There’s power in apology

While at the same time a lot of companies and a few politicians in the US and UK have discovered that consumers react so positively to honest straight-from-the-shoulder apologies, that some of them are even concocting mistakes just so they can earn some easy brownie points with public apologies.

Somehow, South African businesses and politicians can’t seem to make the mindshift change and feel that admitting failure or wrongdoing is damaging to their brands, corporate reputations or political good standing.

We care?

They don’t realise that consumers have grown up and have become a lot more cynical of companies telling them “We Care” and politicians trying to gain a competitive edge by largely pointing fingers at the opposition.

An excellent case history was sent to me recently by someone who travels regularly in the US on JetBlue Airlines and who received this email after one of those typically bad-hair days that seem to afflict virtually every airline on earth with monotonous regularity.

Dear JetBlue Customers,

We are sorry and embarrassed. But most of all, we are deeply sorry.

Last week was the worst operational week in JetBlue’s seven year history. Following the severe winter ice storm in the Northeast, we subjected our customers to unacceptable delays, flight cancellations, lost baggage, and other major inconveniences. The storm disrupted the movement of aircraft, and, more importantly, disrupted the movement of JetBlue’s pilot and inflight crew members who were depending on those planes to get them to the airports where they were scheduled to serve you. With the busy President’s Day weekend upon us, rebooking opportunities were scarce and hold times at 1-800-JETBLUE were unacceptably long or not even available, further hindering our recovery efforts.

Words cannot express how truly sorry we are for the anxiety, frustration and inconvenience that we caused. This is especially saddening because JetBlue was founded on the promise of bringing humanity back to air travel and making the experience of flying happier and easier for everyone who chooses to fly with us. We know we failed to deliver on this promise last week.

We are committed to you, our valued customers, and are taking immediate corrective steps to regain your confidence in us. We have begun putting a comprehensive plan in place to provide better and more timely information to you, more tools and resources for our crewmembers and improved procedures for handling operational difficulties in the future. We are confident, as a result of these actions, that JetBlue will emerge as a more reliable and even more customer responsive airline than ever before.

Most importantly, we have published the JetBlue Airways Customer Bill of Rights—our official commitment to you of how we will handle operational interruptions going forward—including details of compensation. I have a video message to share with you about this industry leading action.

You deserved better—a lot better—from us last week. Nothing is more important than regaining your trust and all of us here hope you will give us the opportunity to welcome you onboard again soon and provide you the positive JetBlue Experience you have come to expect from us.

Sincerely,

David Neeleman
Founder and CEO

JetBlue Airways

Desperately seeking trust

What JetBlue and a lot of other US companies are very much aware of is the fact that since 9/11, the collapse of Enron and Worldcom, along with scandals in churches and Bush and Blair getting the weapons of mass destruction ploy so completely wrong, the consumer the world over is now desperate for someone to trust.

And trust does not come from corporate or political bluster and blarney, finger pointing, ducking, diving and doggedly refusing to admit failure or wrongdoing. Trust is born out of honesty and honesty is based firmly on the ability to admit to it when you are wrong.

Respect comes from saying sorry and meaning it. And that’s the trick. Nowadays it is not just good enough to apologise, one has to make amends.