Good vs. Great

What is the difference between good and great?  I don't necessarily mean good and great companies (I think that book has already been written!) or even good and great employees, I mean good and great in everything and anything.  Good and great companies, good and great employees, good and great restaurants, good and great lovers, good and great customer service, good and great vacations…I believe that the difference between good and great is the same in almost all cases--or at least, all the cases I can think of.  Not being a columnist for Cosmo or a lifestyle magazine, I will limit the discussion in this article of this idea to the difference between good and great in companies, employees and customer service.

So, how do we define "good"?  Good is about meeting expectations.  A good customer service experience is one that where the company acts reasonably within the realm of expectation if I have a problem.  When I go to a restaurant, I know what a good restaurant is, the restaurant meets my expectations around service, quality and price.  A good employee is one who does their job as it is spelled out by their manager.

Great can be a difficult thing to get our hands wrapped around.  What defines "great"?  In my view great is an employee who goes beyond what is expected of them.  An employee who comes into your office one day and says, "I had an idea over the weekend (imagine that!  He/she was thinking about work outside their regular hours!  Try not to fall off your chair!) and I did some interesting research you may want to look at…"  Wouldn't that be great?  Wouldn't it be great if an employee came up with something new to save money or increase revenue outside of their specific job function?  Wouldn't it be great if it was a "fully baked" thought rather than just a random thought? Wouldn't it be great if you went to a restaurant that completely exceeded your expectations?

What has become clear to me is that the difference between something good and something great is about whether expectations are met (good), whether expectations are exceeded (great) or whether expectations you didn't even imagine are exceeded (very great).  This is true even when expectations are very high and are met.  Imagine if we only know excellent restaurants, our expectation for restaurants is very high and we don't get as excited as someone who only knows mediocre restaurants who would go to these same restaurants.  In other words, what one person considers good, someone else may consider great based on the different expectations.  I call this the living in Manhattan restaurant effect.  You have very high expectations for restaurants so it is hard to call one great.

When I lived in New York, I used to go to a French restaurant in my neighborhood regularly and I became acquainted with the owner over time.  One day he told me he was closing the restaurant and opening a restaurant in Knoxville (or was it Nashville?).  When I asked why, he said, "On the day I open in Knoxville, I will be the best French restaurant, if not the best restaurant of any kind, in town.  I would like to be the best for once in my life!  Here in New York, I am just a good neighborhood French restaurant.  In Knoxville, I will be all the rage."  I guess the expectations of restaurants are different in New York than those in Knoxville.  What is good in New York, becomes great in Knoxville.  What is good customer service at the Department of Motor Vehicles becomes substandard at a five star hotel.  What is good anything at a five star hotel is great at a Holiday Inn.

What I have found to be really interesting about this as it pertains to managing employees is that an employee really becomes great when they meet expectations that their manager didn't even have for the employee or the employee met a requirement the manager has with his or her boss.  They have met a requirement that hasn't even been assigned to them, it may not have even been articulated to them.  What this really shows is that the employee is in alignment with what is important to the manager.  The employee is not just meeting the requirements of their own role but is looking beyond the role to helping their manager be successful.  This is greatness in an employee.

A great employee is in this kind of alignment with their manager.  What is important to the manager is important to the employee.   The employee loses sleep over the same things.  If the job doesn't end for the manager at 5PM, it doesn't end for the employee either.  If the manager is striving, the employee is striving.

Likewise, in customer service, greatness is about not just exceeding expectations but resetting in a customer's mind what is even possible.  Like the employee who is exceeding manager's expectations, in customer service the staff provides a level of service to the customer that satisfies a need they may not have didn't even know they had or a need they didn't know they had.

Next month, I will present an article with my ideas on how to manage an employee to greatness. No, it isn't a perfect system that works every time!  Nothing is that good!