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The Midsummer Crash up

Just when you thought things couldn’t get worse—what with the Dow retreating to a number not seen since the last Bush was President, the current Bush president jawboning executives to “do as I say, not as I did”, and the daily dose of “here a billion, there a billion, anybody seen my billions?”—they got worse.

The national pastime—I’m speaking now of baseball, it’s actually football but don’t tell anyone you know this—has been further sullied by an inexplicable decision to call off play at the annual All-Star Game because of a lack of players. Jack Curry of the New York Times described it like this:

There was a lengthy delay before the bottom of the 11th, and Managers Joe Torre and Bob Brenly, some umpires and Selig conferred near the first base dugout. Selig said that Torre and Brenly came to him to tell him they had used all 30 of their players and were worried about taxing Philadelphia's Vicente Padilla and Seattle's Freddy Garcia, the two pitchers in the game. "I want to take this opportunity to apologize to the fans who were here," Selig said. "Their unhappiness was understood."

Joining the chorus were the managers of the two troupes of entertainers.

"Something like this can happen," Torre said. "The last thing I want to do is send a pitcher like Garcia back to Seattle and he's not ready to pitch."

Brenly added: "Other organizations entrust us with their players. We have to make sure we don't do anything that could hurt them."

For those of you who somehow missed the sports section the day after, or perhaps don’t follow baseball and/or don’t care, here’s a brief recount of sport’s latest and greatest day of infamy starting with a bit of historical perspective.

To go way back, baseball is a game that’s kind of like cricket except the uniforms are generally less tasteful and the scoring isn’t as high. Games generally last a couple of hours instead of a fortnight or more (with the exception of the game in question). From time to time something actually happens down on the field. Mint juleps are not served, nor is beer after the seventh inning.

There are two leagues, each comprised of a roughly equal number of teams. The only real difference between the two leagues is that in one, the pitcher (a person who throws the ball a lot, not a vessel for mint juleps) doesn’t have to also stand in the batter’s box and take his lumps when it’s his turn. Someone called a designated hitter—someone who is generally much larger and most likely on a first name basis with a pharmacist—does it instead.

The only difference between the teams is that four teams have all the money and are the only ones with a real chance of winning the whole thing. Two more will put on a heck of a season with minimal talent thus giving hope to the purists. The rest generally take things seriously until about August and then they begin once again to work on their golf games.

Games are played in large facilities that have a useful life that approximates that of the average passenger car. Every five years, teams seek to trade in their ballpark for a new/old better one, or lacking that, substantial financial concessions from either the city stitched on the front of the team’s uniform, or another that would like to take its place. None of this apparently matters because it turns out that all but four of these teams—all owned and run by real business people I might add—can’t seem to figure out how to make money. In the past, Arthur Andersen LLP audited a number of these teams’ books, so it’s possible the numbers may be a tad off.

The rules of the game, at least as I understand them, are that the team that scores the most “runs” wins. A run means that someone who has previously hit the ball has subsequently advanced to a succession of bases that are scattered about in a large diamond pattern after which he finally returns to where he started, called “home.” There are many rules that govern when and how this person may advance, and there are even situations in which there is no hitting involved. Finally, a run may or may not entail any running. I know: it’s a confusing game.

One guy throws the ball, one guy tries to hit it with a big stick, and eight guys try to catch it. Sometimes there are flurries of activity wherein people run this way and that, but otherwise it’s a great time to work on your tan, practice your penmanship, or polish up a fresh new version of a tried and true insult.

To promote healthy family life, it was decided some time ago that the final score would be tallied at the end of nine innings. Innings end after both teams have a go at hitting the ball until such time as each tallies three outs. Outs are not good, but not fatal. Most runs wins, winner buys the beer.

No winner? No problem. Keep playing until one team scores more runs than the other by the end of some subsequent inning. This is apparently where the All Star game went flooey.

The All Star game occurs at the half way point in something called a season. A season is comprised of a very large number of games, most of which don’t matter as evidenced by the fact that people mostly don’t attend them.

Usually these “Midsummer Classics” are little more than a terribly expensive combination of antique show, living trivial pursuit game, and an interview fest with a game thrown in so that the TV people will give the league lots of money. For the last couple of years, they’ve also thrown in something called the Home Run Derby—baseball’s equivalent of the NBA’s slam dunk contest—which for many fans has become the whole point of the All Star game (witness Sammy Sosa’s freak show moon shots in this most recent contest).

Real baseball aficionados can actually remember bits and pieces from some of these games—like the time Dave Parker threw some guy out from about three bus stops past right field or the time Pete Rose nearly killed Ray Fosse while scoring the winning run—but mostly they are utterly forgettable affairs.

First A Game, and Then . . . What The Heck Happened?

But somehow, this edition of the game was different. In this the year when both American commerce and the American pastime both seem bent on self destruction, something magical began to unfold in Milwaukee. All the Whos is Whoville started to sing and a baseball game broke out.

The giants of the game strode forth onto the field of play to strut their mastery at throwing a ball, running in a straight line, and interpreting ancient Hopi hand signals for which they are paid ridiculous sums of money. They even seemed to be having fun strutting, swinging, leaping, diving, and sometimes breaking a sweat. The fans clapped and cheered and drank their beer and ate their hot dogs and a good time was had by all as inning after inning wound past.

The requisite nine innings came and went with the score tied. This not being hockey or the soccer, there are no penalty shots or sudden death so the game kept going. One young family with small children left and there is a report that some guy in New York turned off his TV because he had to get up early to tout some worthless securities, but otherwise, the fans stayed on.

And the band played on.

And the players played on.

And then inexplicably they “ran out of players.”

I’m not even sure I can explain what this means as it’s not something that has happened at the professional level more than about twice before. But this not being a real game and with guys having to catch flights to make the ESPYs the next day, I guess the millionaires in tights started to look at each other somewhere around hour four and say, “how much longer do we want to do this?”

Unlike most sports, once a player comes out of a baseball game, that’s it. He might as well shower, shave, and break out his Gameboy. It’s over. Normally a manager wouldn’t “run out” of players because he usually only plays the starting nine plus a couple of extra pitchers in case things get too exciting. With twenty suited up at the start of every game, there are still plenty to go around in case someone has a nasty itch or a bad steroid flashback and has to come out early.

But this is the All Star game, and just like a Congressional hearing, everyone who shows up wants to get his turn in the limelight. Go eleven innings and you start to have a problem. Now you have a bunch of fellas sitting around who can’t go back into the game, and nine guys who suddenly find themselves a bit pooped having had to actually play a couple of innings. The last thing anyone wants to do is break one of these precious playthings—recall Joe Torre’s and Bob Brenly’s remarks—soooooooo, I guess we’re out of players. Thanks for coming, drive safe, ba bye!

Needless to say, the fans a bit less than pleased.

Once Again, What About The Customer?

There’s a huge object lesson in here. Like every great moralistic tale, more than one, starting with: never lose your wits when 30 million people are watching. This strikes me as one of those sensible things every father should tell his young son along with:

• Never play cards with a man named Tex.

• There is a better way to skin a cat than sticking its head in a bootjack and jerkin’ on its tail. 

• Don’t drink anything you can’t pronounce.

• Don’t eat anything bigger than your head.

• Never marry a woman named after a city.

The lack of imagination displayed by the commissioner was particularly astonishing. In no particular order, he could have done any of the following instead of sending the customers home in a funk.

1)     Play Ball. “Sorry fellas, we have a game to play. I don’t see any rain, so we keep playing.”

2)     Dig Deep. Rules are rules.  You’re out of players and you can’t put someone in who’s left the game. Somebody else’s high priced pitcher is getting more work than makes sense given that this isn’t a “real game.” Okay, how about this? Put the pitcher in left field and tell him to catch anything hit in his direction or get out of the way so someone else can. That leaves seven other guys plus the catcher. Surely one of them can throw the ball reliably from the pitcher’s mound to home plate. Adjust accordingly. Without a doubt, this will produce a bushel of runs. With luck someone can get three outs, the other side gets a chance to play the same game and the game ends with a winner. The game lasts one more inning, no longer. History is made, the fans go home laughing, and a couple of big leaguers get to tell the story about how they got to pitch because nobody else could.

3)     Break the Rules. It’s not a real game, right? Go back to the beginning and start putting in some of those well rested super stars. Afraid of injury? Fifteen minutes of yoga should handle that. Still afraid of injury? See plan 2.

4)     Adopt Different Rules. Other sports deal with ties just fine. Why not borrow from hockey or soccer and go to baseball’s version of penalty kicks? Restart the homerun derby. Five hitters, one pitch each, most home runs win. Or stage a foot race from second base. One guy from each team. One heads towards third and the other towards first. First guy to home plate wins. The collision at home would be terrific.

5)     House Rules. Flip a coin. Draw cards. Pitch pennies. Lag quarters. We’re talking about the big leagues here. These guys know all about how to do these things.

6)     Senate Rules. Voice vote of the fans. All in favor of the American League winning say “Aye.” All opposed say “Nay.” The National League wins!

7)     Customer Rules. They say the customer always knows best, how about this? “Attention ladies and gentleman. It seems that we’ve run out of pitchers. The National League is looking for a right hander. If you’re over 18, are prepared to sign a wavier, and can pitch, please report to the bull pen immediately. We’ll provide the hat and glove.” Off hand, I’d say that would generate a sufficient pool of candidates in about 90 seconds. Big news moment. Big fan moment. Two pitches and the ball is OUTA HERE! Thanks for coming, drive safe, ba bye!

The wags who write about this sort of thing for a living are busy putting forth all sorts of sensible ideas about having more players on the All Star roster, changing the rules to allow players back into the game, not seeking to play everyone on the roster, and so on. No doubt these are terrific ideas, systematic solutions to a problem that probably should have been foreseen, but wasn’t.

That same line of thinking applies to any business that deals with customers. No matter how much you cogitate on what the customers do and don’t want, will and won’t do, or might and might not ask, you still won’t cover the full territory. There are simply too many variables. That’s what makes it life. That’s what makes it fun.

That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try. If you’re serious about delivering a superior, branded customer experience, you’re going to have to make a serious go at designing business processes and business rules that will deliver against all the probable scenarios.

And then you need to do something more. You need to do all the little things that great organizations do to create what might be called a “self-confident organization” which is another way of saying an organization filled with people who:

1)     Understand and believe in the brand promise. They know it, live it, speak it, and deliver it all the time and everywhere. The promise isn’t just words.

2)     Understand and believe in their own power to act. Particularly if you’re in some sort of service business, the only thing the customers remember and talk about is what the people they meet and speak with do. Solve my problem, show some initiative and imagination, make it pleasant, make me feel like I’m valued, and I’ll love you and your brand.  Well, your people just aren’t going to be able to do that if they’re not confident enough to think and act to do what’s right for the customer.

3)     Actually care about what they do. There are janitors who take great pride in what they do, and executives who take zero pride in the craft of leadership and management, and every permutation in between. You want people who are passionate about what they do. You want people who find personal satisfaction and fulfillment in working in your organization. You want people who are serious about their craft and that see working for you as an opportunity to hone it.

4)     Like customers. I’ve met many executives who talk about customers like they were a bucket of range balls. I’ve met gate agents, store managers, and plenty of other customer contact people who seem to feel the same way. We all have. We’ve also met people who genuinely seem to like dealing with customers. Some of that comes factory installed. So hire for those kinds of people. A lot of it can be built up and developed by colleagues, managers, and leaders who make caring about the customer a priority. So spend the time, money, and effort to do that. That’s what every champion customer experience company on the planet does.

In the grand scheme of things, the non-ending of the 2002 All Star game probably doesn’t matter all that much. Though it will be duly etched into baseball lore, to be argued about, recounted, and lied about for decades to come, most casual fans will forget about it by next weekend, particularly if the battle of the rich and richer ends in a season ending lockout. Who knows? History may show the man they call "The Commissioner" may even have made the right decision (right and wrong being completely arbitrary concepts).

But as an object lesson in what happens when the people making decisions have well and truly forgotten about the values that define the brand, and the customers who pay the freight expecting that promise to be delivered, it’s a tale without peer.

There’s a lesson here beyond baseball, one that all of us who deal with customers should not soon forget. Don’t make a promise—a brand promise, a service promise, a product promise, an experience promise—that you don’t intend to move heaven and earth to fulfill.

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Last modified: 05/03/06