Firing Friends

By Tommy Leung on 07/20/2010 in Life

I got a specific e-mail about a year ago. I did not read it. I didn’t want to read it. I didn’t care what was said. I marked it as read in GMail and forgot about it. I decided to open it a year later. I don’t know why I had the urge to read it but, I could have gone without ever remembering that e-mail.

Actually, I didn’t even read it. I just skimmed it and read parts. It was useless in every way. About as senseless and idiotic as the person who wrote it. My life hasn’t suffered without this person. In fact, it might be better because I haven’t seen this person.

Firing people from my life isn’t a rare occurrence. I’m not saying I fire people from my life all the time but, sometimes you need to fire some of them. The energy to deal with them will drastically reduce the quality of relationships you have with others. And that’s unfair.

Like a box of blueberries, you keep the good ones and discard the rest.

Falling in Love with FreshDirect

By Tommy Leung on 07/18/2010 in Life, Marketing

I don’t believe in love at first sight. And it’s true, I’ve only known FreshDirect for about a week. But it might be love. I’ve never loved a supermarket or grocery store. What is there to love? They are all about the same. Boring.

None of them really care about you or even pretend to care. And honestly, you don’t have any loyalties to them. You’re shopping with whomever has a sale this week. It could be that one today and this one tomorrow. Whichever one is more convenient at the time.

There are some exceptions. Trader Joe’s comes to mind. I like Trader Joe’s. But, they’ve never wow-ed me.

When you are someone who reads Seth Godin‘s books and blogs, you come to believe that phenomenal customer exists but, you’ve never really experienced it. Almost frustrating.

That purple cow is really more like a unicorn. You’ve heard about it. Heard great things but, you’ve never actually seen one. You’ve seen horses but, not really a unicorn. Similar but, not quite there.

It’s hard to find but, once you find it there is no going back. Nothing else compares. Not having it will make you irritable; you curse out the morons who just don’t do it right. Much like the once-common disease known as female hysteria. Symptoms included: faintness, nervousness, insomnia, irritability, and “a tendency to cause trouble”. The treatment was simple: orgasm.

Let’s be honest, that does solve many problems.

So how do I know that this thing with FreshDirect might just be real? FreshDirect has a lot going for it. The food is amazing. Shopping for locally grown produce is exhilarating. Knowing that you could have driven to the small family farm where your food came from is oddly assuring.

Lab coat wearing scientists can say that the nutrition content is identical to traditionally farmed produce. I’d say their tests are obviously flawed. The food tastes different. It looks different. It is not identical. They can take their conclusions, turn it sideways, and stick it straight in their filing cabinets.

And if 2012 really does bring the end of the world, I’d like to know that there are farms around me. Apocalypse or not, I still have to eat.

You’ve probably also seen Food, Inc. I have. If you haven’t, you should. We can grow healthy, high-quality food without factory farms. Those who say it’s impossible are contradicting the fundamental way in which agriculture and factory farms came to be: the free market. People demanded food and we found a way to grow more of it using less and less space. Awesome.

Today, we want good food. The market will find a way. It always does. And it won’t destroy the planet as we know it because it’ll take 1000000x–guesstimate–the land to raise all these cows, chickens, pigs, etc. humanely and organically. Like I said, the market will find a way. If there is legitimate market demand, it will happen. For now, prices will be sky high. This is how the market works.

But, this love is not just about the food. I love the food. I do. But, there’s more. It’s Katie and Allie at FreshDirect.

My FreshDirect order was scheduled for the 11 – 1PM time slot. I got up at around 10. I was out last night but, not that late. I slept in anyway. I like doing that. It’s a Saturday.

I did my Saturday morning stuff: shower, breakfast, Facebook, etc. I was expecting a delivery any time between 11AM and 1PM so I took that as an opportunity to catch up on some blogs and other readings. I also let my Roomba do it’s thing–I’m delegating.

1PM came and went and nothing. No FreshDirect delivery. I figured they were running late. Then it was 1:45. Well, that’s quite late–I think that can be considered being stood up. So I checked the website and their FAQs. Late deliveries usually result in a call to notify you. Well, I didn’t get that. Maybe there was an issue? I sent Customer Service an e-mail.

They respond to e-mails in roughly 1 – 3 hours according to their site–in reality, they did it much fast. I took the wait time to clean my kitchen. I had to do it eventually so might as well do it while I’m in a holding pattern anyway.

I got a reply shortly:

I am very sorry to hear that your order #XXXXXXX did not arrive between the 11-1pm delivery timeslot you requested.

I have contacted the delivery team and they informed me that your order was scanned as delivered at 10:34am. Since the route is done for the day we were unable to confirm this with the driver. I suggest checking outside your door or with your doorman if applicable. If you are still unable to locate your order please call us at 212-796-8002 so we can investigate this issue further or set up a re-delivery  for another day. I am very sorry for the inconvenience.

I’d like to thank you for giving us the opportunity to help solve your problem.  If, for any reason you’re dissatisfied with how we resolved your problem, or need further assistance, please feel free to e-mail us directly by responding to this e-mail or call us at 212-796-8002.

Your satisfaction is our number one priority!

Sincerely,

Katie

The response was timely and personable. I can tell there’s template customer service copy but, a real person also wrote some of that. Unlike when I send my Senators a message and they send me back a blanket response of bullshit. Not so fond of that.

So I read that and went to check my door. I may have been in the shower at 10:34AM and if they got into the building without buzzing me then I would have never known.

I open my door and 4 FreshDirect boxes were staring at me. Awesome! I brought them in and unpacked everything. I then went to send a reply to customer service to let them know that it all worked out fine.

hey Katie (or whomever this reply gets to in customer service),

My order was stacked outside my apartment. lol, thanks. I was just expecting to be buzzed and all that. My building door hasn’t been functioning correctly recently so I should have guessed.

Anyway, thanks a lot! Came in perfect condition as usual!

So, I was totally fine with what happened. I’m not new to deliveries. UPS and FedEx screws up every once in a while. USPS screws up about as much as they successfully deliver a package–standard government quality.

So I thought that was that. I wanted to let them know that everything was fine since Katie actually took time to give me real suggestions. I figured someone would probably read it and file it away. That’s not what happened. And that’s how you wow a customer.

A while later, I got another reply from FreshDirect customer service saying this:

Thank you for emailing FreshDirect. I am sorry to hear that your order was left unattended.

Upon reviewing your account I see that your order was delivered at 10:45am. I have issued a store credit in the amount of $5.79, for your delivery fee. You will receive an email regarding this credit once it has finished processing and ready to use.

I’d like to thank you for letting us know what occurred and giving us the opportunity to help solve your problem. If, for any reason you’re dissatisfied with how we resolved your problem, or need further assistance, please feel free to e-mail us directly by responding to this e-mail or call us at 212-796-8002.

Your satisfaction is our number one priority!

Sincerely,
Allie

Honestly, I had no expectations. I thought my order was fine. What I ordered arrived in a condition I expected. All was well. FreshDirect didn’t need to do anything more and this blog post would have never been written.

Any marketing student who paid attention in their CRM class can tell you about perceptions and expectations. This is classic exceeding of expectations. It’s simple and it works.

I’m pretty confident Katie and Allie didn’t go to work today expecting to be written about in a blog later that day. But it happens when you wow your customers. Zappos is the classic case study of delivering happiness. I have never shopped with Zappos so I can’t attest to anything. Certainly, if Zappos does an even better job that FreshDirect then I don’t know if I can handle it.

(Okay JetBlue, I like your customer service too–just in case you were getting jealous there. And Virgin–I like you too.)

Aren’t we all just used to terrible customer service? The person tasked with servicing you is either a robot or is reading a script as if they were a robot. You know, “unplug your modem, wait 10 seconds, and plug it back in”. That kind of customer service. You’d think that after all the years of telling customers exactly that, they’d figure we probably already tried that one before waiting 40 minutes.

And so for all those reasons, I think I may be falling in love with FreshDirect. Can you blame me? :)

The Internship You Don’t Want

By Tommy Leung on 07/13/2010 in Life, Marketing

The economy is still in the toilet. We’ve been constantly told the recovery is right around the corner. We turn that corner and the recovery is no where to be seen. It’s bad for the recently graduated and for those of us who just cruised along during the boom–you now need a real skill to stay employed.

Some of us are of the  mindset that things will get back to normal once we hit that corner–back to being employed to do almost nothing and to do it only slightly better than the lowest common denominator. That is never coming back. That way is over.

People need to wake up. We aren’t. At least, not all of us are. I recently saw this on my Facebook feed:

This is the mindset that you just need to ride out the recession. Spend the minor effort now when nothing is going on anyway to put things that look good on your resume. This is an “easy job, looks good on resume”. Doesn’t say anything about what you would learn–if anything. An internship that nets you no new knowledge is about as good as doing nothing.

I’m not criticizing the person offering this position. I’m criticizing the attitude behind it. This attitude is too prevalent. There are a lot of people who believe that things will return to the way they were. But it won’t. The resume is dying.

In a time not too far from now, a resume will be useless. It is almost useless today. I see plenty of people who look good on paper but, can’t do any real work to save their lives.

You don’t need to build up your resume with activities that aren’t too different from wasting time. You need to build up your Google-ability. Do work that can be found. Do work that is meaningful. That you can point to and be proud to say that you were a part of it.

You don’t need an easy job that looks good on a resume.

Nothing Wrong With Nice

By Tommy Leung on 07/07/2010 in Life, Marketing

One of my favorite books is The Power of Nice. In fact, it’s fundamental to how I am–another fundamental book is Whatever You Think Think The Opposite. There is a stigma associated with being nice. As if being nice is bad for you. A commonly known saying is that nice guys finish last. I beg to differ.

And this isn’t just a matter for guys. There’s a popular book titled Nice Girls Don’t Get The Corner Office. I haven’t read the book but, the title pushes the idea that being nice is a negative.

I think the problem lies in how we define “nice”. That word has been used to describe me countless times at countless ages. I’ve heard it a bit often recently. And it’s probably true, I am nice.

But then, there’s those who are “nice”.

There are people who are “nice” because they want something from you. I never want anything from you. Whatever I do, I do it because I want to do it. No strings.

There are people who are “nice” because they have no opinions of their own. They’ll do whatever you say. They aren’t nice, they are weak. I’m thoroughly opinionated and possibly hardheaded. I’ll listen and try to understand where you are coming from but, I will not change my mind simply because you don’t like my point of view. Tough luck.

There are people who are “nice” because they want to known as being nice. They are about as fake as it gets. They are nice and cheery on the outside and plotting your demise on the inside. They’ll resent doing that favor for you but, show you nothing but smiles while doing it.

Who would like to deal with any one of these “nice” people in business or in personal relationships? Let’s be honest, no one likes a con-man, a push-over, or a fake. Whether they want to disguise themselves behind a veil of “nice” is irrelevant. They aren’t what they seem.

There are the truly nice. The truly good. Those who do good things because it’s a good thing to do. Those who believe in themselves and are perfectly okay with others disagreeing. Those who will tell you like it is because that’s what it is. They won’t con you, bore you, or lie to you.

And they do get ahead. In every aspect and with a clear conscience.

When Ideas Have Sex

By Tommy Leung on 06/30/2010 in Life, Marketing

The fastest way to come up with new ideas is to let ideas have sex. Whether the conceived ideas are good or bad is of little importance. Bad ideas will die a premature death. Only the good ideas will survive.

No great ideas came about by themselves. Individuals are credited with being the first to invent or discover something but, that ignores all the work that had gone before to make it possible for this one individual to get there.

It is impossible for the first man to invent a pencil on his own no matter how smart he was. Firstly, he wouldn’t have any time left to invent after he’s done hunting and gathering. The sole effort of getting enough to eat takes up most of the daylight hours. The rest of the time is used to ensure that wild animals don’t kill him at night.

The only way for him to get time to do things other than find food and have a safe shelter is to cooperate with another person. One person finds food and the other builds a shelter. At the end of the day, both have food and shelter in half the time it would have otherwise took them to do it alone.

This is no new revelation. Economists call this comparative advantage. You trade one thing for another. In this case, these two primitive humans are trading food for shelter and vice versa. Both are better off.

In fact, there is no other way for humans to prosper.  There is nothing as uniquely human as trade. Trade is why we are the most dominate life form on the planet. It is why other species of upright apes are no longer with us. They didn’t trade. We did.

No other creature on the planet trades like we do. You never see a dog offer another dog a bone for a rope. It is an idea that is inconceivable to them.

Modern society is built on top of the idea of trade. Everything from our computers to our food is made possible by trade–the trade of goods, services, and ideas.

This blog software that I use came about by the contributions and ideas of thousands of people. Most of whom I will never know. The design, the technology, and the architecture has been built over time little by little. Idea by idea.

They are then glued together by a much smaller group of people to create a tool that has enabled millions of people to write about the mundane to the world changing.

This happened because a lot of ideas had a lot of sex.

True to Me

By Tommy Leung on 06/10/2010 in Life

I visited my parents a couple of weeks ago. My Dad told me that we were going to have a family dinner for my grandfather in a couple of weeks. It’s his birthday soon. Sure, we do this every year. Most of my Aunts, Uncles, and cousins show up and we hang out. It’s a good time.

But, this time, for some reason, my Dad decided to tell me that I should give my grandfather a gift. Actually, just money. My Dad said it would look good.

Oh? Look good to who?

I didn’t like the idea. It wasn’t about the money. It was the principle. I’m not close to my grandfather. In fact, none of the younger generation are. His reputation is that of the grumpy old man.

He doesn’t talk, he just grumbles and frowns. He yells at the younger kids trying to talk to their mothers when there’s a game of Mahjong going on. Apparently, he considers these kids a disturbance slowing down his game. He’s a real charmer.

He’s old. He gets a pass. No one calls him on it.

He can’t connect with the young. We don’t speak the same language. And the language that we both understand–body language–is always negative. In no society is that a way to build a relationship. But that is the reality.

I give gifts because I care about the person I’m gifting. Whether its a gift for no reason or a gift because of an occasion. I do it because I care. I put energy into it. Giving gifts because you have to is not a gift. It’s actually a lie. It’s telling someone you care when you don’t.

I don’t like to lie.

My Dad either didn’t understand where I was coming from or just didn’t care. He didn’t seem particularly happy afterwards.

But, I will not diminish the value of every gift I’ve ever given so that I can put on a show. By no means will I knowingly compromise my principles to project a specific appearance. A compromise here, a compromise there, and before I know it I’ll be ready to become a politician.

Those who want to judge me are free to. I don’t care. I’m super because of what I do. Not because of what others aren’t doing. I don’t measure myself based on how others are failing. If anything, I want to be awesome when everyone else is awesome. It’s not a victory to kick someone when they’re down.

I have always felt strongly about principles. I don’t pick up money off the floor. I’m not talking about coins. I have come across lost bills on more than one occasion. There was one time where I remember seeing about $60 on the floor. I didn’t pick it up.

Why?

Well, it’s not mine. If I picked it up, the person who did lose it will never be able to come back and find it. Yes, it’s a non-practical way to think. Someone else will walk by and pick it up and the original person who lost it won’t get it anyway. I understand that. But, it also means that I didn’t steal it. At the end of the day, that’s just more important to me than a guilty splurge I can have with $60.

Almost $1000 was accidentally deposited into my bank account recently. I viewed the deposit slip online. The bank teller confused a number and put the money in my account. I saw it at night. I went to the bank the next day to get it corrected. I’m not an angel.

This error would have been corrected regardless of whether I did anything. I understand that. But, I went to the bank at my earliest convenience because whoever deposited that money might have needed it. It also wasn’t mine. The only right thing to do was to get it corrected as soon as possible.

My Mom has this story of me when I was little. I used to go to preschool in Manhattan and she would pick me up after work. She would also have food for me. We would take the train home to Brooklyn. I would only eat it if I was seated. I really don’t know why I wouldn’t if I was standing. From what I can gather from my Mom, it was because I wanted to do it the right way.

That sounds like me. I like to do things for the right reasons.

This is how I’ve been for as long as I’ve been. It’s true to me. And I like it.

Invest in You

By Tommy Leung on 05/23/2010 in Life

The economic future I see is very gloomy. Hopefully, I’m wrong. I’m not the only one who doesn’t see an economic recovery. There’s an entire community of economists who don’t. You won’t hear many of them on TV. I guess their position isn’t very popular.

There is one that you might have heard of: Peter Schiff. He predicted the economic crisis we are in when everyone else laughed at him.

The economics really doesn’t add up to a recovery. But, economics isn’t really a science. Not a science like physics at least. Physics can predict the future if given all the variables. It can tell you exactly when a ball will reach the ground when dropped at a certain height in a certain condition.

Economics can’t do that. Economics can’t time it that accurately. Even if one can predict that the economy will go to hell in a hand basket and be correct, it doesn’t mean there won’t be some very prosperous stops along the way.

In the end, none of us really know. Economists aren’t psychics.

We do know we aren’t in a boom. That’s apparent. The economy is in the toilet. That isn’t a prediction. That is the reality. Right now. Whether the economy will recover next year, five years from now, or ten no one can be sure. It can even get incrementally worse for ten years. No one knows.

The only thing that is sure to be a good investment in bad times and good times is you. Whether unemployment sky rockets or falls through the floor, improving yourself is going to be pay off.

It is easy to forgo self improvement in good times. It’ll take a lot of people to frog leap you for it to really matter. And besides, the other guy is probably thinking the same thing. So we all stay in relatively the same place while the good times keep rolling.

It is in the bad times that we suddenly realize that we have to do something to be better than the other guy. The competition is fiercer. The jobs are fewer. The other guy is thinking the same thing. And so it becomes a matter of who can work harder and smarter. The one who continuously improved through good times is sitting in the best position. He’s way ahead of the pack.

If you haven’t been constantly learning as much as you can, it isn’t too late to start now. It’s never too late. There’s always those who are still praying that the good times return instead of doing something about it. Leap frog those guys first.

I’d recommend looking into personal branding. The economy will eventually improve. When it does, the social trends forming right now are going to still be here. Don’t let the rug get pulled from under your feet. The world of Google, Facebook, Twitter, blogs, social media, and the rest of Web 2.0 isn’t only here to stay, it’s here to dominate the way we live, work, and play for the foreseeable future.

So start or continue to invest in you. It’s the safest investment you can make.