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An amazing revelation occured to me yesterday.

After three weeks away in a secret ninja-style training camp and two days of back-to-work happiness, it suddenly dawned on me that for a service leader, it's less about the broken technology and more about the customer experience.

At one point on the job Monday, one customer's husband was telling me over the telephone, 'it's A----, sir. You're supposed to.... ." Amazing. That's something that we all need from time to time. A kick in the pants to remind us that in the grand scheme of things, the customer is not only the most important part of the business, they are the ONLY part of the business that matters. Even giving them a way to show the path to the right thing is helpful for both you and them.

Now for some folks, being the only part of the business that matters means they can run over the brand and the employees like spoiled children throwing a tantrum. That's not the way this works. Even spoiled children need to experience the reailities of personal responsibility. But, exposure to that reality doesn't have to be a painful experience, just a positive one. Making sure the customer understands that you've aligned with them. That you've assured them you will offer a solution to meet their needs. That you've acknowledged them as the most important person in the room. The alternatives should be presented in a way that shows how the customer has the power to decide. That's the power of this approach. Choice. Control.

Where have I been?

I've been working in retail, at one of the most valued companies in America and around the world. Getting my mojo back as it were, as a technology enthusiast and as a marketer working on consumer expectations one client at a time. As you'd expect my legacy of working and using communications and information technology, the stories about how I had integrated the brand into my personal life (that sounds really marketeer-ish but was a couple of stories about how my 3-year old daughter and I had convinced my wife that we'd purchased a box of fruit for her for Christmas, when in fact it was an Apple computer, and how I had replaced my hard drive and learned the hard way about the need for the GUID file format), helped me secure an extraordinary position at the firm.

I am grateful to be working. I am grateful to be working for a company that makes such great products. I am grateful to have the opportunity to help customers every day get more out of their technologies than they otherwise might have. I don't know if I'll be doing this a month from now, a year from now or a decade from now. But I do know that I enjoy the discipline, the pace and the way the management team and my coworkers help me be the best I can be.

Much ink has been spilt and many electrons have been rearranged to discuss the pros and cons of Net Neutrality as a regulatory philosophy for managing the Internet. The arguments have been that as the Internet becomes increasingly important as an entertainment and communications service infrastructure, there should be safeguards and service provider behaviors that the FCC should enforce. However, proponents argue that the highly competitive access market of telcos, cablecos and IP wirelesscos are the only natural and automatic way to assure that industry participants treat consumers with respect.

Well, further to our Guide on the topic, the FCC chairman has set December 21, 2010 as the voting day for his latest proposal for Net Neutrality, which allows tiering of consumption - use more, pay more - into bands and leaves network owners in charge of managing their networks, pretty much as they see fit. Visitors to our site agree with this practice, particularly as it relates to the emerging class of wireless broadband services.