I just moved to a new area, so I find myself finding a new doctor, car mechanic, tailor, etc. For me, this is an incredibly stressful process, because there’s really no way to know about these things other than word-of-mouth or word-of-mouth-aggregation (e.g. Angie’s List or similar). But word-of-mouth, in my experience, is not the most reliable indicator especially for those services where a person doesn’t actually know how well they’ve been serviced (e.g. car mechanic).
This got me to thinking. People in each industry must know how to find the good ones! So here’s my poll:
[ul]
[li]What is your profession?[/li][li]Are there big differences in skill level in your world?[/li][li]How do ordinary people find the good ones?[/li][/ul]
My answers:
Lawyer
Huge differences. I get to see a broad sampling of other lawyers in my job. I’d say that in the context of individuals or small businesses hiring lawyers for civil matters, about 20% are good, 20% deserve to be disbarred, and 60% are hit-or-miss.
Other lawyers often know who the notorious individuals are in a community. So it helps to know a lawyer, especially one who works in the relevant court. A lot of bad lawyers have a history of disciplinary actions, so that’s a good place to start. And as a client, you should read your lawyer’s briefs. If they look like shitty arguments, or the lawyer uses “quotes” for emphasis like a jackass, get a new lawyer.
How about you?
Mechanic
If the mechanic is the owner, and is at least 60 years old you most likely have a winner. Extra points if the office staff is comprised of family members. It’s essential that the business be a longstanding local fixture. Old mechanics were trained during a time that customer service standards were pretty incredible, and the modern “rip everyone off” mentality may not have taken hold. These guys/gals are more likely to do what it takes to keep customers and to uphold their business’ reputation rather than just maximize their profits. I’ve had great luck with the “mom and pop” garage that I take my car to.
Doctors: you have to start with you insurance company. In our community the most insurance companies refuse to have any dealings with our only M.D. for some contractual reasons having nothing to do with medicine (Apparently he refuses to do a lot of paperwork the insurance companies want.)
I work as a well water professional. I’m the third generation of the business. We are easily the best in the field for my area.
Most of our work is for existing customers. A lot of the pumps I work on where put in before I was born. We Put a sticker on the pressure tanks. So when people need service they call us up. New customers are by word of mouth. We do no advertising at this point. We are selective in our customers. We will happily turn down customers we don’t want to deal with.
There is a vast skill difference in my field between the good and the bad. There are hacks that show up put a pump in the well and 4 months later when it fails they are nowhere to be found. This summer I had a number of jobs where we had to dig new trenches between the house and the well because the people who originally did the line took no persuasions to protect it from being damaged. Rocks left on top working their way through, soil shifting and causing a break nylon adapters failing to the test of time etc. We have never had a line put in by us fail in this manner.
In my field finding the good ones can be a task for customers. I’m not really sure how they would find me other then word of mouth. You can tell over the phone customers that are looking for bad ones. They call looking for estimates for total cost and pick the cheapest. When a customer calls looking for an estimate I tell them flat out ‘if your looking for the lowest cost call elsewhere.’
Because the number of diverse people I deal with in my business I’ve rarely had a problem finding someone to meet my needs. My customer data base is an endless list of people in nearly every field so if I need something it’s within a few phone calls.