Great companies and teams often get stale and then fade away. Here’s what we hear as it happens:

“I’m way too important to listen to customers. Send them to the call center.”

“It wasn’t a bad idea when we implemented it, so it’s not a bad idea now.”

“My boss won’t let me.”

“The IT department said we can’t change that.”

“Our focus is on cutting costs, not increasing customer value.”

“No one will notice.”

“I’ll add this to the file.”

“I’m just doing my job.”

“They don’t pay me enough to care.”

“They pay me enough not to care.”

The thing about “under the circumstances” is that the team members are the circumstances. You’re not just sitting in traffic, you are traffic.