Chip Bell - Keynote Speaker and Author, Inside Your Customer's Imagination [Customer Service]

Nick Glimsdahl 0:05

Hello and welcome to the Press 1 For Nick podcast. My name is Nick Glimsdahl. And my guest this week is chip bell. chip is a highly sought-after keynote speaker and a prolific writer. He’s considered a well, world-renowned authority on customer loyalty and service innovation. In fact, global gurus ranked him in 2020 for the sixth straight year in a row in the top three keynote speakers in the world on customer service. That’s awesome. He’s also written more than 700 columns. For the Business Journal magazine and top blogs. He’s appeared on CNN, CNN, NBC, CBS, Fox, business, Bloomberg, ABC NPR radio and has worked on a featured fortune worked in features and fortune Businessweek, Forbes Fast Company magazine, Wall Street Journal, USA, car magazine, and others. Dr. Bell has authored numerous national-selling best books. And however the newest one, his newest book is inside your customers imagination, the five secrets for creating breakthrough products, services and solutions, which launched now just here in September 2020, which we’ll talk about here in just a little bit. Chip. Welcome to the Press 1 For Nick podcast.

Chip Bell 1:20

Oh, thanks, Nick. Great to be with you.

Nick Glimsdahl 1:22

Man. You know, you you’ve been around and you’ve done some great things when I can’t. I can barely get through it without taking five or six breaths. So

that’s a legend in my own mind.

We used to call some guy around with Liam. And that was it that was it legend in his own mind. So before we get started, I asked everybody on the podcast. Yeah. What is one thing that people might not know about you?

Chip Bell 1:52

I want to open for the Backstreet Boys.

Nick Glimsdahl 1:56

No way.

Chip Bell 1:57

I did. honest to goodness. I know. the operative word is what’s the long story but I did for the Backstreet Boys. And I love to play the piano and say, Billy Joel, stop.

Nick Glimsdahl 2:13

Wow, that is absolutely awesome. What song If you could sing and play one more song?

Chip Bell 2:20

What would it be? Amazing Grace.

Nick Glimsdahl 2:23

Very cool. Yeah. Very cool. Great. Yeah, absolutely. Is that, um, is anywhere Have you singing and playing the piano online?

Chip Bell 2:34

Yeah, this is a couple YouTube videos of me playing and singing. In fact, for this new book inside your matching customers imagination, I actually wrote compose a song that is in the book. So yeah, it’s actually one in the book, actually, I wrote a song book and wrote a song book, I’ll compose the whole song book for the part of the publicity and marketing. And you can go online, and you can get the book on my website. And also, if you’d like to hear the accompaniment, provided that as well. So that way, you got the sheet music, and you can follow along and sing it. But Oh, yeah. Do you look at that book on page? One, 160. They all say the sheet music.

Nick Glimsdahl 3:23

Alright, check it out. walk by it. I’m actually opening it up right now, ladies and gentlemen. Just Colin, there it is costing contracts

Chip Bell 3:32

about that. So

Nick Glimsdahl 3:34

that is very cool. Yeah, I can’t believe that you open up for the Backstreet Boys. So I’ve heard some really cool things have never heard that one. So speaking of the book, you’ve written a lot of books, and you’ve had a lot of success. What made you write this book?

Chip Bell 3:53

Well, I think that’s a great question, Nick. I think part of it is the fact that organizations today all know, they’re supposed to continue to innovate, or they don’t survive. But as customers, expectations are always changing. And typically, they turn to their r&d facility, their research and development folks from best practices, a variety of ways to say, we got to come up with a new product of this or new service or new solution. But you and I are customer people, and and they rarely go well, let’s talk to our customers about helping us invent this new product. Yeah, despite the fact that there are tons of examples out there were companies have just done that. I mean, they don’t often publicize, our customers created this for us. But nevertheless, the customer’s fingerprints are on them. And and so I thought what that would be a cool thing to look at is if you want to innovate, how would you how do you go inside your customers imagination and get them involved? Co creating with you?

Yeah, yeah,

that’s kind of the premise. I’ve been involved in innovative service, the concept of a unique service for a number of years and this was sort of a next step.

Nick Glimsdahl 5:00

Yep, I love it. And there’s so many good things. And I think we’d have a lot of episodes if we actually walk through the entire book. However, let’s talk about it without giving up the the secret sauce.

Chip Bell 5:15

I don’t want. your listeners won’t tell anybody.

Nick Glimsdahl 5:19

They won’t. They won’t hopefully, hopefully the the three people that listen to this won’t tell anybody. What are the five secrets for creating breakthroughs? Based on

Chip Bell 5:29

this a little backstory about it? When I began to realize this is a book about innovation. Yep. So if you looked at the most innovative organizations in the world, and you can name them when you ask anybody, and they’ll come up with Oh, Google, and Amazon and Pixar and companies like that, if you went inside their culture, and go, Okay, one of the features of their culture, the common among the these kinds of organizations, what do you find? Well, one, and here go your secrets. They’re intensely curious. So one of the secrets is all about curiosity. And I can come back and talk about why those are important. But these are secrets. The second is they’re they’re highly grounded, they know exactly what they’re focused on. And they don’t get distracted and go down rabbit holes. Third, they’re about risk taking, I call it discovery. It’s all about taking risks that result in learning and in progress and improvement. That forth, they’re focused on how to create an atmosphere of trust. And the last one is they’re all passionate. They’re very passionate about what they do. And so if you take those, those the vibe secrets, and say, I took those and said, Okay, what if you took those five, curiosity, grounding, discovery, trust, passion, and apply them to a relationship with a customer? What would that look like? And so again, part of the premise is, customers imagination is on the inside. And I like to think of it as a door opened only from the inside. And so the question becomes, is, how do I get my customer to open their door to their imagination, and share with me their kind of crazy off the wall half baked that is that we can use to help collaborate in creating a new product, service or solution. And they all fit under kind of a partnership relationship. And so the more they experience my curiosity and interest in them, the more they’re willing to open that door, and see it as a trusting environment, relationship that is not laced with fear, the more we stay grounded, the more we can find the intersection between their hopes and aspirations and our aspirations as an organization, the more we focus on creating an atmosphere of trust, so you see how it goes is all those elements are all part of creating the relationship, the partnership, so that there is a willingness and a fruitfulness and how we co create together how we collaborate on a new product service or solution.

Nick Glimsdahl 7:57

Yeah, and I think the key to that is collaboration, it’s the coexisting they’re working through it and say, I don’t know everything, I need your help.

Chip Bell 8:06

Exactly, exactly. It’s it takes humility, transparency. And you find that in, in these great organizations renowned for breakthrough, I’ve had a good, good opportunity to work with some of those that are sort of on the cutting edge. Good example is Lockheed Martin, and specifically worked with their Skunk Works group in the Skunk Works well, I asked one of the folks I was working with that. I said, What exactly do you all do? And he said, Well, if I told you, I’d have to kill you, but then he said, Did you see Star Wars? And I go, yes, I’ll Star Wars. He said, Well, that’s what we work on. We work on air defense, 50 years from now, 30 4050 years from now. And so they’re looking at real creative kind of applications of air defense in this case. But when you talk to those folks who worked there, they’re all passionate, they’re all humble. You know, they’re not into showing off. They’re not arrogant, and it’s a very safe environment. And I can tell lots of stories about my experience working with them in Palmdale where they’re headquartered. But it’s a it’s a fast, and I think you find that characteristic of most organizations that are highly innovative and creative. They’re all about driving, as Deming said, How do you drive fear out of the workplace? Hmm,

Nick Glimsdahl 9:21

yeah. But most of the companies that you actually ask, maybe they will tell you, they won’t try to kill you if you actually do.

Chip Bell 9:31

Some, I’m just kidding. Anyway.

Nick Glimsdahl 9:34

I’ve scaled through life so far. So so far, but so the very first one is curiosity. What does curiosity mean to chip?

Chip Bell 9:43

Well, it means First of all, that I am intensely interested in my customer deeper than normal. I talk about the principle of eccentric listening. eccentric listening. It’s a phrase I made up, it’s not really a I’ve never heard of it before. But if you think about eccentric is kind of out of the Ordinary out of the box, you know, different, unique, unusual, it’s how do we help the customer? How we show that we are sincerely interested? How do we show that customer that they are truly valued? And in so doing, how do we get them to dream with us dream? And and how do you ask questions, inquiry questions that take them to a dreamer state I give an example. I was working with a pizza company, you know, well, we all know it’s very famous pizza company delivery pizza. And they were interviewing lots of folks doing focus groups with lots of their customers. And we assume that we would be focusing on three things price product and process, you know, and we’d be hearing things like, well, your pizza is not that great, or which is all about the product, or it costs too much or takes too long to get it in the process. But because we ask dreamer questions like, What’s something no pizza companies ever thought about doing that you think would be cool? You know, that’s the dreamer question that’s taking the customer out of the frame. We kept hearing customer say, what about the box? We go the box? Yeah, yeah, we, you know, I get a pizza throw the box away? Why would you do something with the box? We go? Well, what would you have in mind? Well, you know, you could turn it into a puzzle, you could turn it into a game, you could turn it into a coloring book, you could turn it into a Halloween mask, there’s all kinds of stuff you can do with the inside of the top cover of that mask we’re sharing a few years later, I’m working with a paper manufacturer that made pizza boxes for this company. And sure enough, there was when you open the pizza up on the inside of the front cover, you could just peel off a layer of plastic and there was a coloring book, or there was a mask you could cut out or there was a variety of things they were on, you never knew what you’re gonna get in terms of a pizza box, you know what it was, but then there’s an example of something a customer that the organization was focused on pizza product product, and the customers go What about the log some feature? And so it’s getting customers to think that way dream beyond and only through that intense curiosity. Can you do that I talked about be the customer. And I bet you people who have kids little leaguers heard have heard that phrase a lot. It’s always in the form of the the bowl, which is a way to get that youngster who’s standing at bat. And a ball is coming from the pitcher to stay focused on the ball, the the ball, but what about? Well, what if you apply that to customer and you be the customer? What does that look like? Well, you actually did the work of the customer. What if you were the customer? My wife’s hairdresser, Johnny adairs a good example. He from time to time gets a permanent. I said, Johnny, why do you do that? He said, Well, I realized, when women come in to get a permanent, it can be one of the most awkward, uncomfortable things they go through. So I thought if I could do it, if I get a permanent, I see exactly what they experienced, and enabled me to make some changes, and how I serve them. So it was a more comfortable experience. So there’s a true example of being the customer. All of those demonstrate your curiosity with a customer.

Nick Glimsdahl 13:06

What’s the opposite of being curious?

Chip Bell 13:09

indifference, indifference. And actually, that the interesting thing about indifferent when it comes to service is customer customers hate indifferent service worse than they do bad service. Because you know, when you get bad service, you go, Well, you know, the people weren’t properly trained or whatever, they got bad supervision, or it’s a brand process, you have lots of room to blame other stuff. When the frontline versus indifferent. It clearly says you don’t care. Well, that’s my perception, you don’t care. And so it is only kind of one interpretation for indifference. Whereas poor service might have a variety. They might excuse you for poor service. They don’t excuse you for indifferent. So in many ways, the opposite of curiosity is complete indifference. And And again, it’s it’s worse than bad service.

Nick Glimsdahl 13:59

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It’s It’s It’s awful. And we’ve all experienced it and can kind of what you said we’ve all been consumers, all of us are consumers and something Yeah, but um, you know, he said in the book, a couple of things that while you say a whole lot in the book, but you say listen without an ulterior motive and to listen with your whole body, what does that mean?

Chip Bell 14:21

It means you look like all over like you’re listening and you know, every fiber in your body is all focused on you know, I like to think about as raffle listening you know, if you were to raffle you know, and and they they bout to call the winning number and you’re gonna win that new car. If somebody walked up to you and tried to interrupt you to have a conversation you’d probably go I don’t I’m focused here you ever answer body of your body is all focused on hearing that winning number. And that’s what I’m saying is when you when you focus, focus, focus with with listening like you are that’s only like that person’s only unit only thing in the world and we feel That when people listen like that, but it’s also listening, as you mentioned, without an agenda, I mean, I, I’m listening to learn, and I have no other goal, no objective, I’m not listening here to correct or to teach, I’m not listening here to tell you how you’re wrong. I’m not listening for any other thing other than just to learn. And what causes what happens when you do that is that customer feels truly valued, not just heard and understood, a feel valued. And out of that, they feel the comfort to say, I, you know, you care about me, and I’m willing to share my crazy ideas with you. So again, it’s all about getting that door to open from the inside and share that imagination.

Nick Glimsdahl 15:42

ensuring that those crazy ideas or even complaints for that matter, is, is an opportunity to to improve. Because there’s not a whole lot of times, I mean, employees will will step up and say, Hey, this is where we’re going wrong. And here’s where I see some of these pain points. But if we can continue to listen to those customers, right, we’re going to continue to improve.

Chip Bell 16:04

Absolutely, absolutely. You know, what’s that old adage, people don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care. And so it’s that same thing. It’s, it’s demonstrating caring.

Nick Glimsdahl 16:13

And so what’s the difference between focusing on your customers and not on the procedure?

Chip Bell 16:18

Well, I think you, when you focus on the customer, oftentimes the customer can help. If there’s a process broken, they can go, Hey, you know, what we, this needs to be corrected, or we can work a lot better if it went like this, or, in other words, you know, all processes are human created. And so if I listen to people, they can give me oftentimes information that and then occurred to me that, you know, like the pizza company, I thought about the box, yeah, I’m worried about the pizza price in the process. And so again, listening to that customer can oftentimes point you to ways to improve the price. If I listen to the process, I’m not gonna learn much about the customer. But if I listened to the customer, then I’m gonna learn a lot about the process.

Nick Glimsdahl 17:02

And the customer

and the customer. Yeah,

I love that. So you talk also in the book about and maybe I’m gonna botch this, but imagination, chi or Chi, O, ci, ci, imagination, ci, what is imagination? Ci?

Chip Bell 17:19

Yeah, it’s all it’s it’s all about letting go freedom. creating an atmosphere, TCE is a is the Asian in Asian word for energy. You know, if live, people have ci, dead people don’t have any T, our expression, we have a tachy that we teach, if you’ve seen people do Tai Chi, which is all about learning to move the body, which moves the energy in different parts of the body. Acupuncture has a part of its How it works is all about creating blocks to move ci in a different direction. So it’s about energy. So I just used that ci to say, that concept of energy to say, how do you create imagination, energy, how do you create, and part of it, again, is all about removing the any kind of judgment, any kind of fear of making a mistake, it’s creating a total judgment free environment. And there are many techniques to do that. But it’s in part of it is creating a kind of playful environment. You know, we think of if you thought of an organization less as a boardroom, and more as a playground. Now you’re sort of in that realm. People oftentimes talk about Google and how, you know, people are all riding around in the halls and bicycles, and they got all these places that they can hang out that already colorful music and all that looks like they’re not working very hard. Because we look at their bottom line and go and you think they’re doing pretty well? Well, part of it is the fact that they’re trying to create an atmosphere of work. That is like a playground. And, and out of that comes the sort of relaxation of rigid judgment, to allow the freedom, the CI for imagination, and innovation, breakthroughs, those kinds of things. So it’s helping to nurture that kind of environment.

Nick Glimsdahl 19:16

Yeah, actually, the first time I saw that was probably I don’t know, 22,008 2009. And it was a marketing firm that we walked into, it is actually a part of a corporate headquarters. And they had this table, that it had Legos all over it. And then underneath of it was just his his glass table. And it had all of these things that kind of get you got your mind going a little bit. And I thought that was really unique because nobody else is doing it.

Chip Bell 19:41

Right. Right. And it caused your mind to go in new directions and opens you up into rooms that you hadn’t been in, and there’s where the new ideas come from. So yeah,

Nick Glimsdahl 19:52

yeah. So the fourth secret is trust. Yeah. And you say trust means a readiness to take risks with your customer. So you explain what you mean, when you say trust is honor an action.

Chip Bell 20:04

Yeah, it’s honor an action. It is all about transparency. It’s all about being who you are. It’s about genuineness, Authenticity, that’s honor and action, it is all about no wearing no mask, in terms of not not a COVID mass. But, you know, the Greek word for personality is mask. And so we all sort of wear a mask, but the more I can be who I am, really who I am, the more there is a trustworthiness between us. And, and, and part of what I focus on in that chapter, in that section around trust is also around truth, have truth is a is one component of building trust. So I can open that door and take take the unnecessary risk. And, and we live, we live in a world where it’s sort of, we talk about truth. And then we have all these examples where it’s not really that truthful. And again, upon a fun example is you’re a let’s say, you take the stand in a trial as witness and versa. And they asked you to do is put your hand on the Bible, hold your hand up and say, I swear to tell the truth. But it doesn’t stop there does it? Then it’s the whole truth is not stopping there, and nothing but the truth and then name stop there. So help me God. Go, why come they have all of that three truths in that? Well, it’s because people often aren’t totally transparent. They often have white lies, they all have these not quite tell you everything. And so what do we do to break down that kind of reluctance to be totally honest, I was on a flight before COVID. And the pilot said, another old time landing with Mayday airlines or whatever airlines, okay, I was flying so much. I couldn’t even remember that. But that’s another old time. We’ll call it Mayday. This for fun. Another old time around when I looked at my iPhone, and I go with 14 minutes late. So when we get off the plane, he’s standing in the cockpit door. I said, we’re 14 minutes late. Oh, well, but you said we were on time. Well, the FAA gives us a 15 minute grace period, because we can’t control what’s happening on the tarmac. Wow, I go, what about being honest, you know, telling the truth? Can you imagine that song from my fair lady, get me to the church within 15 minutes of the wind? I don’t think that we’re so what I’m saying is, is we have all kinds of examples. My favorite is the one where you are in a fast food restaurant you pull up and the person that’s taking your order the drive thru says, pull over to the parking lot, whereby we’ll bring it out to you. Now Now what that’s about is about how long you stay stay in that lane. It’s a meter that’s running. And so one time I got in that line, and one of the fast food restaurants, and it was lamb o’clock in the morning, one a soul in line. I said, You know, I think I’ll just sit here, nobody’s behind. If anybody comes up, I’ll pull over to the parking lot. That way, you won’t have one of your phone. If one of your folks have to bring it all the way out. I’m just handed through the window. Oh, no, no, no, you’re gonna get me in trouble cuz you go mess up my time in the wind. And I go, Wait a minute. So what we’re doing is we’re gaming a number that everybody in the organization to the CEO knows is being gamed by having the customer boil over. So you get the fake read on how long it really takes me in the wonder, because I just moved out, because you’re not tracking and while I’m out there. So there’s an example of and most fast food restaurants do and you go, but you aren’t getting a real picture here. I just said here, you’d get the real picture of how long people are sitting there not. So what I’m saying is there there’s countless examples where we’re not totally, totally true. But what you find in a great partnership, is that assertive honesty, that being totally truth trustworthy, and being truthful, to nurture it. So again, that’s, it’s all about how do you create that? Yeah.

Nick Glimsdahl 24:04

And I love the the three truths that you just said, How do you get that in business? What What do you need to say, or create that openness and say, hey, it’s time to dream. Now tell me your honest truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

Chip Bell 24:20

Well, it’s just it starts with a leader who’s willing to be totally trustworthy and honest and direct. I gave you example, I had the wonderful opportunity and number of years ago to work with Harley Davidson. I taught in their university, they have a Harley Davidson university where they bring in their dealers from all over the world and over a multi day period and train them in all kinds of workshops. And I used to teach classes in customer service for the rich cherlene was the CEO at that time. And he would go for in front of his folks, this would be even at this meeting where there’d be 1500 dealers, and he’d say, Here’s that my screwed up home, and what I learned from it Now, think about that. I’m gonna say yeah, here’s how I screwed up on this week. And what I learned from it. Well, that sets the tone that say it’s okay to make mistake. It’s okay to be honest. It’s okay to be transparent. You know, I got a chance to work with her. Herb Kelleher at Southwest Airlines, you couldn’t find somebody more open and transparent than her. I mean, he was a fun guy. But he was all about being just tell me the truth. And so when you find these cultures, where people are willing, the leader is willing to be forthright, open and honest, tell the truth, then it gets honored in that organization and respected in that organization. And when somebody fails to do that, a be telling the whole truth, being totally forthright, it shows it looks different, they look weird, you know, and those that aren’t willing to do that find out they are sooner or later out of place so much out of place, they don’t want to live there. They don’t want to work there. They want to go somewhere else. And so they go to Vegas. So anyway, but but that’s what I’m saying is is where it starts, I think with leaders willing to model that. But it’s not just about the leaders. It’s about being courageous. You know, we don’t all have to have, you know, I’m all like my boss laughs I’m allowed to I mean, your mama told you better than that, you know? So you know that when you were kid, we all say, will they do that? I will do it. Well, if they stuck their hand in the fire? Would you do that? Just because I did it. Your parents talked about that. So you don’t need a leader to Romana it. But it certainly makes it easier. Because in that kind of environment.

Nick Glimsdahl 26:37

Yeah. Yeah. I love the fact that you guys talk about inside the book, you talk about passion, and why it’s never why it’s important to never stop courting.

Chip Bell 26:48

Yes, that’s right. My wife said,

Nick Glimsdahl 26:50

Yeah, and explain the why it’s why it’s important to never stop courting.

Chip Bell 26:56

Well, that was a line my wife used at our 50th women or 40th wedding anniversary, we’ve been married, oh, now 50. Some years be right. But But what it says is, you you make sure that that there’s you take good care of the customer, and that you don’t ever take them for granted. It means that, you know, if you treated every customer, no matter how long they’ve been with you, as if they’re still a prospect you’re trying to make try to close a deal or, you know, you’re trying to get them to become your customer. You know, you showed your best self you did the extra little things you remembered in small ways, you know, well, you know, great relationships don’t stop just because now were their customer. And they continue to nurture that, like if they you know, because you want it to last a long time, you want to be a long term, long term partnership. But it starts it starts with how passionate you are, I mean that, you know, I like to think of passion as being three words past I own, it’s the bring in the best of who you are to somebody else. Rolo, may the great philosopher said there’s an energy field between all humans, and we reach out in passion, it’s met with an answer and passion and changes the relationship forever. So it’s all about being willing to bring that excitement, enthusiasm and interest in every moment at every turn. And so to me, that’s you find those organizations. And they they do that in part because they have a cause they have a noble purpose that they’re they’re interested in, and then that becomes the fuel around their their energy. And when you’re working with somebody, you feel that sense of connectedness, kinship around this particular mission, or cause, you know, we see it in great athletic teams, we see it in high performance teams, we see it in military groups, in a combat situation where the mission is important. They’re all brought together, and they’re tighter than you can imagine. Because, you know, they’re willing to invest together. And so that’s the kind of thing you’re trying to nurture in a partnership with your customer.

Nick Glimsdahl 29:01

Yeah, yeah, I think I talked about how it’s so important to never stop dating your customers. Yeah. And it might not might not be politically correct. But it’s the right terminology is right way to think we worry too much

Chip Bell 29:13

about political correctness, particularly when people clearly get your meaning. Yeah,

Nick Glimsdahl 29:18

yeah. That’s right. Yeah. So I wrap up every podcast with with two questions. Okay. And the first one is what book or person has influenced you the most in the past year? And then the second one is, if you can leave a note to all the customer service representatives are all the customer service professionals. What would it say?

Chip Bell 29:36

Okay, let me start with the last one first. I think if I could leave a note for every frontline person, particularly, it would be you you are brilliant. You are super smart. You are a great human being and don’t ever forget that and act as if you are, you know, act every moment. I’m a great human being, you know, So that’s that’s is part of my spiritual upbringing, probably the thing. Every human being is a child of God and we shit. When we act out of that sense of greatness, the amazing things happen. So I think that’s the first one, I get the first book, you said, first thing you said is a book or a person, a lot of people, but I’m a book person, I’m in the books. And the book I just recently read and reviewed, was a book by my good friends to second edition she just came out with, and I happen to have it here. It’s called selling with noble purpose, selling witness or second edition by Lisa McLeod. And at what moved me, I wrote it, I wrote her in, in my review on Amazon, I said, You had me at page x one, she tells a story on the very preface, that you want you to get to that story. You go, Oh, my God, you get the whole book. And you want to learn more. But here’s the story. Real quick. She was asked to do a study for a major sales company, about why people why high performers do better than low performers. But they were doing a double blind study. So she had no idea. The performers that were the best versus the worse, she wrote, we did rides with all these sales reps and travel. And then what she had one rep, who said, Well, I don’t tell people more than this to them. But one time a number of years ago, I had a I was in a hospital call. And he was a pharmaceutical company and a woman came up and said, I want to you’re representing this company that sells pharmaceut. Yeah, I want to thank you for all the wonderful things it’s done for my life. I can play with my grandchildren, I can do all these things. Because your farmer said, she said, Every time I have a down day, I think about that. And every time I go into a situation, it’s late in the day, I think about that woman, and the difference we made in her life. There was a noble purpose she had Well, she looked back at her notes. And all she found a number of people where they would talk about not in different terms, some noble purpose that tend to drove them. And so when they came in, asked the person leading the study said know which of these people that you all covered. Who do you think’s that best performer? She said, Well, I can think of five. And she named them off. Because they had no idea that performance, the fancy name, where the top five performers in the company, and the woman who told the story about the woman, they came up to her the hospital, she not only was the number one sales rep in the company, but she had been for three years straight. And so all of a sudden, she realized what drives people within that. And more than anything is when they have a noble purpose. And I think for any just people in sales, just focus on that. But anybody who’s in the business of serving others, the more we see it as a calling, the more we see it as a mission, the more we see it is not just getting through the day or collecting a paycheck, but making a difference in the life of that next one. And that next one, that next one. To me, that’s what it’s all about. I was very moved by that story. And it’s philosophy.

Nick Glimsdahl 33:08

I appreciate you sharing that. Chip. What’s the best way for people to get ahold of you?

Chip Bell 33:13

It’s a website I can remember chip bound.com

Nick Glimsdahl 33:19

and I think you can also connect with him on on LinkedIn. Tip our bell at Twitter chip our bell also not also at the end of his name, but Instagram. Yeah, Instagram that he got a chip I appreciate your time everybody else. Go buy his book inside your your customer imagination, the five secrets for creating breakthrough products, services and solution. I appreciate your time. It’s been a blast, and I look forward to seeing the success you have.

Chip Bell 33:46

Thanks. Thanks, fun to be with you.

Nick Glimsdahl 33:47

Take care, man.

Chip Bell 33:48

All righty, you take

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The Press 1 For Nick podcast is both educational and engaging, and each episode offers listeners a dynamic blend of insightful stories, best practices, and invaluable lessons.

Nick’s guests – each with a unique wealth of knowledge – include leaders from a variety of backgrounds and industries. Some of his guests include:

Customer service & customer experience leaders
A hostage negotiator
Award-winning authors
Home Depot’s Senior Director of Customer Care
Former VP of Disney’s Magic Kingdom
Lyft’s Head of Partner and Customer Engagement
Deputy Chief Veteran Experience Officer from the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs

On every episode Nick asks his guest two questions:

What book or person has influenced you the most in the past year?
If you could leave a note to all the Customer Service and CX professionals, what would it say?

You can find all the podcast guests’ answers under their episodes below.

If all you want is the guests’ book recommendations, you can go here.

Subscribe on: Listen on Apple Podcasts Listen on Spoti Listen on Goog isten