I continually preach that a quick response is an elementary part of the Jarltech DNA. On the one hand, I am often impressed by how quickly decisions are made here. On the other hand, it sometimes happens that we receive complaints about our response time.

It is only human to first want to place the blame on someone else -- and the truth is, we often answer customer inquiries too late, because we are waiting on information from suppliers. This affects more than just the movement of goods, since responses from contractors or service providers frequently come too late. Or, sometimes, not at all. This is the best hobby of them all. When it comes to "letting the garbage be washed away" you simply do not answer a question. I am sure that in 30% of the cases no one even notices.

If you look deeper you will realise that you lose a lot of time because of the time needed on the telephone to chase down answers. What is even worse is having to remind your own employees or partners about something that they should have taken care of a long time ago. And impatience with suppliers is particularly justified when they need six weeks and five reminders to prepare a grant statement, but who immediately call the first day when a payment is overdue.

There is no end to the discrepancies: our organizationally-slowest supplier decided one Friday afternoon to publicise a highly complex promotional activity, which should be retroactively effective!!! Plus, the next work day they called, and were very nervous -- where is the order worth millions?! Unbelievable.

In order to improve our service, keep our nerves intact and, above all, save time, we have decided to demand answers quicker and more aggressively. It is one thing to deal with people who cannot make a decision -- but they should at least be able to find someone in their own company who is capapble of making a decision, within a reasonable amount of time. The type of employee who says: "We are a large corporation, whose board only convenes every six weeks. I do not think I should ask them now." is then no longer the right partner for us. If one of our customers is not happy with his representative we are happy if he tells us, instead of quietly turning to the competition.

Regarding what affects me personally, the reader can derive two things from this entry: -- Please do not try to "lull" me into anything. -- And the othe way round: I always answer right away, or not at all. In case I do not answer that means that I simply do not have any interest, so you have to ask more aggressively. :) I gladly allow equal rights for everyone...