“The longer you wait, the harder it is to produce outstanding customer service.”

William H. Davidow

All we have is time.  Time is more valuable than money because no matter what, you can’t buy more of it.  Time wasted is life wasted.

As a customer when does waiting longer for something make it better?  I can’t think of one time where I, as a customer, wanted to wait longer for something than absolutely necessary.  In fact, and especially in today’s world, we should live by the mantra, “when in doubt do it faster.”  Sure, there are experiences where time isn’t a primary concern, such as a great meal at a phenomenal restaurant.  But the minute the time spent is no longer valuable to the customer, it is wasted.  The great meal becomes burdensome if you have to wait for your food longer than you should or if your drink glass sits empty.

Companies that get it right make the customer’s time their top priority.  Starbucks, Chick-Fil-A, Amazon, Apple, etc. They make it easy to do business with them because they know that they are simply enabling something that I, as the customer, desire to accomplish.  The longer it takes, the harder it is for them to serve my need.  They get that customers are trusting them with their most valuable asset, their time, and they do everything they can to make that time spent worthwhile.

So if an experience takes longer than it should, given that a customer will never be able to get that time back, we are failing our customer.  Period.  Find a way to do it faster.  If you don’t someone else will and do you really want your customer experience to be known as a “life wasting experience?”