Be Like Wera : Leadership Lesson From Ryanair Customer Service Manager | Harison Xavier

 

A Day Of A Ryanair Customer Service Manager

I am fortunate to meet Wera, who is a customer service manager at Ryanair in Europe.( Due to privacy reasons I will not be mentioning the place where this occurred. ) Don't know why but we became good friends in a few days. We talked about our interests, our family, the difference in our culture and so on.

One fine day, the topic of our discussion was about work life and she mentioned how tough her day could get and the incidents that happen at her work. Talking to her I could see she is a leader. I asked her to explain about her work in detail so that I could learn few leadership lessons.

She replied she is no leader, she just love to help people to her best as possible . The following is our conversation about her day in her job and an incident that happen.

The Beginning

In her own words : It was an extremely hard day for us, as I have been working for 5 year at the airport I haven't seen such bad weather, the fog covered all the airport for the whole day. It was a Friday so the busiest day for us. Almost 32 flights (out of 41) were disrupted. We had too less people to deal with so huge disruptions and some of my people were taken out of ramp in order to help us in passenger department. There were thousands of people in the terminal, really I haven't seen in my life such amount of people in one place and everyone shouted and wanted something.

Lesson 1: 3C's - Confidence, Communication and Commitment

I went out of my office to spoke with the people, tried to find solutions for them, listened what they want to tell - every passenger and his or her issue is important for me. I know that in such situation I also would like to speak with someone in charge.

    So, group of people wanted to speak with me and during our discussion they started to record me and my words. I supposed that they can do it (it's very popular kind of extortion) but I didn't react in fact. Normally people make a video and do nothing with it in the future because they are aware of the consequences.

“A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way.”

 – John C. Maxwell

 

After few days one of my friends told me that he seen the video with me on the Twitter - I couldn't believe in in. My friends started to search other copies and in occurred that 2 different videos are uploaded into Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. First of all I asked the lawyer what can I do with that, but he told me that the issue is complicated because the author is from different country so I should try to contact with these social media and ask for removing. I found special form on the websites and fulfilled it. I had to tell what kind of my privacy is added without my permission (eg. image, voice) and provide links, to show at which accounts such video exists.

In fact in my case everything were added without my permission! I had also to tell how they can recognize that is it me, so I choose my color of hair. Twitter also asked me about photo of document where they can saw my photo and basic data - I choose driving licence because I wasn't sure that they won't use data from my ID or passport (here on driving licence there is only name, surname and photo, it's not recognized as an ID).

After few (maybe 3-4 days) the particular departments of these websites contacted with me - they wanted to know what exactly happened and why someone uploaded movie with my image, voice and visible pass. Here, it was a small fight - they would like to know all details (I'm not sure if it was necessary). I have waited 7 days more and they sent me and info they checked  profiles which I sent them and deleted all videos, what's more (the happiest part of story) profiles of people who uploaded such content were banned. I'm glad that someone had any consequences.

I haven't believed that these forms are worthy anything and if social media departments will do something with my case and I was heavily surprised when I realized that after 2 weeks all cases are closed! From the other hand I don't think that 2 weeks for such case is a good score. I don't know how many people have seen this video - there were also a lot of comments (not nice ones) and such issues should be solved quicker. 

Lesson 2: Be Prepared 

It was my very first experience with such situation and a issue when someone violated my rights in the Internet. More often there are situations when aggressive passengers try to beat the workers. I remember situation when passenger wanted to hit me and I spent last 5 hrs of my work with security guards nearby because this man walked after me. There were situations when my friends were hit by angry passengers. And passengers were really surprised when we called for police.

“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.”

-Peter Drucker

We know about that situations at the airport are stressful but it's also stress for us, we also want to go home and have a rest and we do as many as we can in order to help passengers but we are not able to do everything. Some things need time. And very often bases have to wait for the decision of headquarter - we cannot make decisions on our own very often. 

Lesson 3: Be The Leader Your Team Can Count On 

I try to be a good leader. I don't know if I do it right but I want my workers to know that they can count on me. They have even my private number - if there is so much work that I speak by 2 business phones, they know that there is also a third option, and they can also call me in private things if they wish.

 In my last work, my leaders weren't really helpful, they just sat in the office and did nothing and I decided that I wouldn't be like them. I want them to know that if they're afraid of making decisions they can always call me and I will make it instead of them (of course if I know the situation and if I'm sure that this decision will be good. Sometimes there are situations when I don't have a general look and I don't know if my decision will be good, because worker is closer to the situation and knows "everything").

“I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” – Maya Angelou

From my point of view as an airport's worker it's always nice to hear "thank you". People usually don't use this words, they are not nice and polite. Trust me, when I hear 3 times "thank you" per day it's a really great score. And there is almost no day without any "idiot", "bitch", etc.

I remember now a strange situation. It was the last day of flights in Europe (next days our borders closed) and there were huge overbooking (189 places in the aircraft and 300 people manifested - we didn't know how many people will appear for flights, etc.) and one of my agents made a huge mistake (but he was extremely tired, it was a long day for him) and on board it occurred that last 3 passengers don't have places and they have to be offloaded. I was ready for a huge affair. I met these people for the next day (our government allowed some rescue flights. I ended my work at midnight previous day and was again in work at 4 am) and I thought that they will kill me (I was at the gate so they could see me), and you know what? It was the family, and the woman came to me and said "thanks that you made everything what you can, we are not angry because of this situation". I was shocked. It was the nicest thing I have heard by 2 days. She understood totally that it's not a common situation and everyone wanted to go home.

 

So if you want to say "thank you" on board - just do it, you'll make someone's day better.

I heard a lot of time that in past life I had to be a man.  I don't like to beat around the bush. I'm honest and I like to solve issues quickly. I hate emotional acts, manipulating, padding issues out, etc. I'm allergic to the women' behavior - all these plots, gossips, emotions, etc. are not for me. If someone has any problem with me I prefer him to come to me and said: you did wrong this, this and this. Or if I behaved in wrong way I like when person just tell me about that and I will apologies. Issue closed. I think that I'm quite simple person. 

Final Note: 

I was glad to know so much about her work and life. I admire how she handles such intense pressure everyday. She don’t lead by pointing and telling people what to do. She lead by going to that place and making a case, and leading with an example.

I learned a lot from this young leader and this journey just got started, I am sure that I will be learning more from her. Leadership is a Journey.