As I mentioned in my prior blog post, the last few weeks have been quite busy. Kids returning to their campuses to start their fall semesters, holiday weekends and – somewhere in there – squeezing in work amongst all other things that happen.
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One week included time in my old hometown hosting some clients at a football game, catching up with some friends and it was topped off by my son flying in so we could send him off to his second year of college. Then another week as a special guest at a concert for one of my favorite bands all-time.
While I talked about my time in Colorado last week, this week I wanted to talk about the close to that busy few weeks. Memorable experiences come in many forms; this week involves one of our XDay speakers, Scott Steele.
Many opportunities for concerts show up. During these last few weeks, I had already attended two concerts with my daughter Kaylee and was offered the opportunity to attend a third concert with one of my best friends and favorite bands. Who am I to say no?
The day of the show was a busy one. A bus ride to Seattle, a little time downtown, where the crowds were buzzing with excitement. Fans of all ages were heading to the stadium to enjoy the music. Approaching the venue, security was fairly tight. We could see lines building up and growing longer by the minute. We had to wait for our wristbands to enter an area called the “Black Box Lounge” which was a pre-concert area for certain fans. As the lines grew longer, I wondered if we would miss some part of the pre-concert activities for which we had signed up.
After finally getting our wristbands for entry, we walked up to the security line, we were greeted and motioned in for entry. No real screening, I thought they would at least check our tickets. Instead we were quickly ushered into the Black Box Lounge for activities – maybe we were going to get screened after the pre-concert activities.
Our tickets were scanned, we showed our wristbands, and we moved into the underside of the stadium. We got to see exciting relics of past albums from the band’s emergence onto the hard rock scene in the early eighties, which made for some great photo opportunities. As we made our way through the exhibits we had friends messaging us on where they were seated for the show. We thought it would be a great opportunity to visit some people we do not see very often, but we all happened to be together. The catch: one group of friends was seated in the “Club Section” of the stadium – isolated and secured from the rest of the stadium.
We arranged to meet near the entrance of their section. When we arrived, however, our friends were nowhere to be seen and we suddenly could no longer get in touch with them. We figured we could walk close to the door and inquire, but as we entered the area and asked about the section where our friends would be seated by asking, “where is Section 209?” the security in the area just let us pass through as if they thought we were asking about our own section. We did not question it, instead we entered the Club area, finding ourselves immersed in the upscale atmosphere and finding our friends had put their phones in their pockets and missed our messages.
As the concert started, we joined them in a few seats next to their seats that were empty. We expected to be disrupted shortly and asked to return to our own seats, but figured we would enjoy the show with our friends for a few songs. Instead, it turned out that we got to enjoy both opening acts from these premium seats before deciding we would go ahead and return to our purchased seats for the main show.
It was a great evening with a lot of great music and no real incidents, but the lack of adherence to basic security protocols had me thinking about the overall experience. Certainly, my experience was improved in some ways by getting the opportunity to visit with some friends I do not get to see very often. At the same time, I wondered if this lack of protocols could have a negative impact on experiences.
Perhaps the ticket holders of empty seats we occupied did not want to be confrontational, and they did not maximize their enjoyment of the show. Perhaps the exclusive Club section had slightly longer lines and wait times due to stowaways like us entering into the area. What if there had been a security incident or emergency, then the number of individuals in one section might exceed the resources available to tend to that area.
As the night concluded, I reasoned that all the breaches in security resulted in no real harm, but it will give me pause in my future visits. They were certainly friendly, but perhaps too at ease in their roles.
While most individuals will not give it a second thought, there is a bit of a paradox in this situation. I see how enforcement of policies can take some of the joy out of the experience. However, the lack of enforcement certainly improved my experience – but perhaps at the expense of others’ experiences. Overall, had policies been enforced as instructed, the experience would likely match the expectations, which is why we have such policies for the frontline teams anyhow. Using tools like Outerloop technologies will help guide teams to build policies for the frontline and ensure consistent delivery through ongoing measurement.
You will want to join us for XDay 2024 on October 3rd in Austin, TX to see my “partner in crime” from the concert, Scott Steele. Last year, this event sold out, and the feedback was outstanding. It will be a day of learning about Research, Customer Experience, and Employee Experience, and it will also be a lot of fun. Contact me if you want to be my guest with a complimentary ticket.
Find out more here.
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