Mistakes - Samsung made a 'Biggie"

Katrina Spinazzola • October 18, 2016

Have you made a 'mistake' in business ? I have ....

Mistakes...

Samsung made 1 mistake and lost $3 billion.

Mistakes. We have all made them. Some of us can’t admit to them.

So how do you move on in your business when you have made a ‘biggie’?

Samsung released their Galaxy Note 7 phone in response to the Apple i Phone 7. Was it rushed through design and production processes to get it to market? Possibly.

What ensued is nothing short of a financial and public relations disaster.

Every plane you board announces to the 200 or so customers, I mean passengers, that these devices are banned due to defects so serious that their batteries can explode. They are labelled in the USA as “forbidden hazardous material”! Production of the phone has ceased due to consumer outcry and regulatory action. Exploding batteries? No laughing matter. On every flight the brand is ‘outed’ and Cabin Crew remind us of Samsung’s mistake.

So how do you reconcile the mistakes you make in business ?

If you are a small business, you don’t have access to huge PR departments and endless resources with unlimited budgets to mitigate this loss. How do you rebuild trust after you make a mistake ?

I am no expert and am guilty of some really stupid business mistakes and much to my embarrassment I will admit 1 to you.

I grew my business too quickly too soon

I didn’t have my processes in place. I didn't have my team consolidated and my mojo was not even in the building.

I saw growth as an incredible opportunity and as the competitor I am - I grasped it with both hands, tucked it under my arm and went ‘long’.

What I failed to see while my head was down was the outside world

I didn't see outsiders critquing my business

I chose to ignore clients losing focus and trust

I let my work hours spiral out of control

Ironically my business growing at such an exponential rate began to dwarf it’s very purpose.

Hey, it wasn't all doom and gloom,

I was meeting fabulous people, engaging with really interesting businesses, honing my craft and making $$ and I was happy ?

Or was I?

The critical key mistake was to abandon my procedures and structure in that race to grow and that was the very reason I felt successful in the first place. Ironic?

Hell yeah!

Here I was at my “Samsung moment”.

So what did Samsung do? How did they address their mistake ?

They faced it head on and recalled the phones (35 phones found as at September 2nd 2016) - so we are not talking about a large number.

They didn't deny it.

They publicised it and apologised for it.

So I decided to do 3 things

Own my mistake - come clean and admit the mistake
Apologise for it
Fix it - no lip service - provide a tangible solution

It was time to be honest - to my clients, to my staff and most of all to myself:

“Yes. Your email was not handled in a timely manner.”

“Yes. I didn’t return your call.”

“Yes. It seemed I forgot to care about your business”

Most of all I said ‘sorry’.

Then I told them it was fixed. Well, sort of……

What had to happen was then very painful - I had to sacrifice weekends, sleep and most days off to implement technology to stop this mistake in its track. I had to ‘’cease production’ as Samsung had done until I solved it.

I perfected an internal job management system (Zendesk)

I implemented a filter to my email (Sane)

I changed the telephone answering system (Hell, I even started answering it - shock horror!)

I moved myself to a new desk in the office and re branded myself as “Client Satisfaction Officer” - CSO.

I incorporated Xero Workpapers into my internal workflow to manage production.

I came to work with a smile on my face and a skip in my step (yep I’ll admit at first it was forced).

My enthusiasm and manic behaviour was infectious - albeit highly annoying to my team.

The tech quickly took over. It started working. It cleared my intray, my inbox, my calendar so i could focus on my clients. Most of all - I was HAPPY!

Most of all I reconciled my mistake with myself. I made peace with the fact I had disappointed people and that I firmly believed that my growth was an enormous asset to them so if they saw it as a negative then it was not my job to prove it to them.

I decided that as much as I cared about peoples critiques - I didn’t care. I didn’t care about the criticism, negativity and selfishness. I knew who I wanted to satisfy and who I owed an apology.

Thankfully it was not a $3 billion mistake that brought me to my “Samsung moment”

So how did Samsung react fully to this mistake ?

They let the press ‘do their job” and blog and post about this issue. They went back to the drawing board and they regrouped. Did they ‘throw their toys out of the pram” ? I don’t believe so.

I think that they