Harvey Greisman

I was saddened to learn of the death of an old boss of mine last weekend.

Harvey Greisman, a long-time New York-area PR guy, and former IBM communications vice president, died suddenly of a massive heart attack in Florida (even more sadly, on the same day his own father died in the hospice facility where Harvey was paying a final visit). Harvey was just 61.

I worked for Harvey when he was comms veep for IBM Global Services in 2001-02. Harvey could be a tough guy to work for. I remember one particular teleconference where he wanted to ask a question of one of his reports who was talking through a presentation on the phone. Harvey couldn’t get the guy’s attention to break in, so he began aggressively punching buttons on the phone - beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep-beep – and eventually the speaker stopped speaking. Harvey asked some tough questions, told the guy to go back to the drawing board, and the next speaker rose to the virtual podium, a bit more apprehensive than he had been.

But wait! There’s more …

It’s true. I’m proud and unabashed about trumpeting our customer service successes and I’m always happy to call out helpful Blueshirt employees by name (via Twitter) when they live up to the promises of the Best Buy brand. But, if I hope to have any credibility at all, I have to be willing to talk about less-than-stellar experiences, don’t I?

Before we dive into the details of my experience heavy on the lousy, I am going to say that the vast majority of interactions I have at Best Buy are overwhelmingly positive, and make me feel good about the company for which I toil.

Far more often than not, the Best Buy person I encounter on the sales floor takes the time necessary to answer my questions and help me find the product(s) I’m looking for (one went so far as to go out back and pull a CD off the delivery truck before it was unloaded; another consulted the store product map to find an obscure cord I wanted that was “21 feet from the aisle”), to make sure I’m fully and completely satisfied with my shopping experience.

(I should point out that I never tell store employees that I’m a Best Buy employee – until it comes time to claim my discount – so there is no “favoritism” of any kind. I am a regular Joe looking for something cool).

But for every rule, there is an exception.

But wait! There’s more …

Best Buy has launched a Twitter help (“twelp” -- get it?) initiative called Twelpforce to give customers a way to ask questions about products and receive instant, or near instantaneous, response from the company’s customer-facing employees, be they blue shirts, Geek Squaders, customer service call center reps or even corporate headquarters types like yours truly.

But wait! There’s more …

Interesting blog post on Getting the best of Best Buy. The concept is simple: You’re in a Best Buy store. Use your cellphone to order products at the lower online price, wait 20 minutes or so and pick them up in store.