I bet you have a story about receiving lousy customer service, I know I have a few. On the flipside – do you have a story about giving lousy customer service? Ouch, this is more difficult to contemplate because we naturally see the world from our own point of view.

Whatever work you do, you have customers – whether they pay you directly or not. If you work in an organisation you will have internal as well as external customers.

The word customer contains the word custom which means habit. So a customer is someone who buys or interacts with you more than once, and this suggests some kind of relationship. Just like other relationships, customer service can be good or bad depending on the mindset you bring to it.

When I was about 12 years old I started working in my father’s hardware store. I was an enthusiastic young man and began to learn about the products, becoming knowledgeable and therefore important (in my mind). One day I got into an argument with a customer about the ‘proper’ definition of a product, my father stepped in, agreed with the customer and sold the product. I was furious because I knew I was right and confronted my father about this. His response was, “Son, I know you were right, but do you want to be right or do you want to be rich?”

The famous sales trainer Zig Ziglar said it this way:
“If you help enough other people get what they want, you can have anything you want.”

With this frame of mind we can prosper by meeting and exceeding the customer’s expectations.

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Well, if the answer is yes to any of the two questions, you have probably fallen in the same trap so many people fall every day…the trap of Procrastination!

But how bad is it to procrastinate anyways?

Well, The Procrastination Research Group (so it even has its own research group!) made a survey on 2,700 individuals and asked them how much negative impact does procrastination have on their happiness? 46% said that very much and 18% said that an extreme negative effect.

Pretty bad, don’t you think?

So let’s explore what are the most common reasons of procrastination:

• Care Too Much About What Others Think

It happens that sometimes you want to impress others so much that when given a task you feel so much pressure that it delays your work.

• Striving For The Perfect

It sounds weird, but perfectionism can be what causes procrastination. You may want to strive for perfectionism so much that you feel disheartened even before you begin. This is because a goal that seems unachievable (and who can ever be perfect, anyway?) can be demoralizing.

• Doing Things Totally New To You

You need to embark on a totally new project and you have no idea at all on how to tackle it. The first reaction is to procrastinate. The uncertainty of the result of this task causes you to delay commencing the project.

• The Task Isn’t Meaningful And Motivating

This is another main reason what causes procrastination. The task at hand isn’t motivating to you, as it does not match your aspiration. It is not meaningful to you and therefore you drag your feet in completing the task.

• The Lack Of Confidence

Another common cause of procrastination is the lack of confidence in completing a task. It can be real that you lack the skills but sometimes it may be a perception that you lack the skill. Because of this you may totally avoid completing the task.

OK, but enough with the causes, here are seven solutions:

1. Give up being Perfect! (Nobody is and nobody will ever be!) It is much better to do a task 80% good, rather than wait until you are 100% satisfied and never actually manage to deliver it.
2. Just as most people can’t eat a whole birthday cake in one bite, some jobs cannot be done all at once. Some people come to realize that it is harder to put something off if they slice a job up into manageable pieces and do the task piece by piece, little by little. This might mean breaking down the time required to-do a task into smaller chunks that are spaced over several days or weeks. Some people don’t like large doses of something distasteful. They find that smaller doses spaced over time makes things easier to do and less procrastinatable.
3. Another way some people have reduced procrastination is to begin with an easy, an enjoyable, or the least distasteful piece of a job to get started.
4. Many ex-procrastinators have realized that working with someone else makes it less likely that they will put something off. Perhaps this would work for you.
5. It could be that you will come to realize that making a commitment to someone or setting a deadline for completing a task is one way to make procrastination more difficult. It is known that for many people, setting a goal results in motivation. For this to work, ex-procrastinators have found that the goal must be something they want to achieve.
6. Maybe you will discover that doing a job in the least distracting environment makes putting off work a little harder. For many college students, homes, dorm rooms, or apartments have many distractions and potential distractions. Perhaps you will find a place like the library to study where it is quiet and is going to stay quiet until you are ready to leave.
7. Like many non-procrastinators, you may find it enjoyable to reward yourself for doing a part of a job and for completing a task. Some examples of rewards are treating yourself to some delicious fruits, going to a movie, visiting with friends, or just doing something that you enjoy.

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An important realisation when working in a team is that the way you perceive and respond to the world (your personality) is NOT the “Right Way” or “The Only Way” to do things. This realisation reduces our frustration and opens us to the possibility of collaboration rather than compromise.

The team work cycle highlights the need for different personalities. Some people are better at generating ideas, some at evaluating ideas, some at making decisions and others at execution (implementation). If everyone on the team were the same, then some parts of the team work cycle would be left out.

Most team issues are due to a lack of effective communication resulting in people becoming aggressive creating conflict or becoming passive and de-motivated. The key self-leadership skill for team members is therefore ‘assertive communication.’

Communication occurs when those involve have shared meaning and understanding. Since we don’t know what something means to someone unless we ask, communication involves asking questions and getting clarification. It also means speaking up (assertive) so that others know your meanings and understandings about what and how things should be done.

Assertive team communication has been made more complex in the virtual world where we don’t have non-verbal cues and we have to factor in cultural differences in speech styles and meanings.

In my experience, what remains a constant for high performing teams is that the following things are communicated and understood by all.

1. Vision - How this work/project is important to the company and the team members.
2. Group Identity – That we are all on the same team and all benefit from the success of the work.
3. Role Clarity – That we each have a role to play and that role is clearly defined.
4. Trust - We are all different but we can trust each other to do the work to the best of our abilities.
5. Recognition - Each of us will do our best for the team and appreciate others for doing the same.
6. Communication - We will both listen to others and speak up as appropriate so that everyone shares an understanding of what is possible at each stage of the work cycle.
7. Celebration - We will celebrate together with each milestone we reach.

How does your team measure up? What can you do to make sure these things are communicated?

Have a good day at work :0

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