Case Studies

How would you (or your people) handle this awful dilemma?

I think that everyone in my home town of Stevenage was moved to tears when two young firemen, Michael Miller and Jeff Wornham, lost their lives trying to rescue a lady from a recent fire.

The words "Fire Service" simply don't do justice to the risk that these people are subject to.

Usually when we think of service we may be thinking of courtesy and politeness or handling a difficult complaint. But in this case, service means putting your life on the line.

In the weeks since that event, barely a day has gone past when I have not thought about these young men.

The whole episode was all the more upsetting as Michael Miller was about to be married. And, only the day before the fire, he and his fiancée had sent out their wedding invitations.

But this week, my local paper carried a very different front page story.

The full page was taken up with the story of how the owner of the local bridal dress shop had been reluctant to give a full refund on the wedding dress that had been purchased Michael's fiancée.

The dress cost £700 and was apparently purchased seven months ago. A refund of just £500 was offered. You can probably imagine how the story was reported as such a cruel twist for the family that had already suffered so much.

The owner of the shop has said that the dress will be offered as part of a sale. And he will also give back any money that is received over and above the cost price of the dress.

The point of bringing this to your attention is not for me to argue about what is wrong or right. But simply to ask how would you handle it? This is a commercial decision with a huge amount of emotion attached.

I believe that, as business owners or managers, we should consider how we would want a tough situation like this to be handled. How would we behave? And how would we want our people to behave?