So, Los Angeles survived Carmageddon. Unworthy of any movie plot where LA is usually reserved for the most heinous destruction, (does that say something when those who live there constantly make movies destroying their city?) the 405 freeway opened ahead of schedule. Or ahead of expectations, at least.
It’s tempting fate when so many civic projects go so horribly wrong to ask the question, but have we become a nation of sandbaggers?
My flight gets in on time. We left the gate 20 minutes late. I guess we have the pilot, Captain Dan Dare, to thank for this heroic act. Did he go to the mat with air traffic control to get us a faster route? You can imagine the cockpit conversations:
Co-Pilot: But Dan, think of the fuel burn! Don’t you realize that Jet-A fuel is up 40% in the last year? Think of the profitability per passenger seat, for God’s sake man!
Dan Dare: Dammit, Mike, we can’t let these customers down. The wheels of commerce; families ripped asunder; just think of our NPS! Push the throttle to 11 and let’s get them there on schedule…
When “on time arrival” became an important metric, the airlines simply added time to the schedule so in-bounds performance became an early arrival. They sandbagged. Does anyone think that the contractors on the 405 were shocked and surprised by how well it all went? It’s safe to say that their plan called for the project to be complete well ahead of schedule. Hitting the schedule would have been a failure!
If customer experience is all about expectations, surely this is the way to go. Lowered customer expectations take pressure of the entire system and have the effect of claiming victory where average performance is all that happens. What’s wrong with that?
In the competitive market space, it’s a dangerous habit. The market has a tendency of revising expectations suddenly and radically, often through new entrants. Establishing a low bar creates a culture of mediocrity and comfort. In an environment where, as Andy Grove* famously put it, “only the paranoid survive”, this seems a high risk approach.
So, by all means, manage customer expectations. Buy yourself some breathing room. But don’t lose sight of the real nature of performance and become consumers of your own mythology. Set the internal metrics higher, expect great performance. We should see a lot more projects completed ahead of schedule.
*Andy Grove is a Hungarian-born American businessman, engineer, author and a pioneer in the semi-conductor industry. In 1968, he co-founded Intel Corporation. During his tenure as CEO, Grove oversaw an increase in Intel's stock value by 2,400%, making it one of the world's most valuable companies. As a result of his work at Intel, and from his books and professional articles, Grove has had a considerable influence on the management of modern electronics manufacturing industries worldwide. He has been called the "guy who drove the growth phase" of Silicon Valley.
