Again, clarity of purpose is essential. Nordstrom is clear that every decision the company makes is for the benefit of customers, and that Nordstrom employees – both on the frontlines and in support – are crucial to enhancing the customer experience.
Trust is the cornerstone of all human interaction, be it social, emotional, or commercial. Caring – for coworkers and customers – is a sign of strength. Without trust and caring we'll never know what could have been possible in our organization.
High‐trust companies hold their people accountable, treat them like responsible adults, and encourage them to take ownership of the customer experience. They want their people to be true to themselves and to their values. Positive actions and decisions build trust and show that you care. The best Nordstrom sales associates will do virtually everything he or she can to make sure a shopper leaves the store a satisfied customer. As my friend Bruce Nordstrom says, “The happiest customer is the one who leaves the store carrying a Nordstrom shopping bag.”
“Servant Leadership” is a philosophy and set of practices that I have tried to adhere to – from the days of watching my parents running their small grocery store in Seattle, to all my years at Starbucks, to the life I live today as an author, speaker, and mentor. The Nordstrom family and every successful Nordstrom manager, buyer, and executive represent the ideal of servant leadership. We are here to serve and support our team, not the other way around.
At Starbucks, we believe that there is no conflict between treating your people with respect and dignity and making a profit. We simply stated that respect and dignity are essential, which is why respect and dignity were factored into the price of every cup of coffee we sold.
Robert and breAnne have identified core cultural values that are absolute necessities for every organization: trust, respect, loyalty, awareness, humility, communication and collaboration, competition and compensation, innovation and adaptation, and give back and have fun. We can all agree that these values are essential to loyalty and longevity.
In this compelling and entertaining book, Robert Spector and breAnne O. Reeves show how any organization – including yours – can create a lasting customer service culture by attracting people who buy into your nonnegotiable core values.
Chock‐full of stories of exemplary customer service, unselfish teamwork, fearless innovation, community and global citizenship, and good old‐fashioned fun, this book will make you laugh, shed a tear or two, and convince you that your organization has the potential to become the “Nordstrom” of your industry.
If that's your goal, what better time to start than right now?
Introduction
A few years ago, Blake Nordstrom, copresident of the company with his two brothers, scheduled a lunch with the chief executive officer of another famous Seattle company. The CEO asked Blake if he wouldn't mind stopping by the tailor shop of the downtown Seattle Nordstrom flagship store on his way to the lunch, and bring with him a couple of pairs of slacks that the CEO had arranged to have altered.
“Blake said, ‘Sure, no problem,’” the CEO remembered. By the time the two executives met for lunch, both of them had forgotten about the pants. “That evening at nine o'clock, there's a knock at my door. There's Blake with those two pairs of pants. I said, ‘Man, that's what I call service.’”
In a sense, Blake's personally delivering those pants is the perfect metaphor for The Nordstrom Way. Nordstrom's culture encourages entrepreneurial, motivated men and women to make the extra effort to give customer service that is unequaled. “Not service like it used to be, but service that never was,” reported Morley Safer in a profile of the company on the CBS television program 60 Minutes. “A place where service is an act of faith.”
Morley Safer made that observation in 1990. Although much has changed since then, Nordstrom's commitment to service has never wavered.
When The Nordstrom Way was first published in 1995, it struck a chord with countless organizations in a broad variety of industries all over the world. Many hundreds of thousands of copies and four iterations later, The Nordstrom Way continues to serve as an inspiration for virtually every sector of international business. Nordstrom endures as a standard against which other companies and organizations privately (and often publicly) measure themselves.
“If all businesses could be like Nordstrom,” said Harry Mullikin, chairman emeritus of Westin Hotels, “it would change the whole economy of this country.”
“The Nordstrom Way,” the phrase that we have helped to popularize, is shorthand for a customer experience that is sui generis. Through all the changes that Nordstrom and the retail industry have gone through over more than a century, the Nordstrom Way is still in a class by itself.
It must be noted that Nordstrom did not suggest we write The Nordstrom Way nor did the company commission its publication. Nevertheless, when the original book was written, the company made its top executives, managers, and salespeople available for interviews. Through all the different versions of this book that we have written over the years (which we will explain in greater detail), Nordstrom has cooperated in helping us to tell their ever‐evolving story.
Introduction to the Third Edition
This is a completely different book from the first and second editions, just as the first and second editions were completely different from the 1995 book and the 1997 trade paperback.
In 2005, for the 10th anniversary of the original publication, we initially thought of adding a new chapter or two. But upon reviewing the material, it was obvious that much of the book was too dated to be relevant. For example, the original book didn't mention something called the Internet. By 2012, the 2005 first edition was also dated. Hence, the necessity for the book you are now reading. Our books have evolved just as Nordstrom has evolved. Our books reflect both Nordstrom's bedrock culture and its understanding that survival requires perpetual adaptation and evolution.
This third edition is coauthored by breAnne O. Reeves, cofounder and partner of our consulting company RSi, a thought leader in customer experience. This book is her vision, based on our years of research and working with clients in many different business sectors all over the world.
The Customer Experience Conundrum
This is not a book about selling shoes or clothes or cosmetics or jewelry. As the subtitle spells out, this is a book about creating a values‐driven, service‐obsessed corporate culture that encourages, motivates, rewards, recognizes, and compensates employees to consistently deliver a world‐class experience to customers.
Each one of us is an expert on customer service. At one point or another during the course of our day, every one of us plays the role of the customer. We all know the difference between good service and bad service. You don't have to read yet another book to understand this.
So, then, why is good customer service so rare?
Picture in your mind a customer service counter. On one side of the counter is you, the customer. You know exactly what your expectations are: a good product or service at a fair price. If there's a problem, you want it taken care of as quickly, seamlessly, and painlessly as possible. Simple stuff, right?
But a funny thing happens to people when they move to the other side of the customer service counter (or the front desk or the reception area or the phone or Internet) where they are the ones who are giving service as opposed to receiving it. Unfortunately, this is the place where their behaviors are determined and dominated by the rules, the process, the manual, the bureaucracy, the way it's always been done:
“Sorry, that's against our policy.”
“Sorry, we have a rule against that.”
“Sorry, my manager's off today. Can I get back to you when she gets back?”
When we are customers, we don't want to hear those excuses. So when we are dealing