3 ms·

This should be a case study for recruiting. Sounds like Barnes & Noble's hiring practices need a serious overhaul. Find some passionate people and they could

This should be a case study for recruiting. Sounds like Barnes & Noble's hiring practices need a serious overhaul. Find some passionate people and they could turn around their business in no time.

nfnaaron 17y ago
I'm not so sure this was a hiring problem. It sounds like everyone he came into contact with treated him well, while he was in contact with them. The individuals who promised to get back were probably in chaos, and/or told to say exactly that and then take the next call. And the next. But they were probably doing their job very well, within the system they found themselves in. It sounds to me like a large part of fulfillment was outsourced (not so unusual) and there was very little involvement from BN during the "channel design" (don't know what you call that, I'm not in the biz) and channel operation. Basically, some vendor was allowed by BN to screw BN and its customers. The VP who denied the $100 gift card was probably staunching a hemorrhage of gift cards. None of this is an excuse. But it sounds like BN actually hired well, at the point of customer contact.
- chrisgoodrich 17y ago
  I see your point, it probably has more to do with culture than hiring. The employees (at all levels) do appear to have done what was required of them with a friendly tone. Where I think this becomes a hiring problem is that I would expect that somewhere along the way that Barnes & Noble would have hired somebody who would actually do what they were hired to do - Customer Service. In my opinion, this issue was never resolved and therefore every representative who worked on this case did NOT actually do their job. No representative (regardless of the process) should promise a call back if they don't actually intend to follow through. If Barnes & Noble had hired correctly, the system wouldn't have failed this miserably.

This should be a case study for recruiting. Sounds like Barnes & Noble's hiring practices need a serious overhaul. Find some passionate people and they could turn around their business in no time.

nfnaaron 17y ago

I'm not so sure this was a hiring problem. It sounds like everyone he came into contact with treated him well, while he was in contact with them. The individuals who promised to get back were probably in chaos, and/or told to say exactly that and then take the next call. And the next. But they were probably doing their job very well, within the system they found themselves in. It sounds to me like a large part of fulfillment was outsourced (not so unusual) and there was very little involvement from BN during the "channel design" (don't know what you call that, I'm not in the biz) and channel operation. Basically, some vendor was allowed by BN to screw BN and its customers. The VP who denied the $100 gift card was probably staunching a hemorrhage of gift cards. None of this is an excuse. But it sounds like BN actually hired well, at the point of customer contact.

chrisgoodrich 17y ago
I see your point, it probably has more to do with culture than hiring. The employees (at all levels) do appear to have done what was required of them with a friendly tone. Where I think this becomes a hiring problem is that I would expect that somewhere along the way that Barnes & Noble would have hired somebody who would actually do what they were hired to do - Customer Service. In my opinion, this issue was never resolved and therefore every representative who worked on this case did NOT actually do their job. No representative (regardless of the process) should promise a call back if they don't actually intend to follow through. If Barnes & Noble had hired correctly, the system wouldn't have failed this miserably.