We brought on a new client last week.  They already had a secret shopper program in place, but wanted some refinements and appreciated the insight that we would offer them. I was reviewing their existing shop, and I was taken aback by the types of questions they were asking.  Combined with their "scoring" system, I don't know what their employees thought they wanted them to do -- and I've been creating and evaluating secret shopper programs for almost two decades!  And, if I couldn't figure out what the message was, how could they expect their employees to? In a nutshell, 90% of the observations were completely subjective!  Using this scale, a mystery shopper could be in a bad mood and rate the employee one way, and come back the next day and give gushing reviews the next day!  Needless to say, we tore into the shop and created a document that any employee could understand and articulate.  They were no "gray areas" when we were done. This philosophy needs to permeate throughout your employee training.  Leave nothing to chance.  Or, like I prefer to say, "Leave chance to the casino-- keep it away from your bottom line!" For more information, check out our other blog posts or stop by our other web sites for ServiceQuality.US or The Service Quality Department.