For the first time last night since this whole fuel nonsense started, I had to go and get some diesel. I’d tried to avoid it but even with the car set to EcoPlus, it was telling me I had 21 miles to go. For those of you in places that aren’t in the SE & London, you’re probably wondering why I’m still piping on about fuel shortages, but in the Brighton area where I live (and I think in lots of the SE), we still have significant problems. Most garages in my area were shut with no fuel, and once it got some, the queues were bloomin’ ridiculous.
One of our local Sainsbury garages decided this week to not open in the day and to only open at night from 10pm to 6am. Seems crazy but the queues in the day were not only blocking up their store traffic and car park, but it was becoming dangerous with queues sneaking out onto busy roads and snarling up the traffic (and public transport). So, probably not a bad move…
So, I ventured out at 10:45pm and arrived at 11pm to quite a queue. And an unexpectedly enlightening experience that I decided to illicit some lessons from – in Operations Excellence. Read on for the experience and then my Ops Excellence learnings!
That queue I was in was going down quickly, I was delighted. The organisation from the Sainsbury staff was decent – they had really thought about how to get people off the road and into a ‘snaking’ queue system around the car park.
They were good at reacting quickly to the ebb and flow of rising and subsiding queues, making the ‘snake’ of a queue shorter as they worked through the vehicles in the queue – and taking on extra demand by filling up parts of the car park with more demand. They seemed to have people at the right points along the journey to ensure I was told where to go next.
And guess what, they had smiles on their faces. In the cold, at past 11pm at night!
So far, all mental ‘ticks in boxes’ from me. 😊
Then, I’m afraid we hit a snag – and this is where I really had time to think – and where my experience felt more and more like some similar ones I’ve had lately in Contact Centre queues and some examples of end-to-end customer journey failures I’ve suffered (and I often see referred to by others on LinkedIn and other social media platforms).
You see, suddenly I went nowhere. The whole queue stopped, with no obvious reason – or any explanation from anyone. And suddenly from hero to zero, this Sainsbury experience didn’t feel anywhere near as special (but please read on, as I am definitely not having a go at the Sainsbury staff in this blog!).
After 10 mins, a staff member walked somewhere near to my car whilst in the queue and I gently asked whether there was a big problem and should we still expect to get filled up. She very politely explained that they just had to shut down for 10 mins to get the re-fuelling of the station going and would be running again very shortly.
Relax, Paul. Those 13 miles left on your fuel gauge will be plenty to get you in and out, you’re not going to need to worry about driving home on empty. Phew.
After another 15 mins, we were unfortunately, still going nowhere. And the queue had by this point filled most of the car park.
Another staff member passed by my car, and so after again gently enquiring, I was told that this was a computer error (not the station being filled as per previous), and we’d be going again in a minute or two.
And just like that, 25 mins or so after coming to a grinding halt, we got moving. Within 5 mins I was at a pump, confidently ushered through to the right pump by a smiling chap – and with the wonderful ‘Pay At The Pump’ now being used by pretty much everyone.
Homeward bound. And after more reflection once home, I decided to jot down where I see parallels with customer contact operations and what learnings I was able to take and related to.
Lesson 1 – quickly adaptable processes are vital to ensure you make the most of the resources available to you. Sainsbury did this well in the most part – but were eventually overwhelmed by the computer issue. All operations should start with process (not technology or people) and build from there.
Lesson 2 – the whole team within a process or customer journey needs to understand how and when the process adapts to cope with raising or lowering demand. Leadership and communication within a team or business here is vital of course – and the team achieve as a team not as a set of individuals.
Lesson 3 – customer signposting and comms are absolutely vital. Ushering us around that queuing system worked well, but when a mini crisis made that process grind to a halt, there was no customer guidance or reassurance. Every business needs to ensure they understand that customers are generally very forgiving – if you talk to them. Engage them. Explain what’s happening to them, especially if it’s something unexpected.
Lesson 4 – team members who smile (whether physically or metaphorically) will always be more likely to win over customers and build loyalty
Lesson 5 – when we are ‘forced’ to digitalise and we realise it makes things easier and quicker for pretty much all of us, it breeds more digital behaviours. Inevitably, petrol station cashiers will be less busy moving forward
Lesson 6 – computer problems sometimes shut down fuel stations as well – so my own tech failures don’t seem so difficult or troublesome now!
There are, of course, plenty of other things to extract from this experience – and let’s be honest, it’s a bit of a 1st world problem that I had to wait an hour for fuel, however we may as well take what we can from it and ensure we think about these things in our own businesses or operations. The Sainsbury team at West Hove last night did a sterling job and the above is not meant to be critical of them in any way. I hope my own smiles and waves to them all as they ‘did their thing’ helped them to realise that we all appreciated what they were managing to deliver to us, in very trying circumstances.
Of course, if any business out there (even fuel stations!), need help with fixing operational problems, or in delivering transformation in their business, drop us a line and let’s chat.