By Steve Motenko

Customer service.

Yet another example of how the focus on short-term profits erodes both trust and effectiveness in American business …

In a bizarrely titled Time Magazine online piece – “Could 2013 Be the Year That Customer Service Gets Better?” – the author notes that traditionally, businesses see customer service as  a “cost center” – meaning a place where expenses drains out and no revenue comes in to replace it.

From a severely myopic perspective, this is obvious.  Customer service departments cost lot of money.  And they don’t earn any of it back for the company.  Not directly, anyway.  So let’s cut those costs to the bone.  It’s so logical.

Unless you get your nose off the grindstone and take a longer view.  Then something else becomes obvious — the stupidity of gutting customer service, if you want your company to be successful in the long term.

And the Time article says it’s taken American business til 2013 to figure this out.  Well, look at the bright side — at least we’re getting there!

Jim and Steve chew on this crazy little paradox in the show we just released (click on the link under “This Week On The Boss Show”).