Page 185 - The Voice of Authority

sor for his personal attention and he’ll get back to
you immediately.”

And . . . no one ever called back from Customer Re-
lations.

Virtually the same communication caper surfaced again
when our community bank merged with a large national
bank and began bombarding us with paperwork, new
PINs, and passwords—but couldn’t coordinate their ef-
forts during the actual changeover of their systems. For
months we received paperwork saying, “Here’s your
new . . . ,” followed by a call or letter telling us to ignore
what we’d just been told in the previous communication.
The next week, a new wave of misguided, uncoordinated
communication.
The colossal internal communication collapse created
chaos for their customers, as well as employees, for almost
a year.
It’s all too familiar, isn’t it? The frustration of getting
poor service because department X doesn’t talk to depart-
ment Y, . . . of people who don’t listen, . . . of people not
following through on what they tell you, . . . of telling
companies who don’t care, . . . of visiting Web sites that
promise but don’t deliver.
Companies who plan to be around in the next few years
have to stop communicating like this—or shall I say stop
not communicating like this.

The Problem Is Not the Problem

In most cases, as with the move across town, the problem
is not the problem. The problem is not the technology. The
problem is the communication about the problem. The lack
of communication—either wrong or mishandled commu-

Is It Circular? 173