Sometimes You Have to Change the Rules.
You Always Have to Be Careful About It.
L.L. Bean got undeserved grief for
adjusting its famous lifetime guarantee. But the company needed to deter the
"customers" who were gaming the system. Startups, too, face the issue
of seeing good intentions veer off course. Learn how to reduce that risk.
There's an old expression that "no good deed goes
unpunished," which I sometimes think has become a cliché. And then when I watch the trials and
tribulations of a business like L.L. Bean, whose good-faith commitment and
lifetime guarantees to customers have been shamelessly abused for years by flea
market phonies, eBay a-holes and other crafty resale store shoppers, I remember
that things become clichés, not because they're pithy phrases, but because
they're sadly too true. It's unfortunate when a few bad apples (cliché alert!)
can spoil things for the rest of us, but it's the nature of our world today.
When a first-class
firm like Bean tries to respond-- in a reasonable and long overdue way-- to
creeps and cheats gaming its return policies by implementing common-sense
adjustments, the company is summarily subjected to cheap shots, bad press,
a bunch of SM trolls and strike suits/baseless litigation by the omnipresent
class action lawyers. I just hope Bean has the guts to stick to its gum-soled
hunting boots. Honestly, knowing that merchants stand behind their products for
the long haul is more a source of comfort and reassurance than some kind of
dollar and cents consideration.
At the same time and
in the interest of full disclosure: I'm a million years old and yet I'll
readily admit that, when I bought my latest pair of Doc Martens, I went with
the For Life 1460's because I liked the idea that I might actually be around
long enough to take advantage of the guarantee. Was the lifetime guarantee
really a deciding factor in my purchase or any realistic component of the
"consideration" for the commerce? Did I detrimentally rely on
the guarantee, as the lawyers say? I don't think so. It was maybe a "nice
to have" add-on or a "feel-good" feature, but it certainly
didn't drive the deal. I just love the boots.
And more likely,
what's really at work here is another version of the classic psychological
observation that many of us who are still buying books (now neatly stacked on
our nightstands or in our bookcases) actually do it in part because we think
that buying the books will create the time we need to read them. (Concerned
digital readers should rest assured that I also have a stack of Kindles sitting
right next to the pile of books.)
Of course, in our
"right now" world, maybe offers of lifetime guarantees have
effectively outlived their viability and even their marketing value in an age
where the demand for instant gratification is intense and overnight product
obsolescence is virtually assured. On the other hand, if we're lucky, the ideas
and values they stand for-- excellent execution, commitment and pride, and true
craftsmanship-- will never go out of style, regardless of how many cute little gizmos
we can 3D print in our garages. We may not always want to pay for it, but we
know great quality when we see or feel it.
This whole "good
deed" thing got me thinking about how in the startup world there are also
a multitude of ways in which the best of intentions can easily lead to bad
decisions and lousy results. This is something for every smart
entrepreneur to keep in mind. We see a problem and we want to be super
responsive; we jump to a conclusion, we impose a quick solution (a new rule, a
different process, more required approvals, etc.), and then we move on to the
next fire.
But, in our desire to
hurry up and do something--pretty much anything, if the truth be
told-- it's too easy to overdo it. When your hair's on fire, you really
want to avoid putting it out with a hammer. Sound familiar? We've all been to
this movie but, as often as not, it doesn't have a happy ending, for a few
important reasons.
First, effective and
consistent communication is harder than you think. You know what your new change
is intended to accomplish and how you expect to see it implemented but, in the
heat of the moment, not everyone gets the right message. And then things start
to quickly go south. Some folks take the news too literally and they end up
slowing down every transaction in order to get things exactly right instead of
only dealing with the exceptions and the outliers. People aren't good listeners
and it pays to repeat yourself a lot. And also, it's very smart to keep an eye
on the store so that, if and when things get off the track, you can intervene
before it's too late. As they will tell you at Cape Canaveral, a
millimeter's deviation at launch and you miss the moon by miles. Head the
problems off at the pass and save a lot of grief in the future.
Second, even startups
can be surprisingly bureaucratic. You don't want to answer the same questions
over and over again and, for sure, you don't want to waste time addressing the
same problem repeatedly, so you make a new policy or rule in order to put
things behind you and to bed. And sometimes that happens. But policies don't
put themselves into effect; people need to be part of the program and, here
again, it quickly becomes clear that one size (or one solution) never fits
every situation. You've got to make room for some flexibility and exceptions to
even the best rules. Rote rules make for robots, not great results. Overkill is
a real issue and customers are very sensitive to changes in the ways you've
always done things. This is especially true if you haven't done a good job of
explaining the "why" for the change as well as the "what"
that has changed for both your team members and your clients and customers as
well.
And finally, take your
time and try to overcome your best/worst instincts to fix something fast. Not
everything is a fire drill or a complete crisis and going off half-cocked is
the worst thing you can do in sensitive situations -- especially when it later
becomes clear that you charged off in the wrong direction. In the short term,
people want answers, but in the long run, people don't remember how quickly you
fixed something; they remember how well the solution worked out for them.