The more you ignore me
The more you ignore me, the closer I get… Sang Morrissey on his finest album Vauxhall and I. No matter what stupid and ill-conceived notion he comes up with next I’ll always have Vauxhall and I.
It’s easy to ignore something and very often essential for our emotional and mental health. However I’m often surprised when senior members of the GreenSquareAccord team chose to ignore what is in actuality insight into where they can find the weaknesses, strike some quick wins, and strengthen their procedures.
I suppose the obvious question is why should they take this insight from me. And it is a fair question. Unlike GreenSquareAccord I’m happy to be asked and answer questions.
‘Skin in the game’
That’s right, I actually have some ‘skin in the game’. Myself and my wife are in a shared ownership agreement, this means we own a percentage of the property and GreenSquareAccord own the rest, this part we rent from GreenSquareAccord. It is a great scheme that has allowed us (and many like us) to grab a footing on the property ladder.
Wealth of experience
I have a wealth of knowledge and use this in my day job to turn around customer perceptions, increase sales, and enable better communications between my clients and their end users. I have led many customer service teams to success through providing the best service whilst being supported with robust procedures, practices and empowerment. I have turned underperforming teams into award winning teams. I have (and still do) create procedures and processes that enable behavioural change, strengthen productivity, grow teams, streamline customer journeys, and empower people to effectively provide the highest level of service.
What do I hope to gain?
The money we invest into our property will provide the retirement and end of life funding for my wife and me (we don’t have children). We hope to spend our twilight years drifting around the world financially secure, but our investment may also be needed to provide support, supported living, and (or) end of life care.
Whilst GreenSquareAccord fail to provide basic upkeep they are reducing the value of my neighbourhood and my property, and thus negatively impacting the quality of life for me and my wife now and once we lose the ability to earn. This I cannot allow to go unrecorded and without a fight. I have everything to gain and everything to lose.
Not going anywhere
So my cause is just, my experience noted, and I’m in for what looks like a long fight unless GreenSquareAccord start to work with me and the many ignored residents across their property portfolio.
So why block?
Please don’t think I’m picking on anyone here.
This is not a personal attack.
I am in complete and utter bemusement however and as such I am going to point out the hypocrisy with the goals and achievements mentioned in this particular LinkedIn profile. I wouldn’t have known that this person had gone to such great lengths to ignore me had they not blocked me on Twitter and LinkedIn. As you can see this doesn’t really achieve anything as the profile is still within the public domain and as such easy to view. I have hidden their photo and name as (again I want to reiterate) this is not a personal attack. This person has every right to block and ignore me, that I don’t dispute, I just find it worrying that they should.
Now lets look at the publish version against the known facts
Senior Housing Manager - so in theory engaged, keen to understand the short fallings and concerns affecting the sector and more importantly their team.
Leading high performing housing team - as a resident and having seen the feedback from other residents (both published by GreenSquareAccord and within the public domain) I’m not convinced this is a high performing team.
Delivering exceptional customer satisfaction and service improvement… - This simply isn’t the case.
My role is critical - I agree this role is pivotal, as such I’m posting this blog about their currently lack off engagement and curiosity as to what a proportion of their customers feel about the current level of service being provided by them and this high performance housing team. It is worrying that this current attitude will negatively impact the future needs of customers and the business.
Established track record - An example of these results would go a long way, they’ve been at GreenSquareAccord since December 2019 and the service provided has definitely gotten worse over the last two years.
Congratulations on your award - However in a sector that loves to ‘pat itself on the back’ and whilst service levels have been reduced across the business perhaps it isn’t as noteworthy.
The GreenSquareAccord trait
This is behaviour is led from the top down. A view of Rachel Crownshaw’s LinkedIn profile tells a similar story, whilst others including Ruth Cooke now just post a list of previous positions. The GreenSquareAccord website hosts no end of self-congratulator pages whilst the opinion of the residents differs vastly.
A quick look at what GreenSquareAccord residents posted about this high performing team this week
What started as a simple Facebook post from GreenSquareAccord:
What could go wrong?
In conclusion
Until you are able to engage, acknowledge, and work with all your residents you are doomed to fail. Whilst failure in other sectors will have a varying and albeit marginal impact upon the lives of your customers, this is not the case within the Housing Sector.
Hence the harsh appraisal.
As always - here when you are ready to work together to become ‘a simply brilliant landlord’.