“This has got to be the cleanest office kitchen I have ever seen! And it’s always clean – not just on Mondays!”
These words drew attention to what I first thought was an insignificant aspect of life at Texcel. Sure, the kitchen was clean, but this was probably just because it had recently been renovated and everyone feels pressure to keep things all shiny in the beginning. But as time moved on and 12 months has passed, it is still just as clean. And before you ask, yes staff do use the kitchen, yes we do use ceramic crockery and metal utensils and no, we don’t have a dishwasher! Say what now? A kitchen with no dishwasher – that’s insane! Let me be the first to say, I totally agree however, I have to admit, it doesn’t seem to make any difference.
I’ve quietly observed staff carefully making their lunch and washing up any preparation materials before sitting down to eat and then washing up their remaining dishes after they’ve finished their meal before returning to their desk. And it happens . . . every. . . single . . . day. All this had me wondering, why is this office any different from every other shared office space I have ever observed? Is it the unique combination of personalities, fear of non-conformity or simply the fabulously curated selection of kitchen equipment and utensils?
Does it even matter whether our kitchen is clean?
To this, my answer is yes.
Is it because our kitchen is gloriously free of hurriedly selected cute kitten memes about clean workspaces or at the other extreme, memes of celebrities threatening retaliation for dirty dishes? No and I’m glad to enjoy the meme-free space. Most importantly, I feel like the clean, tidy, organised space says a lot about us as a business. Ultimately, we take pride in our appearance. We take pride in our space. We take pride in our work. And we take pride in honouring our commitment to our customers. Attention to detail and completing a task as you said you would – these things matter. Going the extra mile – even when no one asked you to or no one was watching.
I see it all around the office. I see it when Vivian takes the time to wipe out a dirty monitor case and carefully replace the stickers. I see it when Nick offers to personally drive out to a customer site to deliver it by hand so that someone can get to work on their urgent task. I see it when Navin double checks each tiny detail while building a monitor and when Michael checks his calibrations are spot on. It’s there when Eileen tries to get your invoices exactly perfect before issuing them out, it’s there when Mark visits you on site to check everything is running smoothly and it’s there when Richard helps you with your data. It’s even there in the background when Arveen is building the software and wants it to be set up for when your business grows and you want to log in more often and it’s there when Mahan designs new equipment. And we’ve been doing it for 30 years and I’ve seen every day as Bruce and Andrew mentor us new kids on how things should be done. I see it every day and I hope as our customers you see it too.
I believe these things are the difference between success and failure and they are the reasons that our customers choose to do business with us. We are a reliable, safe pair of hands – your independent expert.
