توضیحات جورج

BEC : Value - George

Hi, it’s George here. I want to talk to you and give you my comment or thoughts on this value add, value added. You know I think it’s pretty easy to see value add when you’re talking about a commodity, as AJ said, a hard product. Basically, the value add to a product, as I said, is something unique, something unique about the product. Maybe it’s the luxury factor that you get a lot of really nice things on this product that nobody else gives you and it doesn’t cost you that much more to get these luxury items.

In many products it’s just the design, furniture would be a good one. You know the value add is the store that sells Mediterranean furniture only or Old English European furniture only or Swedish furniture or Japanese. It doesn’t matter what it is, but that’s unique.

That’s a value add and they’re probably going to charge you more than if you went to the furniture store that just sold all kinds of stuff.

The quality, the quality of a product, this is particularly useful for long-term companies, companies that have been around a while and they’ve got a proven record of the quality, the automobile that will go 100,000 miles without ever breaking down; the vacuum cleaner that you will keep for 10 years and never have to worry about it breaking down; the refrigerator that you can keep for 20 years and it never breaks down. Well, it usually takes a long-term record for a company to make those kinds of claims and support them. That’s a value add and guess what? That’s worth a little bit more money.

Also, kind of connected with quality is reliability. This is a reliable product. In fact, as the folks at Hyundai the automobile maker would say, our product is so reliable we will give you a 100,000 mile warranty. Meaning if something breaks down on that car within 100,000 miles, we’ll fix it for free. Now, that’s a pretty good-size warranty because most cars in the United States, up until recently, you’d be lucky if they lasted 50 or 60,000 miles. So that’s a reliability factor.

Those are the key things I think that we’re talking about in this uniqueness in products.

What about what makes somebody, some person unique. What is it that makes them unique? Well, I would say what makes a person unique in the business world or in anything else for that matter and therefore a value add to their company and to their customers is that they seek out and do things that others don’t do; people who will seek out things and do things that other people don’t do.

Those kind of things are generally aimed at improving quality, reliability, maybe design, support either for customers or for vendors or maybe peers within the same organization or peers or another organization within the company that the person’s organization works with. They seek out ways to make improvements. They seek out ways to reduce cost. They seek out ways to reduce paperwork. They seek out ways to improve or increase revenue. They seek out ways to bring teams together focused on the mission of the department or the organization they’re in.

How do these people do that? Well, certainly they look for ways. Some people aren’t happy just doing the job and that’s great. I love those kinds of people. As a manager I didn’t want to have to go out and tell somebody what they had to do. I wanted to give them the general specifics and the general objectives as to what they were supposed to accomplish and let them do it. Within certain bounds and guidelines obviously, but let them figure out the way to make the thing work.

How do you do that? How do you become one of those kinds of people? Well first, you get excited about what you’re doing and start looking at the ways that it can be fun. You improve the skills that you already have. Whatever skills you’ve got, I don’t care what they are, whether analytical or organization or they’re interpersonal, I don’t care what they are, make them better than they are today.

You learn new skills. If you’re not a very analytical person, acquire that skill. Learn how to be analytical if you have to take a course in it. If you’re not very good in math, take a course in math so you can better in math. You’re already starting that process right now because you’re listening to me and to AJ. Maybe you’re not learning a new a skill, but you’re improving on an existing skill.

What else do you do? You increase your knowledge. Increase your knowledge of everything around you. Increase your knowledge of the company, the organization of the company.

Who are the important people of the company? Who are the leaders in the company? What is the organization structure top to bottom? Who reports to whom, what departments, what organization? Learn your company. Understand the inner workings of your company and the policies, procedures and practices of your company. Not just the ones that pertain to your department and your job, but all of them. Learn about the products of your company.

Become somebody who knows the products of the company. You can be the salesperson if you had to, at least to your wife or your husband or your neighbor or your friends. Lean your products. Know what’s going on in your company.

Improve your interpersonal skills. I don’t care how good they are, work, work, work and improve them. Again, because you’re listening here I have an idea that that’s part of what you’re trying to do. You’re going to improve your interpersonal skills with those people that you have to talk business English with simply by taking this course.

What you’re really trying to do is you want to create a positive image for your company.

You yourself, personally, are a part of that, how you act, how you look, how you talk, the enthusiasm that’s in your voice and in your eyes when you talk about your company and what it does and what it makes and how good that is for the customers and how valuable it is to the economy and so on and so on and so on.

Be an ambassador for your company, I guess is one way to say it. The way you do that is by doing your job and beyond. Do more than is expected and find ways to make your job more than it was when you took it. In other words, make it difficult for somebody to come in and replace you. Not so much that you can’t be replaced, you don’t want that situation because you want to move on to the next job, but make yourself unique through all those things that I was just talking about. Become an ambassador for your department, for your company. Add some value. Be unique.

That’s my thoughts on that subject. I want you to listen to AJ next and see what he has in mind.

The End.