There are no two ways about it - our service economy sucks! Getting a broadband connection at home (this is the most premium plan, and with the 'best' operator) is proving to be a headache. This is after my earlier broadband connection would provide such terrible connectivity that I would find it quicker to use a data card on my computer!
This is not just about broadband, or even telecom. I don't understand why we do not have a good, professional service economy. Where if I am told that xyz will happen on a certain day, it does happen on that day (or even that week)! This is true even of the largest retailer in India, who commits delivery on a certain day but actually delivers on some other day.
Earlier, this was a given - because everything was Govt. (or should I say bureaucracy) owned, and the Govt. certainly does not care about service. It is much more difficult to understand now - we have private companies with a profit motive, we have differential pricing, we have pretty much all elements in place for great service. But do we get it? Unfortunately, the answer is no!
My hypothesis is that this stems from 2 key factors - a) the chaos and unpredictability of daily life in our cities. I cannot predict to within 30 minutes the time it will take me to get from place A to place B, or whether I will find parking there, or whether the guy I'm supposed to meet or the item I'm supposed to collect will be there at all! In such an environment, even a small variable can effect output tremendously. Therefore service providers are unable to predict things themselves b) we are horrible at communication and are very short term thinkers. We think saying something conveniently now (Yes surely I will deliver today / Guaranteed madam, kaam aaj ho jayega) is enough to satisfy the customer, rather than say something not so pleasing, but then keep the promise. Ergo, we are short term optimizers rather than long term strategics.
Whatever the reason, our service economy sucks!
1 comment:
well.. the concept of "service" as a deliverable is totally non-existant in our culture and "professionalism" ! whom are we kidding?!
Ofcourse infrastructure sucks and all that but most of all failure is bcoz of attitude more than physical constraints.
I remember my experience at a nationalised bank coupla months back.
a. the counter is supposed to open at 10. and the guy doesn't get there for another half hour coz he drinking tea and chatting with others (and i can SEE him!!)
b. in the middle of our transaction, his cell phone rings and he actually answers it!!! and talks for another 15 mins about some family thing!!!!!! I was like "EXCUSE ME!!"
But then the rest of the people are also enablers. I turned out to see if anyone else was as annoyed as me, only to find that everyone including my mom was patiently waitin for the guy to finish as if he was doin nothing wrong :OOO
Post a Comment