Mother’s Day, to my mom and to yours. If you’ve learned and gained as much as I have personally and professionally from your mother as I have, then consider yourself fortunate. I know that I do!
[Note: I’m delighted to feature this brilliant piece written by Izzy Gesell, who generously allowed me to share it here. A former stand-up comedian and public school teacher turned professional facilitator, coach, and speaker, Izzy creatively applies improvisation to enhance personal and organizational learning. You can learn more about this “organizational alchemist who helps individuals and organizations transform their thinking from commonplace to extraordinary” by visiting Izzy’s website.]
“Ladies, gentlemen & non-binary passengers. This is your Captain speaking. This inaugural flight of Air Pandemica is beginning its final descent into the partially renovated New Normal airport.
I know we’ve been in the air much longer than anticipated so I hope the complimentary Zoom memberships made the journey a bit easier.
Please take the remaining time to check around your seats and into your heart and make sure your risk-tolerance belt is tightened low and snug around your assumptions.
The flight crew will make one final pass through the cabin to collect all old habits, empty sanitizer bottles and the take-out food containers that have sustained you during this trip.
In your seat pocket you’ll find our complimentary in-flight magazine called “Lessons Learned.” You are welcome to take it with you. Please read it and discuss it with your children and grandchildren so they might know what to do if or when they have to take the same trip.
We’ll be landing shortly, fingers crossed. Vaccinated passengers wearing masks will depart first. Thanks again for flying Air Pandemica. We know you had NO choice in airlines but we thank you anyway. Hope never to see you again. BuhBye.”
[Thank you, Izzy Gesell!]
Q: How would you facilitate a meeting-of-the-minds between two competitive nonprofits?
A: Very carefully.
That was my challenge when I was asked to facilitate a special meeting of two organizations striving to enhance their impact in their community: one was a local affiliate of an established nonprofit and the other was a grass-roots start-up. Both groups were dedicated to helping people with cancer.
Concerned with competing for limited donor and volunteer resources, the established nonprofit felt threatened and candidly admitted they wanted the new organization to just “go away.” Fortunately, they accepted the new group’s invitation to sit down together and explore how they could co-exist to serve the community.
Focusing on what matters
I remember my feelings of trepidation as I prepared for the joint meeting – I was a facilitator, not a peace-keeper! But my fears dissolved after interviewing several volunteers from each organization. Their message was clear and consistent: “We don’t care who we work for as volunteers, we just want to eradicate cancer. So find a way to work out your differences.“
These volunteers provided the critical reinforcement and reminder both nonprofits needed to hear: purpose supersedes politics. It also proved to be the perfect framework for a dynamic and fruitful dialogue.
I’m happy to share both organizations took the volunteers’ message to heart as they continue to successfully co-exist and collaborate in their efforts to help people with cancer.
The arrival of spring combined with advent of mass COVID vaccinations is the perfect time to refresh ourselves as we emerge from our winter cocoons and quarantines. This year in particular, it’s also the perfect opportunity to safely indulge in a little fun with a re-visit to one’s inner child. Here’s why:
“We’re living in a world that’s more conducive to anxiety than playfulness … Play offers a reprieve from the chaos, and it challenges us to connect with a key part of ourselves that gets lost in the responsibilities of adulthood, especially during a crisis.” Kristin Wong
Here are several play date ideas for you to safely engage your inner child:
Whatever your inner child decides to do, be playful … whimsical … let your imagination take you wherever it leads … Just let go and enjoy.
“What all play has in common is that it offers a sense of engagement and pleasure, takes the player out of a sense of time and place, and the experience of doing it is more important than the outcome.” Stuart Brown
Last year’s disruption by COVID-19 led to copious content on its impact on the workplace discussing how leaders could navigate, cope, innovate, sustain and/or continue to grow in anxious and uncertain times.
As an advocate for a positive and engaged organizational culture, I was fascinated with the discussions and resulting responses to the pandemic. And I’m excited that aspects of the workplace have actually changed for the better. Here are some of my favorite quotes that reflect these changes.
Collaboration
“While no organization has the exact answer yet (that we know of), many are seeing the office of the future as a meeting place for collaboration, connection, and innovation and much less as a heads-down cubical farm for individual work.” Aaron De Smet, Laura Tegelber, Rob Theunissen, and Tiffany Vogel, Overcoming pandemic fatigue: How to reenergize organizations for the long run
“If there’s a silver lining to crisis, it’s that it shakes up structure … Many teams have seen people across functions step up and speak up with effective results — and now that they’ve found their voices, taking them away would be both difficult and wrong. Leaders and teams alike need to learn a new style of collaborative decision making.” Lolly Daskal, How to Prepare Your People for the New Normal
Employee wellness
“This crisis has presented a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to reinvent the workplace. Things that might once have seemed impossible have proved surprisingly workable … Focusing on well-being and social connectivity will serve [an] important purpose: helping employees to recover faster from what, for so many people, has been a traumatic, painful, and stressful period. And that is not only good for business—it is good for people.” Adriana Dahik, Deborah Lovich, Caroline Kreafle, Allison Bailey, Julie Kilmann, Derek Kennedy, Prateek Roongta, Felix Schuler, Leo Tomlin, and John Wenstrup, What 12,000 Employees Have to Say About the Future of Remote Work
“In unprecedented, rapidly changing situations, play is a critical capability. As well as providing much-needed stress relief – how many of us are currently working from dawn to dusk? – play can end up being counterintuitively, very productive. We can make interesting, new connections between ideas when we allow ourselves to loosen up from our regular goal-driven, laser-focused, instrumental approach.” Martin Reeves and Jack Fuller, We Need Imagination Now More than Ever
Leadership
“This is a time for leaders to try to invoke or provoke a degree of reflection, spending the time to talk about a shared sense of purpose and core values while also spending the time to emotionally check in. In fact, it will have the dual benefit of helping people move past the present suffering and begin to envision and create their new future together.” Richard Boyatzis interviewed in Psychological safety, emotional intelligence, and leadership in a time of flux
Better Workplace Culture
“… companies are waking up to the need for greater empathy and compassion to create a workplace that can unleash the full potential of their people even beyond the crisis … introducing new, more human-centered principles that truly put talent and people at the heart of organizational success. [These principles] all have one thing in common: a vision of successful organizations that are intensely human, nurturing the very best elements of emotion, creativity, human connection, and empathy and inspiring emergent leadership at every level.” Aaron De Smet, Laura Tegelber, Rob Theunissen, and Tiffany Vogel, Overcoming pandemic fatigue: How to reenergize organizations for the long run
Confession: I have as much fun talking about LEGO® bricks as I do working with them.
I actually use these colorful plastic building blocks in team development as a Certified Facilitator in LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® (LSP) – a novel approach that enables participants to “think with their hands and listen with their eyes.”
I had a special opportunity to share why I find this hands-on method so powerful with fellow LSP facilitator, Peter Tonge, host of “LSP – Face-to-Face,” a podcast produced primarily for the global LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® facilitator community. Peter is a member of the Brickstorming team whose founder, the brilliant Kristen Klassen, trained me in LSP.
In our conversation we discuss some of my favorite early participant LSP models (shown here in this post) to illustrate the power of LEGO® SERIOUS PLAY® in people’s hands. I’m amazed how deeply participants engage in individual and collective discovery as they create and share their models with each other. That’s why this hands-on approach must be held in-person — LSP’s potent immersive experience cannot be duplicated in a virtual setting. 
One of my takeaways from our discussion was this insightful quote from Peter, “The [LSP] Method doesn’t require it to be complicated. The Method requires it to be thoughtful.” This quote ties in with why I cite the single grey brick as one of my favorites. Take a listen to learn more, including what the models included in this post mean.
A special thank you to Peter for allowing me to post our conversation here.
How many people do you know who truly love what they do? Well, you can count me as one of them.
Combining multiple roles of “catalyst, conductor, and coach,” my work as a facilitator is complex, challenging, and gratifying. Projects may appear to be similar, yet each facilitated session is unique.
I enjoy my work on two parallel levels.
Working with people to ensure a meaningful experience:
Working on myself for ongoing professional and personal development:
When it comes to my work, I’m fortunate to enjoy both what I do and how I do it.
“People don’t choose their careers; they are engulfed by them.” John Dos Passos
Seeing the selection of Boss’s Day cards for October 16th reminded me of the bosses I previously worked for who ranged from great to toxic. [See my suggestion below for observing Boss’s Day this year.]
I had the privilege of working for a few executives I highly respected. I also worked for execs who were inept, inconsistent, immature, and egotistical to the point of being intolerable.
Along my journey in the workplace, I did my best to practice the positive traits of the best bosses and avoid the negative behaviors of the bad ones. They all taught me how much influence those in charge have on engaging employees to do their best or causing them to disengage over time.
The Best Bosses taught me the value of working effectively with employees. Through their attitudes and actions they demonstrated:
The Bad Bosses taught me the behaviors that frustrate employees and lead to a toxic work environment:
I don’t know if anyone is ever fortunate to work with only the best bosses or cursed to work with only nightmare bosses; most likely it’s some combination. Regardless, each has something to teach us about what works and what doesn’t in managing and leading people.
How to Observe Boss’s Day 2020
COVID-19 restrictions and working remotely may preclude the usual celebration of taking the boss to lunch. If you’re fortunate to work for someone worth acknowledging on Oct. 16th, let that person know you appreciate working with her/him/them and offer specific feedback that compliments and reinforces why you like being part of that person’s team.
If you work for a bad boss, consider observing Boss’s Day discretely by updating your resume. It might turn out to be the best gift you give yourself.
It’s been several months since COVID-19 disrupted and changed the workplace. Regardless of where your employees now work – whether from home, at your place of business, on the road, or some hybrid approach – the following still applies.
“The way your employees feel is the way your customers will feel.
And if your employees don’t feel valued, neither will your customers.”
– Sybil F. Stershic