S8 EP 03: Maximizing the Member Experience | Shep Hyken, Customer Service Expert

08/01/22 • 38 min

How can we do that? If you ask Shep Hyken, it’s by creating an amazing customer experience.

Shep Hyken, calls himself the CAO (Chief Amazement Officer) of Shepard Presentations. He’s a customer service and experience expert and a sought after keynote speaker, as a Hall of Fame Speaker from the National Speakers Association. For decades, he’s worked with companies that want to build loyal relationships with their customers and employees.

As a New York Times and Wall Street Journal best-selling author he’s written 8 books focusing on delivering amazing customer service, customer engagement, managing the customer experience and creating customer loyalty. His new book “I’ll Be Back” on building returning customers, is a perfect fit for the situation in our industry today. He’s also the host of “Amazing Business Radio”, a podcast where he profiles leaders and their customer service expertise.

With all this said, Shep is a big golfer and as a member at his local club, he understands the customer experience at clubs from both the staff’s perspective and from the members’. That’s why this is such a valuable conversation. There are plenty of takeaways in this conversation to help you and your team build a better service experience at your club.

GBN is the leading private network for today's most successful PGA Professionals. Exclusive events at premier facilities, vendor partnerships to grow your business, education to increase your knowledge, and access to the top Professionals in the industry are just some of what membership in Golf Business Network will get you. Go to www.golfbusinessnetwork.com to find out more and become a member.

How can we do that? If you ask Shep Hyken, it’s by creating an amazing customer experience.

Previous Episode

S8 EP 02 | It's Supply and Demand | Seth Waugh, CEO PGA of America

Are you looking to hire team members on your golf staff? GBN's Recruiting Services make hiring easier with our best in class network of Golf Professionals that helps you reach deep into the market to locate your next staff member.
Go to www.golfbusinessnetwork.com/recruiting to get started and get ahead of the competition.
Seth Waugh came to the PGA of America after a highly successful career on Wall Street and most recently as the CEO of Deutsche Bank Americas. His love for golf and respect for the Professionals that power the game were the driving forces behind his move to the PGA. He’s often been quoted as saying his goal in this position is to better the lives of PGA Professionals so they can impact more lives. It’s a noble cause that was never going to be easy, and that has turned even more difficult than we could have imagined.
Seth’s tenure has already endured more tough decisions and crises than most would ever handle in this position. For a while it seemed like the biggest challenge he would face would be the PGA’s move to Frisco, TX, which is now nearing completion. However, a once in a lifetime global pandemic threw golf into a new stratosphere of demand which quickly erased the constant conversations of how we were going to grow the game and stop the bleeding of a reduction in golfers year after year. Seth’s previous leadership experience in crisis helped him and the rest of the PGA leadership team guide the game through the pandemic as well as provide support to PGA Professionals.
Tough questions have come one after the next. There was the decision to move the 2022 PGA Championship site after January 6th, should they hold the PGA Championship or the Ryder Cup in 2020? Now there’s the question about how to handle the LIV Tour players as it pertains to the PGA Championship and the Ryder Cup.
All while PGA Professionals battle a never before seen labor shortage at a time when demand for play remains near all-time highs. And that’s where we start the conversation in part one of my interview with Seth Waugh. You will hear how he sees the labor situation and how the PGA is working to combat this challenge. How does he feel about the work-life balance question? Is it possible in our industry? You’ll want to hear his answers.

Next Episode

S8 EP 04: "Owning" the Problem...and the Solution | Jay Karen, CEO, NGCOA

Are you looking to hire team members on your golf staff? GBN's Recruiting Services make hiring easier with our best in class network of Golf Professionals that helps you reach deep into the market to locate your next staff member.
Go to www.golfbusinessnetwork.com/recruiting to get started and get ahead of the competition.
In this season of Getting Better Now, we’ve talked a lot about the state of the golf industry. We heard from the Golf Professionals when we highlighted “The Club Pro Crisis” in Episode 01 of this season. We heard from the CEO of the PGA of America himself in a candid conversation with Seth Waugh in Episode 02. Now in Episode 04 of Season 8, we hear from another association chief, Jay Karen.
Jay is the CEO of the National Golf Course Owner’s Association (NGCOA), where he’s spent nearly 17 years in multiple roles with the association. He has a pulse on the issues impacting owners throughout the country, many of which end up impacting us as the PGA Professionals working for those owners.
A self-proclaimed “learner”, Jay is actually pursuing his membership as a Class A PGA Professional and you’ll hear his own war story about passing the PAT. In addition, we’ll obviously get into the labor situation from the perspective of the owners as well as Jay’s personal feelings about how we got here, and more importantly how we can fix it.
Jay also watched the downturn in golf happen after the “Tiger Boom” and has great insight into how we can avoid that from happening again, post COVID.
Jay is the co-host of Golf Business LIVE, where he shares the screen with the PGA’s own Don Rea. You can catch up on past episodes on YouTube.
Not only was Jay fun to talk to, he is really knowledgeable on the issues impacting golf so I know you’re going to get a lot from this conversation.