Apologies for the slight delay in writing this latest blog. As we have said the plan is to write one every week but we must admit we have been rather busy of late and so this is the first offering for two weeks. Slap our wrists, we must do better!
Anyway, as the UK awaits the onset of the corona virus epidemic….(we love that sales in corona beer are down – bang head!), we’d like to share a recent masterclass in surveying customers with you (see photo). We encountered this on a recent trip to London when staying at the Premier Inn near St Pancras. As you can see, they have a very novel and ever so slightly biased way of gaining customer feedback on breakfast!
Now over the years we have seen many biased surveys in the past, but this approach probably takes the biscuit! As you can see customers are offered three rating options” ‘great’, ‘good’ and ‘average’. And while we would admit our £5 breakfast was good, the inability to give negative feedback seems like a stroke of genius. Not exactly real-world, is it! Perhaps the NHS and other healthcare teams could adopt this approach?!
The best bit is that the process proved utterly meaningless. First, the data (aka counters in bowls) was clearly not being recorded or measured. Second, on day 2 we tried a little experiment. When we walked in for breakfast, we deviously placed three counters into the bowl marked ‘average’. On leaving 20 minutes later, all the counters had mysteriously shifted into the bowls marked ‘great’ and ‘good’. Spooky!
All this is just a bit of fun isn’t it? Presumably Premier Inn just want to make customers feel involved and engaged. But at a wider level, what is the point? Measurement should be meaningful at all levels, even when rating breakfast! And looking at the bigger picture we see this stuff all of the time (maybe not quite so blatant) inside healthcare and out.
Indeed, the organisations, teams, networks, groups, bodies and people who manipulate data and change or delete feedback really aren’t for us!
PS Do feel free to comment on this blog. We’d love to hear your thoughts, irrespective of whether they are good, bad or downright ugly!!!
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