I take things personally.

I do take things personally. Especially my business. I find it is hard to ‘go bureaucratic’ on people. Putting up rules that explain why something can’t be done. When someone, a client or a colleague, criticizes my work, I take it to heart. In regards to service, I like to service my suppliers the same way I service my clients. I pay my suppliers on time and, just like my clients are good clients to me, I try to be a good client to them.

Last week I realized just how personally I can take things. I have a client that lives a couple of hours away. She was in the salon at the beginning of the week and purchased a beautiful wig. She is rapidly losing her hair due to chemo and needed it for her birthday party the following weekend. I needed to put highlights in it and assured her that I would get it out to her later in the day or the next day at the latest.

On Friday I got a phone call asking me where her new wig was. Uh oh. It was one of those things. It had not been shipped. My baaaad. So the question was now, how do I get it to her by the end of Saturday? Who delivers on Saturday? There are lots of people, but none of them go to the small town that she lives in. I called a buddy of mine that is an executive at Purolator. He was not in (moving his office). I called all over. I finally got someone that would do it. Then they called back and said no, they are too busy to take on new accounts (MUST BE NICE!!). I did not give up. It had to get there. I was even thinking of diving up early in the morning, but I couldn’t since I had to audition for the Marilyn Denis Show (that’s another blog). But I did eventually get back to Purolator. It seems that they have a same day service to that town. Its $215 (!), but I had no choice. I signed off on their fax and they picked it up. They got it to her just after dinner. I had spent most of the afternoon on this file and was very happy that we got it to her in time. I also learned about a couple of things for the future if they are needed. This is taking things personally. It can be stressful, but I would not want to run my business in any other way.