Just recently Amy and I had an interesting experience. We had an appointment which we believed to be at a certain time, but when we arrived we were informed that we were half an hour late – which was the point of contention. During this experience we had dealt with two employees, let’s take a quick look at the reaction of each:

1. Employee #1: Curtly informed us we were late and in no uncertain terms told us we would be penalized as there was not enough time to perform the full range of services. We informed her that we believed we were actually early at which point we were promptly cut off.
2. Employee #2: Appeared not to be concerned that we may have been late but immediately worked to move one of her appointments to accommodate us. In the end I was able to receive the full range of originally scheduled services. When I thanked her she acted as if it were no big deal and that it was just part of her job.

Keep in mind that when gauging either person’s actions we did not ask for special treatment or to accommodate us in either way; we also conceded that it could have been a misunderstanding on our part. Employee #1 was looking to assign blame – it was our fault, so here are the ramifications. Employee #2 was seeking to resolve the conflict with the least amount of pain possible, she focused on results rather than blame. Consider this – who do you think received the larger tip?

Here is what I would like you to take away: focus on results, not blame. Humans are fallible by nature and therefore anytime a person is involved in an interaction there is room for error – even from the best of us. This is further complicated by the fact that the more people you add to an operation the more error that likely can be added due to the complexity of coordinating the efforts of multiple people with diverse backgrounds and values. This is why business attempts to automate processes and services whenever possible – less chance of error, especially over time.