The Sweeney Agency

About Doug Lipp - Speaker on Customer Service and Change:

Join Doug Lipp as he takes you on an entertaining and insightful journey behind the scenes, to discover both the secret of Disney’s success and how it and other organizations have overcome spectacular challenges. As an internationally acclaimed speaker on customer service, leadership, change and international business for over 30 years, Doug has inspired and challenged over 1000 audiences and 200,000 individual attendees. His combination of high energy entertainment and thought-provoking lessons is contagious, motivating audiences around the world to maximize both personal and professional success.

Formerly the Head of Training at Disney’s Corporate Headquarters, Doug provided the famous Disney University Traditions program and developed leadership courses for Disney executives. Pivotal in Doug’s career with Disney was his experience in the mid-80’s when the corporate culture changed from the arrogant: We’re the best; why change? to the progressive: Don’t rest on your laurels powerhouse corporation that Disney remains today. Doug found that even strong organizations, like Disney, must embrace change and be willing to innovate.

Fluent in Japanese, Doug was on the start-up team for Tokyo Disneyland, Disney’s first international theme park. After leaving Disney, he co-founded, with a Stanford University professor, the Intercultural Relations Institute. Based upon his rich career at Disney, plus his work as an international consultant for some of the world’s most admired corporations and business leaders, Doug explores the strategic necessity of why all companies must now think globally, and act locally. Learn how companies such as IBM, Starbucks, Procter & Gamble, Siemens and Intel have benefited from those lessons.

He is the author of numerous articles and seven books on leadership, customer service and international business, including his two most popular: The Changing Face of Today’s Customer: How to Attract and Retain a Diverse Customer and Employee Base. With a foreword by renowned business leader Peter Ueberroth, head of the US Olympic Committee and Ken Blanchard of One Minute Manager fame, The Changing Face addresses how businesses can thrive in this era of cultural diversity and global competitiveness. Doug’s other most popular title is Even Monkeys Fall from Trees: The Art and Science of Outstanding Customer Service which focuses on a balanced approach to service, leadership and teamwork.

Doug customizes every keynote presentation or workshop to the client’s specific needs. Known across corporate America and around the world for his captivating and humorous story-telling style of delivery, Doug challenges his audience to take action and get results!

What Doug Lipp Talks About:

Customer Service

• The Magic of Exceptional Customer Service
• All Business is Show Business – Disney’s Formula for Success
• The Balance of Art and Science for Outstanding Customer Service
• Creating Service Magic - Attracting, Motivating & Retaining Employees & Customers During Tough Times
• Pixie Dust! – Creating a Guest Service Attitude with Disney Basics
• Customize your own title to fit your conference theme

Doug Lipp provides fascinating stories, unique insights, and invaluable lessons. Learn how certain skills, attitudes and behaviors contribute to exceptional performance to build, win, and keep market share. Customer service keynote speeches and workshops are customized to include service modules that meet the client’s specific needs.

Service and attitude affect your bottom line. Doug’s active listening strategy, R.A.P.S., introduces techniques for improved communication, building internal and external relationships, and handling unpleasant confrontations.

Using a variety of activities and approaches, Doug keeps the attendees energized and engaged. He clearly conveys his ideas by including individual and group exercises that illustrate his enthusiastic message. This keynote speech is a great choice for an opening session at your conference. Clients often choose customer service as a topic to set the tone for their meeting and Doug is a master at creating a high-energy and memorable kick-off message. Also, this topic is equally effective for a closing keynote speech. Doug studies conference curriculum and breakouts, then masterfully incorporates vital learning themes into his wrap-up keynotes. Either as a closing or opening keynote presenter, Doug inspires participants to return to their job and share these best practices.

Leadership

• Lead the Way, Your Customers and Employees Will Follow
• Great Leadership = Great Customer Service
• The Magic of Exceptional Leadership, Teamwork & Service
• Customize your own title to fit your conference theme

Very few people are natural born leaders. So, what are the rest of us to do? This presentation demonstrates how the best leaders in the world infuse their organizations with the unbeatable combination of vision, extraordinary communication skills and an uncompromising commitment to quality. Great leadership = great customer service. The best leaders also recognize that exceptional customer service breaks down if they don’t model the desired attitudes and behaviors with their internal customers … their employees. Doug reinforces these concepts through a combination of amusing, yet thought-provoking stories from his career at Disney and as a consultant to Fortune 100 corporations.

Top and middle-managers are responsible for creating the culture of the organization and building the team that lives and breathes the culture. Successful leaders get it: employees, and customers, sense sincerity and respond to it. Doug gives numerous examples of how successful leaders become role-models of excellence, leading to both personal and professional success.

Change and Innovation

• Moving Beyond Stuck in the Middle Seat - Welcome Change and Take Control
• The Changing Face of Today’s Customer
• Even Monkeys Fall From Trees – Learn from Mistakes and Embrace Change – Lessons From Disney
• Customize your own title to fit your conference theme

Even the best and the brightest make mistakes. However, the ability to deal with setbacks, then bounce back even stronger, is the hallmark of consistent market leaders. Join Doug as he takes you on a behind the scenes tour of the Walt Disney Company to learn about both its successes and how it overcame spectacular obstacles by challenging the status quo and embracing change. Doug’s Disney career included the landmark period in the mid-80’s when Disney changed their corporate culture changed from the arrogant: We’re the best; why change? to the progressive: Don’t rest on your laurels powerhouse corporation that Disney remains today.

The vast majority of continually successful organizations are those where the prevailing attitude is change or perish. Competition is fierce but the companies that are willing to reinvent themselves will survive and thrive. Constant growth and change, from the executive levels to the front lines, is what drives sustainability. An attitude of arrogance, indifference, or the victim mentality can bring an organization to its knees. How do the best organizations overcome such growth traps as: turf wars, hierarchical barriers and creative stagnation?

In this thought-provoking presentation, Doug gives multiple examples of how world-class organizations have eliminated barriers to improvement and enthusiastically embraced change. Doug constantly challenges his audience to ponder the questions: The world is changing, are you? The globe is expanding, is your business? Participants will learn to assess their organizations by blending existing knowledge and skills with improved attitudes, strategies and habits.

Global Competitiveness/Diversity

• Common Sense Versus Cultural Sense-The 6 Mistakes Every Global Company Makes and What to Do About It
• The Changing Face of Today’s Customer- The Globe is Shrinking, Is Your Business Expanding?

The globe is shrinking… is your business expanding? All companies that expand globally, or provide products to culturally diverse customers, eventually run into problems. Learn what companies such as IBM, Starbucks, Procter & Gamble, Intel and Disney have discovered (often the hard way) and how you can benefit from those lessons. This session gives real-life examples that support the concept of think globally, but act locally, and is a must for groups that serve a culturally diverse customer or employee base either domestically or internationally.

Doug’s international experience began at the age of 16 when he began studying Japanese. He developed a passion for the study of other cultures and after earning a graduate degree and becoming fluent in Japanese, Doug was hired by Disney. Fast-tracked into management, Doug was on the start-up team for their first international theme park, Tokyo Disneyland, a rousing success story. Doug this time, Doug worked with Disney’s top executives and board members, preparing him for leading their training division upon returning to headquarters.

Following his work with Disney, Doug became a founding member of an international consulting firm with a professor from Stanford University. Their work focused on helping multinational corporations succeed in the global marketplace. In addition to his speaking career, Doug currently works as a consultant to organizations interested in addressing the needs of their diverse employee and customer base. He has coached numerous Fortune 500 companies in adapting their approach to dealing with a changing market and an international audience. As with all his presentations, Doug personalizes this presentation to address the specific needs of the client by including thought-provoking activities, success stories and learning modules to reinforce key messages.