In today's world of business, minimal staff is a big cog in the profitability mechanism. While reaching a level of cost effectiveness, certain aspects of customer service, evaluation of production and investor interaction cannot be automated.
My children once asked me if I would prefer a jar 100% full of roaches or one 50% full of butterflies. Real world response would dictate the jar be full butterflies. Realistically, the correct answer is 50% full.
Corporations are plagued with this conundrum, and those that choose "100% full" reach bankruptcy at a sprinter's pace. In the race to fill their coffers, sacrificing the human quality is much more costly than the payroll which it saved.
Take an example of a warehouse type discount store. Floor to 20 foot ceiling is filled with merchandise available to chosen portions of the public at what appears to be premium prices. The only employees are the manager of the floor and the cashiers.
The consumer must do his homework before shopping or risk purchasing a cheap widget that will not solve his dilemma. In short, there is no one to answer his questions while he shops.
Once Joe Shopper gets home and finds that his bargain widget does not fit, he has choices.
- Bring the widget back and handle the frustration of the return policy.
- Keep the worthless widget and spend more money to buy a new widget.
The company is out even more than Joe.
- Loss of the original sale.
- Added payroll of the return and the processing of the returned item.
Ann Marie Dwyer is an internationally-published, award-winning citizen journalist with bylines on Helium, One World Net, Yahoo! News and Global Exchange. Her articles appear in corporate newsletters, archive history web sites and in news print.
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