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As the birthday of the United States approaches, I thought I would share one of my favorite stories of the Revolution. Many years ago, I stumbled across an officer’s account of the Battle of Fort Sullivan on June 28, 1776. Shortly after our success at Bunker Hill, British warships advanced toward Charleston with the intention of conquering the port city, thereby isolating the South and cutting off a key supply route for the rebellious colonies. If successful, the British would strangle the nascent rebellion before it had a chance to blossom into a revolution.

A single fort stood in the way of the British: A small unnamed and incomplete outpost on Sullivan’s Island. The fort was led by a maverick Colonel William Moultrie and his young band of inexperienced and passionate patriots.

All predicted the British would rout the young revolutionaries and plow forward to victory in Charleston. Without their important port, the rebellious colonies would inevitably surrender. But as it turned out, Providence and the Spirit of 76 would prove too much for the British.

Though the underdog patriots emerged victorious, it wasn’t easy. And as with all battles, it came with great sacrifice. An early casualty of the engagement was a young soldier remembered only as Sgt McDaniel.

All we know about the soldier are his actions in the last moments of his life: When a British canon ball tore through his torso and drove him into the sandy earth, McDaniel’s last words were not expressions of anguish, regret, or pain. Instead, he raised his bloody body up onto his knees and with his last breath, he bellowed:

“Fight on my brave boys; Do not let liberty expire with me today!”

And his boys did fight on. They defeated the British battleships and drove the most powerful military in the world back to England. Their victory preserved Charleston for four more years — long enough for the Revolution to mature and the new nation to emerge victorious.

Thanks Colonel Moultrie. Thanks General Washington. Thanks Ben Franklin. Thanks John and Abigail. Thanks TJ. Thanks Molly Pitcher, Nathan Hale, and the Swamp Fox. And thanks to the unknown patriots like Sgt McDaniel and the thousands since who have given the ultimate gift.

Many have observed that “in a democracy, the people get the government they deserve.” This July 4th, let’s recall the great gift our patriots gave us — the freedom to choose the course of our republic — and let’s resolve to make their sacrifices worthwhile.

In advance of undertaking another major enhancement to GQ’s reporting system, Rob and David invested some time in a bunch of “little things.” They pushed these enhancements on Friday evening. Here are two of the bigger things that were on their list:

Remember Me. If you select the “remember me on this computer” checkbox when you login, you’ll immediately login without having to type in your username and password. Also, if you share a link from your account with another one of your users, they will go straight to that page if they have their “remember me” box selected — and if they don’t, they’ll go to the login page and land on your link after they provide their username and password. You can test that out by clicking on this link to a forum post about these enhancements.

Survey Response View. In a recent release, we dramatically improved the survey user interface for your customers, but we also inadvertently made it a little tougher to see all the project details. We corrected this with Friday’s release. So now, both your customers and you have an improved user interface on the survey view.

There’s a list of other smaller things (relating to permissions, required survey questions, project information editing, and overall system performance), and you can read details about all of them here.

Yesterday, by way of Engadget, I came across an article by Todd Bishop of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer about a leaked 2003 email from Bill Gates. In the email, the leader of Microsoft describes his own painful MS user experience and challenges his team to do better.

Gates’ email begins with “I am quite disappointed at how Windows Usability has been going backwards and the program management groups don’t drive usability issues” and winds up with “The lack of attention to usability represented by these experiences blows my mind.”

The end of Bishop’s article concludes with some very recent comments from Gates about that email. Gates’ response was what really caught my attention. He didn’t sputter or make excuses or talk about how far they’ve come since then. He simply replied:

“There’s not a day that I don’t send a piece of e-mail … like that piece of e-mail. That’s my job.”

So the wealthiest and arguably most successful businessperson in the world describes his job as “Customer Experience Advocate.”

Ever since I read The Road Ahead many years ago, I’ve had a tremendous amount of respect for Gates (even with my misgivings about Microsoft’s ability to deliver an adequate customer experience). But this recent declaration on the eve of his retirement raised him up another couple notches in my estimation.

Pay your new employees to quit, and the folks that stick around will be the truly committed. I stumbled upon this story about Zappos via Signal vs Noise.

After about a week at Zappos (the $1 billion internet shoe sales company), new employees are well into the immersion process. They are working their tails off and starting to drink the juice. That’s when they get “the offer.” The company offers them $1,000 to quit.

Bill Taylor, original founder of Fast Company, writes about this galvanizing policy, as well as Zappos culture of commitment to the customer experience, in a brief article on how the shoe company has become blazingly successful.

Over the last couple years, I’ve gotten to know Tim Faller of Field Training Services. By coincidence, FTS was featured alongside GuildQuality in a recent Remodeling Magazine article. Tim is the go-to guy for “education, training, and one-to-one consultation with managers and field personnel.”

We don’t have any field personnel so I can’t personally speak to the value he brings to building companies, but a great number of our members have used his services: Conner Remodeling & Design, Encore Construction, Jeff King & Company, and the list goes on and on.

Your folks in the field are the face of your company. They are production, sales, and service all rolled in to one. If you see that some of your team is dragging, or you feel like your people have some opportunities to improve, you may want to call Tim. Regardless, I encourage you to attend one of his seminars at the IBS or Remodeling Show.

I just noticed this January 2008 article from BuilderOnline about how folks are reacting reacting to the market. The article leads with Charleston-based Guildmember Dan Buffington of Buffington Homes talking about how the tough market has enabled him to be more selective and demanding of his subs and helped him to increase quality while reducing his construction cycle by about 50%.

In anticipation of sending a membership-wide survey about trends in the industry, I posted a question to the LinkedIn “Answers” forum. My question: “If you could ask 2,000 homebuilding, remodeling, and real estate professionals a question (or questions), what would you ask?”

The LinkedIn audience is made up of zillions of business folks from all over the place, so I anticipated getting some great questions about the market, marketing, and strategy. I received a few of those, but I mostly received vitriolic challenges to home builders, remodelers, and developers to improve quality and professionalism. Here are a few examples:

• What happened to QUALITY? My home and several other’s in the area are less than 5 years old, several different builders. Just after a couple of years, we noticed nail “pops” which we are all told are “normal”. My parents home is 60 years old with NO pops. We are not talking cheap homes by no means. Hiring remodeling professionals to cover these mistakes and other “small but annoying” imperfections leads to worse situations. Where is the quality?

• Do you really care about customer satisfaction?????? I see too many people in this and other arenas who are just worried about what they put in their pocket and not about delivering value.

• What can be done to insure that the average consumer is not working with a crooked builder or contractor? Today, especially, the phrase, “Let the Buyer Beware”, is a reality. I find people that have been affected by Builders and Remodelers that are not legitimate constantly. How can we as a country correct this problem?

• As a consumer, I’m saying to these professionals “I don’t trust you” or “How do I know what you SAY is true?” A home is the most important physical possession that most people have. The decision to buy or remodel one is significant. So, in light of market conditions, and the general distrust for home “contractors”, I think the question is “What will you do to earn my trust?” What written document defines your commitment? Will you make yourself open to my inquiries (i.e. references, testimonials, etc.) What is your long-term commitment to me?

This vitriol reflects a sad reality: nationally, around 63% of homeowners would recommend their building or remodeling company.

The current average among all of our Guildmembers is 91.4%. If you are a Guildmember that’s performing at this level, you might think, “Hey, that’s great! I am doing way better than just about everyone else in the industry.”

Well, it is great, but you’ve still got a big problem. Prospective customers think the industry is filled with unprofessional incompetents. And that perception of the industry tarnishes your reputation. Your team must not only deliver an exceptional customer experience, but even before you get that opportunity, you must teach your prospective customers how and why you are different so that they’ll give you the chance.

I can’t imagine how difficult our own sales process would be if a significant majority of our prospects started their relationship with us expecting to have an unpleasant experience. Not only would that skeptical customer be harder to please in the long run, but their anxiety would negatively impact the price we could charge for our services.

So I am a firm believer in the idea that a rising tide floats all boats. And it’s why our mission is to elevate the profession to a stature commensurate with its importance. Once prospective home buying, building, and remodeling customers everywhere are beginning their relationship with the expectation that things are going to be great — and the industry is fulfilling that expectation — we’ll come up with a new mission. But until then, that’s what we’re working on every day at GuildQuality.

GuildQuality has been giving out the Garcia Award once a quarter since the start of 2007. Each of our employees votes on who they think most embodies our core values: Integrity, Stewardship, and Improvement. I’m pleased to announce David Strandburg as the winner for Q4 2007.

David was the core developer for our Marketplace application. He really took ownership of building an efficient and elegant code base. A key component of the Marketplace is its powerful search capabilities. David introduced the use of the Zend_Search_Lucene class and since its inception it has worked very well. He is also responsible for working with other employees in the company when issues arise. Everyone speaks highly of his responsiveness and accuracy in solving the issues that they bring to him.

If you see David around town, be sure to congratulate him. I also hear he likes REI, beer and fudge rounds (and corndogs).

We use a product called Basecamp as our internal project collaboration tool. I’ve written a little about Basecamp here, and have always thought it would work great for builders, developers, and remodelers. Turns out I’m not the only one.

Shaw Builders of Connecticut uses Basecamp to “help manage the complex process of building custom homes.”

We work with a wide range of talented architects, interior designers, engineers, landscape architects, masons, electricians, plumbers, HVAC contractors. Our clients range from Wall Street Exec’s (super type A’s) to Hollywood celebs. If they actually had to take the time to “learn” how to use Basecamp, they wouldn’t use it. Sometimes a simple tool can solve a wide variety of major problems and Basecamp does that for us.

At GuildQuality, Basecamp is our tool of choice for communicating about all the running projects in our pipeline. So whether you are a customer satisfaction surveying company or a high-end custom home builder, check out Basecamp. It is definitely a simple tool that just plain works

“Quality is never an accident; it is always the result of high intention, sincere effort, intelligent direction and skillful execution; it represents the wise choice of many alternatives.”   Author Unknown

Courtesy of Lawson Calhoun of Calhoun Properties in Atlanta.

Stacey Freed, Senior Editor of Remodeling Magazine, has put together a three-part series on how remodelers can “engineer the customer experience”. This series asks remodelers to ponder the question “What do clients really need and how can I make my world work best for them?”. She guides remodelers through the customer experience in three stages; sales, production and post-project warranty work (June 2008).

Her latest installment “Productive Production” (part two) focuses in on production; “what makes and keeps clients happy as their homes and lives are turned upside down during a remodel”. Stacey Freed talks with GuildQuality President and Founder Geoffrey Graham about, among other things, the correlation between the overall customer experience and high rankings in scheduling, punch list and communication.

“The most important thing for homeowners is schedule,” says Graham, “followed by punch list and communication.” “There might be delays,” he says, “but if a remodeler communicates [about those delays] in a way that a customer appreciates and understands, overwhelmingly the customer is happy”. And those happy customers will recommend their remodeler. … “If a remodeling company regularly struggles in those areas, they aren’t as profitable as those people who have those things down pat.”

This is an excellent series and we recommend it to any quality-minded remodeler looking for ways to fortify or improve on their delivery of an exceptional customer experience.

We just released a new design for our survey. This new design shows up when a respondent is taking an email or phone survey. It also shows up when viewing a completed response. I’ve had a couple questions today about printing this new survey format. I figured it would be best to write up an entry here.

There are two simple things that need to be configured when trying to print the survey. The first is ‘Printing background images and colors‘ and the second is ‘Setting your left and right margins‘. You’ll only have to do this one time and your browser will remember these settings for you. The overwhelming majority of our users use Internet Explorer 6 and 7, so I’ll write up a how-to for each browser because the steps vary slightly. If you do not know if you use Internet Explorer 6.x or 7.x, you can find out here.

If you are using Internet Explorer 6.x, then follow these steps…

(more…)

Last month, GuildQuality had the distinct pleasure of awarding Atlanta based Revival Construction with a Guildmaster Award for the third consecutive year. Revival Construction, a Guildmember since 2004, is a full service remodeling contractor specializing in whole house renovations and additions to older homes within the intown Atlanta area. We are proud to announce that GuildQuality wasn’t alone in recognizing Revival Construction’s phenomenal work.

In March, Revival was named a NARI 2008 Regional Contractor of the Year for the Southeast region in the Residential Historic Renovation and Restoration category of its annual awards competition. Contractors from seven regions around the country vie for CotY Awards on an annual basis, and all regional winners are eligible for National CotY Awards. Judging is based on problem solving, functionality, aesthetics, craftsmanship, innovation, degree of difficulty, and entry presentation. The honor bestowed upon Revival Construction was based upon their renovation of the Colonial Revival house built in 1922.

Revival Construction also performed a whole-house renovation on a 1950’s ranch built in the Tuxedo Park neighborhood (within Atlanta’s Buckhead Community). The goal of the recent renovation was to instill the classical proportions and details of the historical architectural styles within the neighborhood to this modest ranch home. Not only does the design fit within this beautiful, historical area, but also the construction recalls the materials and techniques of the 1920s and 1930s. For their efforts, the Southeast Chapter of the Institute for Classical Architecture and Classical America (ICA & CA) awarded Revival Consruction with the 2008 Shutze Award. Named for Philip Trammell Shutze, the Atlanta architect whose work is revered internationally as one of the Twentieth Century’s most devoted Classicists, the Shutze Award recognizes contributions to the creation of Twenty-first century classical and traditional architecture.

Congratulations to Wright Marshall and everybody at Revival Construction. Your achievements are well deserved; GuildQuality is proud to have such quality-minded members.

This weekend, GuildQuality’s engineering team will roll out another system enhancement. This project improves a number of aspects of the surveying process. Most notably:

1) We’ve redesigned the web version of our survey to improve the look and feel. From a usability perspective, we made the comment options more obvious, and enabled people to clear answers after they’ve entered them.

2) We’ve enabled members to personalize the survey emails (much as they can with their mail surveys). Emails can now have customized subjects, introductory language, and personalized “from” and “reply-to” email addresses.

When we introduced survey mailers about nine months ago, our overall survey response rate bumped up a few points. Earlier this year, we made some tweaks to the email and mail delivery process bringing another nice little jump.

We expect this enhancement will bring more gains by improving the survey respondent’s overall experience — both with a more elegant survey design and a personalized message from the Guildmember.

To customize your email messages, log into your account, click on Customer Satisfaction > Survey Admin > Survey Settings.

Among my favorite things about our business is that the more we grow, the better our service becomes for each and every one of our members. Every member we add and every customer we survey increases the richness of the information available to our members. More information equals better trend reporting and benchmarking for everyone. With that in mind, a couple years ago we introduced a referral program: Build the Guild.

We have enjoyed a great surge in membership referrals as of late — mostly from NAHB 20 Club members and Remodelers Advantage Roundtables, but also from plenty of members referring one of their local peers or competitors. Thanks to all those that have encouraged others to reach out to us. Referrals are by far our number one source of new members.

Despite the volume of referrals, most of our referring members are surprised to receive a credit. That makes me think our members don’t know about Build the Guild. So, in an effort to raise awareness, here are the details:

1) Let us know about it. Before a prospective member joins, either the prospective member needs to let us know they’ve been referred by a specific member or the referring member needs to let us know they are referring someone.

2) Both the referring member and the new member receive a credit. Once we receive our first payment from the new member, both the referring member and the new member will receive a credit equal to the new members’ monthly membership fee.

3) Awards credits last one year. Credits expire one year from their date of issue.

4) Some caveats. Occasionally multiple members will refer the same new member. When this happens, we split the referring member credit among multiple companies. Also, from time to time we learn about a better way to do things, so please know that these terms may change at any time.

We’re honored to have your support. Thanks very much!