Lance has an interesting post over here (for those who can’t be bothered reading it – a semi-secure CRM had some dodgy comments about customers on it which entered the public domain). While obviously a PR disaster occurred and the CRM should have been secure, some bigger issues are called into question.

How many times have we gotten off the phone after talking to a customer only to say ” they’re friggin retards/they’re useless/they don’t have a clue”? My contention is that regardless of whether or not we say this in a fully secure closed system – the issue lies in articulating the opinion at all.

Our customers are everything – they own us and if we think of them as anything less than exemplary, it will taint the way we deal with them. Sure there are good customers and bad customers but we should deal with customer development the way we deal with employee development – utilise the carrot not the stick.

What I’m saying is that by flippantly stating that a customer is a retard, one lessens the entire tone of the external view of the organisation.

Above all be nice!