Changing times............cell phone usage

[GrainBinMan]

I have gotten quite a few customers who literally demand we carry phones when on their property, they want to call to find out what's going on,

We are in the ag construction industry (I know, that is a broad industry) and I just recently ran into this with a customer, it was totally new to me. The customer asked one of my employees what his cellphone number was, in case he wanted to call him. I was pleased my employee promptly told him, 'My boss doesn't want us carrying cellphones.' The customer thought that was really strange. And here I figured this customer would be one that would squawk about workers standing around playing on their phone.

I'm also finding this is spilling over into my entire life, those that feel its now normal to have a phone permanently attached to their ear, feel its perfectly fine to call ALL the time, even if your not on their property, anytime they have a question about an upcoming project or completed project, they just call and ask, then chat some about whatever and do this repeatedly at any time of the day or night.

Could you turn your cellphone on silent when you don't want to be bothered (like if you are at home)? We don't have a landline phone at home, my wife carries a cellphone, so if I am going somewhere with the family, we just take her phone. My employees know what that number is and can call it if needed.

Myself, I'm finding all I do is answer my phone, as boss, anytime an employee calls I've always answered it, usually they had a major need to call, but over the years, I feel all I've done is create a much dumber set of employee's, they no longer have to think, troubleshoot or make a decision, they just push speed dial and get an answer.

A business coach I work with, suggested that if an employee contacts me with a question, I should reply with a question, "What do you think we should do?" Then you can help that employee make an informed decision, and hopefully the next time that question comes up, the employee will think about what you told him the last time.

I did some reviewing a few days ago, I got up at 4am, and went to bed at 11:30pm, had over 60 calls and was on the phone over 7 hours total during the day, and not one single call I made to anyone for anything I needed, most were customers, employee's, and telemarketers, customers taking the lead in time spend, and surprisingly none of them we were on THEIR jobsite or property at the time.

I started storing everybody's number in my phone. Then I could look at the number (when they called) and make a decision about whether to answer it or not. And if I have repeated calls from a telemarketer, I stored that number as well and gave them a unique ringer that was silent, so I never knew they called unless I looked at my phone.

We gave up having anyone answer the phone at the shop, all they did was tell off telemarketers, since no customers would call the shop anymore, they wanted to talk directly to me/us.

Is it possible to back up the clock, hire a phone answerer/secretary again, ban all phones in every job site, force everyone including truck drivers to leave them in their personal vehicle at the shop and go back to two way radios again and force the customer to come to us instead of picking up the phone. This has been hashed over considerably and we just don't know if we'd lose their work completely or not.

I don't think you would, but I don't know what business you are in. You need to train your customers that you have employees that are capable of answering at least some of their questions. If you have an employee that has a little more experience in doing something, send all the calls related to that, to him.