Lightning strikes twice
A pilot and an Inland Revenue staffer are fine examples of ‘social intrapreneurs’ – customers love them, some businesses marginalise them.
It had been one of those nights when foul weather in Wellington had a flow-on effect on all the flights transiting through the capital. I was in Christchurch and desperate to get back to Welly. After my mid-arvo Air New Zealand flight had been cancelled, I secured the last seat on a 7pm flight.
It didn’t actually end up boarding until 7:30pm but no matter. At least we were getting away. The plane yawed sideways as the southerly storm lashed the runway and the air bridge.
As they closed the aeroplane door, the cabin staff warned us that the winds might make the hot drink service a bit dicey. The flight crew fired up the two Pratt & Whitney turbofan engines and the A320 started to move.
Then it stopped. The big turbofans wound down and the cabin lights came on. Not a good sign really.
Then a funny thing happened. The door to the flight deck opened and out stepped the captain. He smiled apologetically to the passengers and grabbed the mic for the public address system. In simple, honest tones he explained that Wellington Airport had been hit by lightning, lost power and was closed.
We had two options, he said. He could pull back to the airbridge and let us off, but once that happened there could be further delays and there were no promises of anyone getting another flight.
On the other hand we could just wait a few minutes in the plane and with luck, Wellington Airport would power up again and he could get us under way.
Unsurprisingly, the passengers were vocal in their support of option two. Five minutes later, he popped out again and gave us the good news that the airport had re-opened and we should buckle up.
In all the time I’ve been flying and all the ‘‘operational reasons’’ that have mucked me around, I’ve never had a pilot come out, own a situation and tell it like it was. It was nothing less than astounding and the brand equity it delivered to his employer was palpable.
Last week I had a similar experience with Inland Revenue (IR).
As you may have noticed, the folks at IR have really wound up the level of functionality available within their ‘‘MyIR’’ portal.
The existing GST functionality has been broadened out into ‘‘My Business’’ to include fringe benefit tax and gaming as well – and importantly, the ability to pay and amend filings.
Likewise, IR seem to making a very genuine effort to make it easy for taxpayers to claim back any overpaid taxes, with online DIY tax refund functionality.
Not good news for the myriad companies who set up shop in the previous information vacuum, but very good news for taxpayers who no longer need to share their refund with commercial enterprises.
But things don’t always work. And sometimes you need manual workarounds to online systems.
That’s the situation I found myself in, as my Google password manager kept on dropping my business password into my personal IR account.
Then the platform’s password reset functionality seemed to be bust. Or more likely, I’d had so many unsuccessful attempts to log in that the IR risk algorithm mistook me for a Balkan scammer.
So I rang the infamous 0800 number and got a pleasant surprise. A bubbly woman called Dale in the Manawatu contact centre managed to combine good humour with an ability to make stuff happen.
Best of all, she didn’t treat me like I was dumb when I asked dumb questions. Rather she used that magic phrase ‘‘how can I make this right for you?’’
Compared to the IR phone people of yesteryear, she was a breath of fresh air. And she got everything sorted, even when the online platform refused to play ball. She knew the system well enough to work around the blockage to make it easy for me, the client.
I have a term for folks like the Air New Zealand pilot and Dale the customer service rep. Fixers. They are people with an inclination to help and the operational freedom to fix problems in ways that aren’t necessarily formal policy, but absolutely delight the customer.
My old mate and industrial psychologist Dave Winsborough, who runs a leadership laboratory for Kiwi corporate teams, has a different term for it. He talks about ‘‘social intrapreneurs’’.
They are people with entrepreneurial tendencies and a love for fixing problems; but who choose to work inside big companies rather than strike out on their own and wrap their delivery around customers.
His general thesis is that top-down company cultures often seek to marginalise such people, because they can be seen as undermining ‘‘the system’’ rather than supplementing it. That’s mistakenly seen as counter-cultural, and they get managed out.
Meanwhile, in the case of Air New Zealand and IR, I’m just pleased they seem to be okay with social intrapreneurs. Long may it continue.
In all the time I’ve been flying, I’ve never had a pilot come out, own a situation and tell it like it was.
Mike ‘‘MOD’’ O’Donnell is a professional director and business adviser. His Twitter handle is @modsta and he’s a bit scared of planes and the IR.