In free moments I like to speculate on what the world would be like if everyone got up in the morning with the goal of making life easier for other people. This would require a significant shift in attitudes and practices in many offices and agencies.
Imagine for instance that the building department wanted to help you build better homes, not just catch you doing things incorrectly, that they worked hard to make codes comprehensible and applied them consistently rather than whimsically.
Likewise governmental regulations and environmental rules would make sense because people sat down together with the mutual goals of both preserving our planet and still allowing—even welcoming—PEOPLE to reside on it with other forms of life.
This make-life-better approach would not be limited to the construction industry. Supposing designers at every manufacturer made a practice of using the products they produced? My guess would be that shampoo bottles with caps that require a tool to open would get re-designed. “Easy” open/close zip lock plastic bags containing frozen veggies would actually be possible to open and close—I won’t go for easy as that may be expecting too much even from this concept.
Here’s a more serious example. Recently our local paper (Colorado Springs Gazette, March 10) carried an article exposing the blatant arrogance and greed of KV Pharmaceutical. KV won exclusive rights to produce and market a prenatal drug called Makena (a right awarded to them by the government to ensure consistent quality).
For years this medication which helps prevent premature birth was available from compounding pharmacies for $10-15 a dose. With their new exclusive rights, KV hiked the price to an astonishing $1500.
Early this month, KV gave in somewhat to pressure from groups like the March of Dimes and lowered the price to just under a still greedy $700. Even better, behaving with considerable common sense, the FDA announced that it would not take enforcement measures against pharmacies producing a substitute version. As a result, the medication will continue to be available at the former low prices.
[http://www.thirdage.com/news/kv-pharmaceutical-cuts-price-prenatal-drug_4-1-2011]
Sad that KV would take advantage of desperate patients for material gain but kudos to those who came to the rescue. What can you do today to make life better for someone—whether a customer, co-worker, or associate? Systems are often impersonal, uncaring, and mechanical but those of us who apply them can still think if we choose to. Many times, there is a way to make things work if we look with that intention at heart.
[For more thoughts on using good judgment in customer service, download Judgment Calls from our Service Library Articles.]
