Do you have evaluation fatigue?
Jul. 11th, 2015 04:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
blogcutterIt never seems to stop these days. Make a routine purchase at your local drugstore and the cash register receipt urges you to go online and "Tell us how we did today! You might win $1000 or a free iPad!!" Frankly, if I got through the store within a reasonable period of time, the cashier wasn't out-and-out rude to me and she gave me the right change, I'm satisfied. Not delighted or ecstatic. Satisfied. They've met my expectations and I've really nothing more to say. So why should I go to their website and say more?
Actually, there's one thing that does impress me because it's so rare. That's when the cashier actually counts my change back to me. You know, like they did in the good old pre-calculator days when people still used slide rules for the more advanced calculations and cashiers didn't expect the cash register to do everything for them. But the folks who do that are generally the small independent businesspeople or the farmers at the market stalls (who are also independent businesspeople, I guess): in other words, precisely those folks who would never in a million years hand me a cash register tape urging me to go online and tell them how they did today!!
Other than that, I don't particularly care if the woman in the clothing shop packages my purchase in artfully draped coloured tissue paper in an elegant carrier bag and walks around from behind the counter to hand it to me directly. Certainly she should know her merchandise: What type of fabric is it? Is it washable? What sizes and colours is it available in? I'm even receptive to hearing her views on whether that colour and style suits me or whether something different might suit me better. But other things that they evidently teach in the Sales Associateship 101 course are at best unimportant and at worst downright annoying because there's this tacit implication that we don't see through the little mind games they're playing with their customers.
Whenever I go to a conference, it seems they want us to fill in an evaluation for every single session we go to. Now, I don't mind answering a few questions about the conference as a whole. Was it worthwhile? Would I go back? Were there sessions I particularly enjoyed or which left me cold, and were there sessions I would have liked to see but which weren't offered? How were the accommodations, catering and social events? Was it good value for the money? Those are things they can really use for planning purposes. But I have my doubts whether the individual session evaluations really make all that much difference. and they often make me late for my next session so I can't get a seat!!
There are surveys I do participate in because I think they're worthwhile, the originators are listening to what I have to say, and they have the potential to really make a difference. Case in point: the biweekly CARP polls on issues of the day of particular interest to Canadian seniors. I think CARP does a really good job of lobbying government and they're large and powerful enough that they have the ear of the higher-ups, while still having enough of a grass roots base that they'll take the pulse of individual members - the citizens and voters. They think nationally and act both locally AND nationally (though in many ways the issues transcend national borders).
When I was still in the workplace, I felt that the generations that had grown up very "wired" tended to want continuous feedback about every little thing they did - and they expected 95% of that feedback to be positive! I'm not sure if that means they have a super-positive self-concept or that they're incredibly insecure! That's obviously a sweeping generalization I'm making and I hasten to add that I know not all younger people think alike!
But I see it in other milieux as well, especially the tourism and hospitality industries. I take a trip on Via Rail and they want to know every last detail of how I enjoyed my trip. I stay in a hotel and they want me to evaluate my stay. If I give them 9 out of 10, they want me to tell them what it would have taken for me to give them a 10. I don't want to get anyone into trouble, but it gets a bit tedious after a while. And surely the whole point of surveying your customers should be to learn what your strengths and weaknesses are and what are the concrete measures you could take to perform better?
Actually, there's one thing that does impress me because it's so rare. That's when the cashier actually counts my change back to me. You know, like they did in the good old pre-calculator days when people still used slide rules for the more advanced calculations and cashiers didn't expect the cash register to do everything for them. But the folks who do that are generally the small independent businesspeople or the farmers at the market stalls (who are also independent businesspeople, I guess): in other words, precisely those folks who would never in a million years hand me a cash register tape urging me to go online and tell them how they did today!!
Other than that, I don't particularly care if the woman in the clothing shop packages my purchase in artfully draped coloured tissue paper in an elegant carrier bag and walks around from behind the counter to hand it to me directly. Certainly she should know her merchandise: What type of fabric is it? Is it washable? What sizes and colours is it available in? I'm even receptive to hearing her views on whether that colour and style suits me or whether something different might suit me better. But other things that they evidently teach in the Sales Associateship 101 course are at best unimportant and at worst downright annoying because there's this tacit implication that we don't see through the little mind games they're playing with their customers.
Whenever I go to a conference, it seems they want us to fill in an evaluation for every single session we go to. Now, I don't mind answering a few questions about the conference as a whole. Was it worthwhile? Would I go back? Were there sessions I particularly enjoyed or which left me cold, and were there sessions I would have liked to see but which weren't offered? How were the accommodations, catering and social events? Was it good value for the money? Those are things they can really use for planning purposes. But I have my doubts whether the individual session evaluations really make all that much difference. and they often make me late for my next session so I can't get a seat!!
There are surveys I do participate in because I think they're worthwhile, the originators are listening to what I have to say, and they have the potential to really make a difference. Case in point: the biweekly CARP polls on issues of the day of particular interest to Canadian seniors. I think CARP does a really good job of lobbying government and they're large and powerful enough that they have the ear of the higher-ups, while still having enough of a grass roots base that they'll take the pulse of individual members - the citizens and voters. They think nationally and act both locally AND nationally (though in many ways the issues transcend national borders).
When I was still in the workplace, I felt that the generations that had grown up very "wired" tended to want continuous feedback about every little thing they did - and they expected 95% of that feedback to be positive! I'm not sure if that means they have a super-positive self-concept or that they're incredibly insecure! That's obviously a sweeping generalization I'm making and I hasten to add that I know not all younger people think alike!
But I see it in other milieux as well, especially the tourism and hospitality industries. I take a trip on Via Rail and they want to know every last detail of how I enjoyed my trip. I stay in a hotel and they want me to evaluate my stay. If I give them 9 out of 10, they want me to tell them what it would have taken for me to give them a 10. I don't want to get anyone into trouble, but it gets a bit tedious after a while. And surely the whole point of surveying your customers should be to learn what your strengths and weaknesses are and what are the concrete measures you could take to perform better?
