2 Minute Warning

A few weeks ago, I had an issue with my smart phone. 

It was not accessing any cellular service.  This was my business phone, it had been two days, and no phone service means no business.  This was bad. 

I tried the chat function.  After 20 minutes of the employee trying to troubleshoot, I was advised to call the 800 number with my ticket number.  So I called, for the first of 5 conversations and 3 chats, over the next three days, with no company representative of competent skill to solve the issue. 

There is a lot to dissect about this disaster of a customer service experience, but I want to focus on one.

“May I place you on a brief hold?”

What is considered brief in 2018? The issue took many employees to try to solve.  Inevitably, they would get stuck and ask, “May I place on you a brief 2 MINUTE (my emphasis) hold?”  In my mind I was thinking, “Is 2 minutes brief?”

When I started training customer service, we taught 30 seconds was the absolute length of a hold.  We would turn off the room’s lights, and stay in silence, for employees to understand how long 30 seconds felt to a customer.  At about second 15, employees would start shifting in their seats.  It was uncomfortable, and it emphasized the point.

As service has evolved, and products have become more complicated, did we default to 2 minutes and no one told me?  If you are watching a You Tube video, and see it is longer than 2 minutes, do you still watch it?   Hmmm…

What made this particularly annoying is the agent was attempting to contact the next tier support. So every two minutes he returned to say, “We are experiencing high call volumes, and I cannot reach technical support.  Do you mind if I place you on another brief 2 minute hold?”

This went on for an hour; the agent came back to me approximately 30 times! Yikes!  

The Gurus Solutions

1. The Easy Fix 1 – If it the agent knows it will take more than 5 minutes to reach the next tier of support, or to research the issue, then train them to be honest with the customer.   Let the customer make the decision if they have time to wait.  Customers are calling on lunch breaks, late at night, or through the other busyness of life.   This is an inconvenience to call.  Be compassionate and realistic about time expectations.
2. The Easy Fix 2 – If it is going to be a long wait, train agents to tell the customer, “It will take at least ten minutes to reach the next support team.  I will come back every five minutes to check on you, or if you like, I won’t come back until I have them on the line.  Which works better for you?”   This sets better expectations, and is kind to your customers.   They will appreciate it.  This works better if there is music on your hold function, so customers know they are still on the line.
3. The Longer Fix - As I have worked in call centers, I know many times, “We are experiencing higher call volumes” translates to “We are not adequately staffed.”  If long waits of 10 minutes are more the norm than the exception, take a look at your staffing or workforce planning.   Adequate staffing increases customer service  satisfaction and employee engagement.  It is worth the investment.

The Resolution

No one at the company was able to solve my issue.  My husband finally solved it by googling the problem, and found other users had the same issue with the fix.  That is a topic for another blog. 😊

Be compassionate out there!

The Unexpected - Shake it up, move it out

Photo courtesy of Gratisograhpy

Workplace training comes in all shapes and forms.  We moved from strictly in-class room, to computer e-learning, to blended learning.  The one word that also seems to go along with many of training initiatives is the description BORING. 

The PowerPoint is ready, with title and presenter name, the workbooks are on the desk, sometimes with the entire 80 slide deck.  YIKES!  It is the workforce learning routine.  Even the beginning is routine: an ice breaker starts the class – ask your neighbor some ‘get to know you’ question where you are not sure you are clever enough or witty enough to be the room.   The presenter gives a dissertation on their credentials, and then away you go to slide number 2…blah….

What if we in workforce training pushed the envelope and went for the unexpected?  I have been doing this for a while, and I was taught a formula to create a class.  But I am finding the formulas don’t work as much today.   The current employee learner expects the unexpected, or at least hope for it, because it the nature of life. 

I also know the classes I have taught, and have attended, which I enjoyed the most is where I pushed for the unexpected.  You would be amazed what a game of hot potato will do to a classroom training.  Yes, the hot potato game you played as a kid.  You would be amazed what happens when you push people to do role plays/improv (whatever you want to call it), when they don’t want to do it.  Magic happens! 

So wear your traditional suit and create your beautiful PowerPoint decks.  But before you get started, show the participants your big blue unexpected pair of clown shoes, and plan for something amazing!

Stacey Oliver-Knappe is a customer service guru, speaker, and business anthology author of “Compassion@Work: Creating Workplaces that Engage the Human Spirit.” For information, contact 407-495-0846 or www.thecustomerservicegurus.com. For information on The Secret to Customer Service Excellence™ training programs, go to www.thecustomerservicegurus.com/programs Follow on Twitter: @CSGurus

Viva la Resistance! The Resistant Participant

I was teaching The Secret to Customer Service Excellence for a client and had this exchange with a participant.   For context, this client worked with families dealing with end of life issues.

Me: “I encourage you to not use the word ‘Unfortunate.’ It implies that you are not in control, so it gives your power away as a representative and a company.”

Participant: “But we have to use the word ‘unfortunate.’”

Me: “There is no word you have to use in customer service.  Especially using ‘unfortunate’ in your line of business, as the entire situation is unfortunate and difficult.  You saying it doesn’t help.”

Participant: “But it does.”

Me: “How do you know?”

Participant: “I just know it.”

This went on for a few more minutes, and then for the sake of the class, we had to move on.

This is the classic resistant participant.   This participant wasn’t rude or insubordinate.  She was resistant to the idea that I was presenting.   It isn’t uncommon in a customer service class for there to be a few employees who are ingrained with habit and tradition, and believe the class is for others in the room and not them. They are not open to the idea there could be a different, and possibly easier, method to help their customers. 

Why does this happen?  The root of this type of resistant participant typically is from a lack of consistent feedback on their current performance.  It is difficult and costly to put in place a quality assurance or mystery shopping programs that monitors an employee frequently enough to give them a true picture if they are tanking, are average, or excelling.  I get that. 

However, if an employee doesn’t receive critical feedback often, say at least two times a month, they are developing a skewed self-view of their performance.   They are not encouraged to seek or embrace change because they believe they are doing well enough.   The key phrase with my participant in this exchange was when she said, “I just know.” 

Do you really want to run your business based mostly on employees’ self-evaluations?  I didn’t think so, and I am happy to help.   

The Gurus’ Solutions

1.  The Easy Fix - Start a simple peer quality assurance program. 

Don’t overthink this.  It can be simply one agent gets 15 minutes to double-jack with another agent and offer the classic, “What went well” and “What could be better next time.”   They need to take notes and give it to the supervisor afterwards so they take the task seriously. Operationally, decide what makes sense for frequency.  

This can also happen in hospitality face-to-face customer situations, especially when it is slow.   Have servers or front desk folks partner with the one of them waiting on the guest and the other observing.   The same type of feedback is offered, “What went well,” and “What could be better next time.”

Result:  You create a continuous improvement culture that is not always dependent on leadership or a quality program.   Every employee is on the quality team and giving feedback.  How great is that?!

2. Less Easy, but Critical – Increase the number of mystery shops for face-to-face or call monitors.  

I know this is a bite to the budget, but the return on investment is worth it.  If you are relying only on social media to gather data, then you are letting others determine what your level of service is.  Social media engagements tell you, organizationally, what you can get away with as a service minimum.    You should set your bar, it should be high, and you should verify it is happening, not your customers.

Result:  You are controlling and setting your standards of excellence by monitoring employee service behaviors.   Employees are on their best performance more frequently, as they know the possible shop or monitoring could happen more frequently.  

3. Take it to the Next Level – Check their product or service knowledge more often.  

Most of the time service recovery situations occur because an employee gave incorrect information.   Organizations are running so fast forward, many times they forget it is important to consistently review current information.  This can be done through paper quizzes, in one-on-ones, team meetings, and there are electronic ways to do this too. 

Result:  You create the most intelligent service workforce in your industry.   You also create a learning culture, one that incorrect answers are not accepted.  However, you support employees to gain the necessary knowledge to perform the job to the best of their ability. 

Back to our Story…

Would these strategies have helped with my resistant participant?  I believe yes, for this person. If she had a better vision of her current performance, she might have been open to other ideas.   People come in to class resistant for all sorts of reasons, but my experience shows the most resistant are those who don’t realize I have been brought in to help them individually improve. 

As always, if we at The Customer Service Gurus can help, we are at your service.  Visit us at www.thecustomerservicegurus.com or write us at info@thecustomerservicegurus.com   

Wishing you a fantastic and successful 2018!

The School of Hard (Maybe Just Life) Knocks

Recently, I participated in a 10 day business challenge blitz from Spiritual Bada&* Entrepreneurs, and one of the challenges was to share three personal stories. The sponsor of the blitz, Amethyst Mahoney’s idea is these stories not only shape us, who we become as adults, but as entrepreneurs, it also fuels our motivation for why we do what we do, and serve who we serve. (Don’t you just love the name Amethyst?)

Part one of the challenge was to share the stories within the group.   Sure, I thought, easy peasy.

Part two of the challenge was to share one of your stories with those who you serve, through your business channels.  WHAT??!!  Ah, this is not so easy; it is scary; and it is Daring Greatly time (cue the lovely Brene’ Brown).    

The one story I know it is time for me to share helped me understand why I love the hospitality and call centers industries, and the larger customer service industry.  It does fuel the “why” I do what I do, and my respect for employees who do these important jobs.  So without further adieu…

I am a high school drop out

There I said it.  It was a badge of dishonor I wore for a very long time.  

High school was a difficult for me.  It was a roller coaster of emotional highs and lows, and I had several family events happen over the same 2 to 3 years.  There was more to it the story, but overall this once highly aspiring young person turned into a sad, lonely, overweight, and clinically depressed teenager. 

According to National Institute of Mental Health, “In 2015, an estimated 3 million adolescents aged 12 to 17 in the United States had at least one major depressive episode in the past year.”  So I was probably in good company with other teens at my school.  But at the time, all I felt was a deep loneliness with no hope, or sunshine, in her life. 

I attempted to make up for lost time senior year with almost double course load after flunking my junior year.  It became too much.  In my mind, I couldn’t add more failure on to my overwhelming sense of failure the previous year, so I cut my losses and dropped out March before graduation.

I was devastated and lost.  This was not how my story was supposed to go.  I had no Plan B.  I earned my GED in August of that year, but it took me ten more difficult years to find the mental health assistance I needed and my path back to college.  Most importantly it was a journey for me to learn to love learning again.   My passion has become helping others love workplace learning.   

But What to Do For Work?

This is why I love the hospitality and call center industries.  During those 10 years, I worked 8 years in hospitality, primarily hotel operations, and 3 years as a call center agent, and I mostly loved it.  (Of course no job is perfect. J)  People who don’t go to college, for whatever reason, still need a job to support their families and contribute to society.  These industries offered me solid jobs, and developed a strong foundation set of skills that have served me well.  

Those positions, and the leaders I was fortunate to have, taught me about integrity, having pride in accomplishing a task to the best of my ability, working on a successful teams, conflict management, defining problems and developing solutions, just to name a few. 

They are those precious soft skills that everyone needs to be successful, and they aren’t taught so much in college.  No one even every asked me about my school experience, either, which was a huge relief.

As for the hard technical skills, many employers sponsored me to take classes, either informally through their learning ‘universities’ or formally.  Most of them had college tuition programs that eventually lead me back to school.

Good People Doing Great Work

My experience in those roles showed me that intelligent and talented service employees and leader are all over the spectrum with their educational backgrounds.  People don’t go to college for all sorts of reasons: some had children unexpectedly young; some had medical issues; some didn’t want the burden of enormous debt; some people need to help their families; some like me, had a challenging high school experience so continuing wasn’t their goal. 

The reasons are all over the place, but rarely is it lack of intelligence. 

Knowing this, when I teach my classes, I teach them as true skill building, like a mini university class.  The people I teach are smart, regardless of their past education history, and they do incredible work.   

To Finish

I eventually earned my associates, bachelors, and master’s degrees.   I am one of the few people I know who actually work in the field of my master’s, which is adult education, training and staff development.   Does it make me better at what I do?  In somethings, I think so.  But would I be a poor training manager without all the initials?  It would depend on my professional experience.   

When I was in the corporate environment, I felt many soft skill programs, especially customer service programs were insulting and talked to service professionals like they were children.  I hated it!  That’s why I went out on my own to develop an intelligent class that speaks to the real experience of working with customers.

So that is why I do what I do, why I passionately serve those who hire me, and I am grateful I have the opportunity to do so.  

Lucky me!   

Flying the Unfriendly Skies - Flight #3411 - A Solution

It has been months since Dr. David Dao was physically assaulted to leave United Flight #3411.   I wonder what happened internally at United since April 9.

I tried to write about this when it first occurred.  Those blogs didn’t seem to add to the conversation.  My rant wasn’t about the employees, because they were following policy and not trained in alternatives.  And because the employees were following United’s policy my rant was with the executive leadership team who created the policies. 

Specifically, there was a rant about CEO Oscar Munoz’s response to customers.  Being a United loyalty member, I received his email explaining the situation. It sounded more, “Oops, we got caught.  We have a poor unfriendly customer policy, and now we realize it.”  If there had been no video of the altercation, as three other customers peacefully left the flight, this poor policy would not have changed.   

That’s not helpful and adds to the negativity that currently circles the service industry.

   

The Gurus’ Solution

What I believe happened at United is there was a policy written on overbooked flights, but there were not practical procedures written to enforce it, or procedures that encouraged creativity what to do if no passengers took the highest incentive offered.

Short-Term - Train Employees on Creatively Solving an Overbooked Flight  

If the incentive went high enough, someone would have left the plane.  Alternatively, how could the United employees on the flight been rerouted, if truly no passengers would leave?   The classic Service Recovery solution is to simply ask the customer, “What do you want?” 

What misses so many times in Service Recovery situations, the employees are not put through “What If” scenarios.   United’s operation leaders should write several “What If” scenarios, with the company’s ideal response, and distribute them through their normal communication channels.  It doesn’t have to be a proper in class training, although ideal, but just communication is a huge help to employees unsure what to do.

Long-Term - Rewrite Policies with Employee Input

Rewrite your policy and procedures WITH the employees closest to the situation's input.  Policies tend to be written by the leadership team who rarely deal with customers.  Their considerations are more financial or quantitative driven, and not always practical when handling customers.  It is one thing to write a policy, it is something different to tell a customer to their face they are not getting what they want.   

The gate team is the subject matter expert.  They have seen it all, and have smart ideas how to solve it for next time.  Use their knowledge to create smart policies and procedures that are fiscally responsible and customer friendly.  It is absolutely possible to have both.

Final Thoughts

To develop strong policies and procedures is a good practice for any service industry.  Seriously, in my career, I have never seen an employee who didn’t desire to do the right thing by the customer or the company.   It always came down to lack of knowledge and lack of training for the “What if,” situations. 

It’s a relatively easy fix, and it saves your organization embarrassment and certainly a huge pay-out.

Do the right thing.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/apr/27/united-doctor-dragged-flight-settlement-david-dao

Are you a Bad Boss?

I was talking to a friend of mine, high up in an organization, about a new employee who was not performing.   The employee wasn’t a bad culture fit, but his qualifications on his resume didn’t seem to match his performance on the job.  True enough this happens.

To help this employee who was not delivering on time, my friend decided to put in place hard deadlines for her entire staff.   Her prior style was to give soft request and deadlines because she wanted her team to have autonomy and ownership.   My friend wrapped up our conversation with, “I don’t want to be that kind of boss,” inferring micromanaging.

Bad Boss - Not This Time

In this case, my exceptional leader friend wasn’t being a bad boss.

My response, “Giving employees deadlines is not being a bad boss.  Giving someone a deadline and then hovering over them until it is done because you don’t trust them is being a bad boss.  You are simply setting expectations, and that is helpful for everyone.”

Good Bosses and Happy Employees

As I teach leadership classes, what I see most often is managers do not know it’s a best practice, or are afraid, to set clear expectations.   The intention is good, to have individuals guide their work lives.   These good intention people want to treat their employees as the bright adults they are.   I get that.

But I would argue ambiguity is what is causes much unnecessary stress in the workplace. 

Happy employees, at any level, are ones given tasks with clear deadlines, which they check off when accomplished.  That is why so many people thrive on making lists and Franklin Covey makes a fortune!  

It also causes stress to the boss when they need to start disciplinary action.  They ask their HR professional, like me, “How did the employee not know what they were supposed to do?”  I can tell you why, most of the time is the employee was unclear about expectations.

The Gurus’ Solution

Employee autonomy is how an employee goes about doing the task.   Give them the tasks, the deadline, and then get the heck out of the way.

So help yourself and your employees, look at what you expect them to do and tell them in simple clear terms. 

Examples

• “I expect you to meet with your partners every two weeks, and send a summary report afterwards to the project team within 24 hours.” 
• “I expect you to have the timeline sketched out by Friday.  What obstacles do you see in making that happen?"
• “I expect you to work effectively with Sam and I know you have had some bumps in your relationship.  Effectively to me means…”    

So there you have it.  If you find your employees are not performing to expectations, first look internally to see if you are setting clear expectations.   Put in writing those clear expectations, with deadlines, to make yours and your employees’ lives easier. 

If you need help developing your managers or supervisors, we invite you to learn more about our training class The Secret to Managing Excellence. Contact us at 407-495-0846 or info@thecustomerservicegurus.com.  We'd love to hear from you! 

  

It’s Complicated – Customer Service in 2016

It’s unusual for me to blog philosophically about this industry I love, customer service. But with recent world events, I am compelled to write something about the big picture of customer service.

Customer service can be boiled down into one word: relationships.

These relationships are circular, hierarchical, tangential, and in the end whether you give or receive exceptional customer service is really how two people feel about each other.  The two people are the customer, obviously, and the direct employee.

The old school of thought was, “The Customer is always right,” or “The Customer is king.”   This creates a hierarchy in the relationship, and I simply do not believe this is effective anymore.   Not that the customer's point of view isn't important, however current society is more egalitarian, and with this we operate more as peers.   When it is a peer situation, the ability to give serve others is a choice, not a job requirement.

Companies would be wise to help their employees understand this, respect it is their decision, and help them choose to do the right thing.  Serving others is highly rewarding, but it is the rewards of the heart that make it so.   Policies, mandates, and punishments, can be written until the end of time, but it isn’t until we choose to be different, do we consistently commit to do so.

Relationships in a Scary World

How are these relationships affected in this increasingly less colorblind world as we all become scared for our individual safety?  Once I believed we were on a new path of inclusion, but with recent events in Brussels, it will take dedication from us to continue on it.

I keep thinking how it will be now for the many millions of Muslims in the world, who are peace loving, but how will their service relationships continue?  I am talking simple everyday events like going to the grocery store, or calling the phone company.   Will the service professional simply not like them, and then that is the ruination of the relationship?

This is one statistic, and it is quite old 2006, "Civil rights complaints filed with one Muslim advocacy group rose from 366 in 2000 to 2,467 in 2006, an increase of 674%." (Read the entire article: https://goo.gl/qTtZCj).  

I think of young black men in the US who walk into a store and the worst is assumed about them.  What kind of service are they receiving?   Don’t they deserve our best too?    What kind of service will they give based on these experiences?

We have to get beyond this.

Possible Solutions

I was taught early in my career to give Benefit of the Doubt.  It was even an acronym, BOTD.  This is difficult in most situations, especially when dealing with the unknown, and it is especially difficult when our deep biases pop into our heads.  It challenges even me, The Guru, at times.

As customer service professionals we must be better, and serve every customer equality or equitably.    

In training class, I show a picture of an elderly man, who looks agitated.  I ask, “Would you approach him?”   The answer is almost to a participant a loud and shocking verbal, “No!”  There is no BOTD.  Then I ask, “What if he has had a stroke, and that is the way he looks because he lacks muscle control?”   As soon as I say that, the mood the class changes from tension to compassion.

What if we could start with compassion instead of tension?

It’s Complicated 

Service in 2016 is not impossible.  I talk and work with many companies that do a great job.  Unfortunately, I talk to at least 3 times as many who do it poorly and don’t get it.  I think how we teach customer service and support it has to evolve.

If you want to deliver superior customer service, you have to be willing to dig deep and not only analyze your customers, but your employees as well.    Change the tone of the training conversation from, “You just have to do it because it is your job description,” to, “This is a chance to do something special for someone.”

Thanks for reading my random thoughts today.   Be safe and live well, wherever you are. 

The Walking Dead have Taken Over Customer Service! The Antidote is Here

I don't mean to scare you, but the Zombie Apocalypse has arrived!

These are not the walkers and biters of horror fiction.  These are even more real and dangerous, as they are causing you sleepless nights and lost revenue in loyal and satisfied customers. They are the terrifying, "Disengagers."

How can you tell if an employee has been infected by this horrible disease?  Well, they are easy to spot in other businesses.  It is the cashier not smiling at the point of sale.  It is the sales person who has no enthusiasm for the product she is selling.  It is the server who forgets to refill your drink for 10 minutes after being asked twice.  It is the hospitality ride attendant who cares more about his conversation with a coworker and who is at Chili's on Facebook, than your safety as you board a roller coaster.

Disengagers can also be on the phone!  I kid you not! It is the contact center agent who's tone during a call sounds like they have already been bitten and can only grunt conversations.  It is the service professional, like a relocation coordinator, not returning your call.

How The Disease Spreads 

I am not versed how a bacterial disease spreads, but I can tell you this one is viral!

Employees arrive from new hire training, typically excited about their job and being a part of this interesting organization.  This is if you even have a decent orientation process (Read our Onboarding blog).  But regardless, the infection begins to take control as soon as they begin their regular job duties.

It is not through bites one becomes infected. It is through observation and talking to the infected, aka current employees.  The new hire begins to realize the high standards preached about in orientation are not the norm for daily operations.  She observe management hides in their offices, or does not keep tabs on her if they are At Home agents, afraid of confronting the infected.  He learns he can get away with not being his best at all times.  The tenured employees clock in, but they mentally check out.  They can show up unprepared with no enthusiasm, give mediocre performance, and that is acceptable.

The typical infection takes only weeks or months, depending on the organization.

The Gurus' Antidote 

1. Immediate Take Action Now Solution - As supervisors and managers, be very visible to the infected.  Get in their face! Great news: strong leaders are immune to the disease.

It is scary, but confront the infected by explaining, and more importantly DEMONSTRATING, what superior service looks like.   Leaders, you must hold the Disengagers accountable.  Your actions tell your team what are the acceptable behaviors on the job.  EQUALLY, your inaction speaks volumes what you will tolerate.  Zombies attack the weak!

2.  Long term Organization Solution -  Take Two Pills and Call Me in the Morning

Pill A. Put expectations in writing, or create short media clips what common interactions should look and sound like.   If the expectation is Be Nice (one of the pillars of The Gurus), get detailed what that means.  For example, does Be Nice mean to greet every customer, and if so how?   It is not difficult to make decent videos, and they tend to be the most helpful.  My caution here is keep the situations real and don't over polish it.  Many times I see the training situations created are too polarized and don't reflect real life for the Disengaers.  It makes it hard to connect you are talking about them.

Pill B. Give Disengagers the opportunity to cure themselves, of course with your critical care.  But if they decide to remain infected, they need to be removed.   If you do not remove them, they will continue to infect others.  This is a Lose/Lose situation for you and your organization, and possibly catastrophic.

Hope Has Arrived

Like a good Zombie movie, the survivors live on hope as they face the many challenges to finding a cure and a peaceful existence.  I am hopeful too that once solid expectations and processes are put in place, and constant informal performance monitoring occurs, our customer service zombie apocalypse will end.  This will take diligence and courage.  Be strong!

THE END


The Customer Service Gurus offers an engaging and customized training defending your organization against customer service zombies.  Call 407-495-0846 or email info@thecustomerservicegurus.com for details.

Coaching, Tom Hanks, and Trust

The ability to coach is the key to successful leadership.  The model used does not matter as much as the individual's ability to communicate the message and obtain positive action afterwards.  After observing hundreds  of managers, being a manager, and being managed, I believe the most important element in a successful coaching relationship is trust. 

Do your employees trust you, and why should you care?

Most decent coaching models approach the discussion from two sides, the administrative and the emotional.  Administrative loosely means the paperwork and brainstorming what is to be said.  The coach gathers information to share with the employee on true observed behaviors and develops how to lead the discussion with the employee to adjust to desired behavior.

The second is the emotional side.  There are multiple emotions to consider, but the foundation to all relationships is the degree we trust the other person.  Think politicians: would you vote for someone who sounded competent, but on some level you don't trust them? When my mom corrected me as child, I trusted she had my best interest at heart.  It doesn't change all that much as we age.  The person giving us correction, whether expert, peer or authoritative, needs our belief in them.

If trust is not established, cultivated, or is lost, a coaching discussion has little chance to create change.

The Gurus' Solutions to Build Trust 

1. Have Technical Knowledge Expertise or Humility Plus a Development Plan  
Believing the person coaching us knows a better path is critical.  Many times this happens because the direct supervisor was promoted to the job because of technical expertise.  If you do not have this expertise, humble yourself to acknowledge it and work on getting enough.  Enough is determined by industry and jobs to be supervised. Ask peers for advice.  Create your own development plan.

2. Individually Coach the Good and Bad
Tracking of positive and opportunity situations for an employee signals you are looking at them holistically.  You simply care about the big picture, and that translates into her overall best interest.

3. Handle Problem Children Quickly and Effectively
When you have a poor performer, deal with it.  Dealing with it shows your leadership integrity and employees trust you have the overall performance of the team at the center of your coaching practice.

4.  Treat Employees like People
If you only speak to employees when you are coaching, that is not treating them with respect.  Try to connect to everyone on the team, especially ones you have share less commonalities.  On the other end of the spectrum, understand the division between engaged supervisor and BFF.  This line should be clean for the group to trust you do not play favorites.

So what does this have to do with Tom Hanks?  According to a Reader's Digest Trust Poll, Tom Hanks is the most trusted person in America.  Who knew?  (See the entire list here.)

Additional Resources 

Bruce Tulgan's It's Okay to be the Boss.  It is an easy practical read for all levels of leadership, especially good for new leaders.  It has evolved my thoughts on effective leadership. I have no relationship with Bruce or his company, I just enjoyed the book.

Continue reading at our blog on Coaching Howm' I doin' - Giving and Receiving Feedback

What Training Gets Wrong with Difficult Customers

Frequently, I am asked by leaders how to deal with difficult customers.  The higher one gets in an organization, the tendency is to want a fail proof formula to help with these difficult situations. It makes sense as they tend to cost the business more to service, and have a greater impact on their brand. But leaders want to believe customers can be calculated like EBIT, and there is blanket solution.  

I hate to be the one to tell you, but there is no perfect formula.  And this is where many training programs go wrong, and why most service recovery programs are a disaster.

Many programs I have participated in and have taught from other vendors focused on either trying to throw empathy at the problem, or introducing a complex customer emotional matrix of action. 

Why this doesn’t work?  Explaining an abstract concept like empathy is haphazard at best.  I doubt many service professionals can honestly say, “I understand why you are upset, as I have had something similar happen to me.”  Even if they could, as a customer, I don’t care if it is happened to you, because it is happening to me. Now.    Frankly, the employee’s experience is irrelevant. Also, society is not as empathetic, making empathy not the tool it once was. 

The customer emotional matrices (Side note: what a great word?!)  imply humans work like math problems.  We simply don’t have the same shared experiences to make this true.  If customer expresses A emotion, agent does B action or gives compensation, and then C should occur and customer is back to neutral.  There are so many nuances that create an individual transaction.  It is in those details that determines the appropriate response.

The Gurus Solution

Let me preface, these solutions are for most service businesses, where you are providing a service or product.   These do not address the big events of life like moving, death of a loved one, or legal action.  The solutions below are a good start, but there is more to add with life events. 

1. Immediate Take Action Now Solution – Help and Train your Employees to Understand Fear makes Customers act emotionally.

People act out emotionally because of fear.   Customers begin to yell, cry, or are unresponsive, because something is scary to them.   It could be a financial implication to the situation. It could be fear of an expectation not being met.  It could very possibly be something that has nothing to do with the business at hand, but something else occurring in their life.   

When an employee understands an upset customer is at the core a scared individual, he can also understand he is the professional to reassure this frightened individual and get them to a better spot.  If you are in the service industry at all, you naturally want to help others. Wow, that is empowering!

Phrases we teach to help customers get past their emotions, “Tell me what happened.”   “I am sorry to hear you crying. What happened?”  “I hear you are upset.  What can I do to help?”  “What would fix this for you?”  “I will fix this for you.” This sounds similar to Service Recovery, but who cares what the label is.  It’s good stuff.

2. Longer-term Organization Health Solution- What are your problems?

Examine what is root cause for your top 5 emotional calls.  What is making your customers the most upset?  Is it a policy?  Is it a defect in your product? Are your employees rude?

Once you discover that valuable information, for goodness sake, fix them as best as you can. If it is something like a raised fee, which is very common, empower your employees with the clearest language why the change occurred.  Do not hide behind vague explanations and then be puzzled why customers get upset. “It is an administrative fee.”   Customers are smarter than that. 

For example, you have a fee increase.  You practice with your employees to say, “The fee increased 5% as the great vendors we use to help you have increased their prices.  We want to continue to offer these benefits, and that is why the increase was put in place.”  Still people could be upset, but at least it will be fewer people.  And it is certainly better than, “I don’t know.”  Worst. Answer. Ever!

The Customer Service Gurus offers an innovative and customized training on Servicing Difficult Situations.  Call 407-495-0846 or email info@thecustomerservicegurus.com for details.  

Are you Assessing for Success? Guest Blog on Behavioral Assessments

Note from Stacey

Many of my professional friends and clients swear by behavioral assessment tools.  I wanted to learn more, so I asked Gurus' friend Dolly Penland from Predictive Results to give us a peak into the tool she supports Predictive Index (PI).  Curious for more information, Dolly's contact information is at the bottom of the blog.

Take it away, Dolly....

By Dolly Penland - Predictive Results

The cause of most customer service problems is often related to one of two things. Option 1 is a lack of clear customer service standards with measurable, actionable strategies. Option 2 is having the wrong people in those customer-facing positions.

The latter is a disconnect in many organizations.  They go to great lengths to establish guidelines and procedures, but they fail to develop sound hiring and talent training processes. A behavioral assessment tool, such as the Predictive Index (PI), can help ensure the best customer service every time a customer interacts with your business.

The idea is to fill important talent gaps with “rock stars” to ensure the right cultural fit for your company, and ultimately, your clients. Businesses cannot afford to make hiring mistakes and be stuck with the wrong employees.

And, even if you hire rock stars, they must be placed with managers who have been trained to effectively motivate and communicate with them every day. Extraordinary customer-facing employees provide extraordinary customer experiences, and only when they are led by managers who truly know how to work with and motivate their people.

How to do this? First, visualize and define what the ultimate customer service rep is for your company. Great customer service is delivered by companies that build it in to their company culture. Do you need people who are fast? Attentive to details and accuracy? Perhaps someone who is genuinely friendly?  What makes YOU different from your competitors?

Turning that vision into reality means defining what the ideal is using a behavioral assessment tool, and then conducting a fit/gap analysis to understand exactly who candidates are for customer-facing roles in your company.

For your current employees, behavioral assessments will coach existing talent in a way that improves performance. Everyone has strengths, but you must know what they are to best use them. What you want to do is understand what truly motivates your people, hire the best and train them in the way that will ensure your customers enjoy that ultimate customer service experience.

There are many benefits of using a behavioral assessment tool. First, placing the right employees in the right jobs means higher customer service ratings and increased sales. Second, knowing exactly how to effectively manage those employees leads to higher job satisfaction and productivity.  Finally, more engaged employees lead directly to improved customer loyalty.  The cost of acquiring a new customer is five times that of retaining an existing one. It all comes down to great customer service.

TIP BOX

• Behavioral Assessments Drive Results
• Decide which metrics you want to improve
• Choose a tool that has proven success in that area
•  Make sure you can customize the target pattern to your cultur
•  Ensure that it is EEOC compliant
•  Use it as a pre-interview screen to get the best results

Dolly Penland is a business adviser and speaker with Predictive Results who works with organizations helping them to hire and manage their talent to their highest potential. Dolly specializes in multiple areas including helping businesses grow sales, reduce turnover and develop leaders.

She can be reached at (904) 374 9914 or Dolly@PredictiveResults.com.

Stacey's Final Thoughts

I am an unashamed HRD geek! 

I love to learn what is available and how to help organizations work better, smarter, faster, and happier.

One aspect of my geekness is reviewing the many exciting tools available to help hire and manage talent.  It is striking how the world changes, adapting to new technologies and research.

I have done the Predictive Index assessment twice, and it was eerily spot on.  The first time 6 years ago, my corporation administrated the test to our entire team, as a quasi-team building event.  But there was no follow through and it left me feeling deflated. 

We did the analytic debrief as a group, I had areas I would have liked to develop, but nothing, nada, happened.  (To be clear, this was not the awesome Dolly helping us). 

So lesson learned, when you use such tools, be sure your plan is comprehensive and dedicated to completing the experience.  That is the key to the maximum ROI.   

Language and Service Part 3 – It’s a Small World: Serving All Your Customers

This is the last part in our series on the impact of language in the service industry.  

The first blog explored how service improves when the customer and service professional truly comprehend each other.   It’s not just basics of grammar and vocabulary, but a heartfelt connection.  (Read Here)

The second blog offered tips to help offshore call center representatives or non-Native English agents when they cannot understand the customer, if it is a USA based business. (Read Here)

Today’s blog covers when a call center agent cannot understand the customer because the customer does not speak the main language of the business.  Businesses are now global. Customer populations are diverse, and have to be for businesses to grow.   But how do we effectively serve this diversity?

Keeping It Real

I have a difficult time understanding anyone with accented English.  

It is no one’s fault.  They try, I try, but it unexpectedly extends any conversation by several minutes.  Part of it is I am partially deaf, and sometimes verbal communication is difficult for me.  Partly, it is easy to live in the United States only speaking one’s native language because of limited interaction with people outside of one’s cultural circle.  

But in this beautiful modern world, at some point when working in the service industry we will have to serve people we do not fully understand.

This is much easier in face-to-face interactions with the use of nonverbal gestures, and a smile goes a long way.  In a call, visual hints are unavailable, and many customers use cell phones to contact call centers, which can have unstable connections.  What can agents do to still create a successful service experience?  

The Gurus’ Training Solution to Serve English as Second Language Customers

1.       Immediate Take Action Now Solution – Be Nice first, and then Be Right

Always Be Nice.  Train your agents to be sensitive and have patience to this situation.  An agent’s job is to service any call, the easy and the complex.  Your organization has marketed to this customer that you will serve them with excellence, so it is up to the agent to deliver on this.

 

Ask the customer to gently slow down, and listen for key words.  When asking them to repeat information, be respectful.  There is nothing more frustrating for a customer than being asked to repeat information they believe was said crystal clear. 

It’s Critical to Be Right.  The agent must clearly recap to the customer what they said, and what action or information is being requested.  This is the only way to ensure both parties understand each other, and the agent is delivering the correct service.   Practice this repeatedly in role plays.  

2. Longer-term Organization Health Solution

Some companies strive to hire native speakers of all languages they serve.   Geographically, they are in a labor pool of international diversity and can do so.    

If you can do this, then do it. You will also need to investigate if a language pay differential is available.  In my Central Florida market, it is getting less common to pay for Spanish, but less available languages like Mandarin may still pay a compensation differential. 

Also understand as a business  who are your clients and customers.  If it is multinational, it would be an exercise to help your agents understand a little about different cultures.   Some cultures believe it is rude to ask questions, which can make a service interaction difficult.  Some cultures are very direct, and that can put an agent on the defensive.    Awareness can go a long way towards high customer service survey scores.

The end desire for customers and employees is to have a positive and effective service experience.   Challenges come in all sorts of wrappers at a call center.  This challenge is an opportunity to differentiate yourself from your competition, by paying attention to niche segments of your customers.  This will only help you in the future, because it is a small world after all. 

Language and Service Part 2- Let’s Be Honest, We’re not talking Thai Here

People tend to complain to me about poor customer service since I am The Customer Service Guru.  I have heard the ugliest racist descriptions slip from people’s mouths when they have to deal with an overseas contact center, or speak with a representative who does not natively speak English.  Let’s be honest, I am not talking about Thai here. 

The true problem isn't where the representative comes from; the problem is the customer not being understood.  That leads to misunderstandings, frustrations, and a waste of time and money for the customer and the business. 

If you remember from the first blog I wrote about language and service (Read it Here), I have been the service professional on the other end that did not speak the language of my customer.   After being yelled at in French a thousand times, I built up an armor to ignore it. 

I was doing my best and did not want to disappoint my customer, but yelling at me did not improve my French skills.   Yelling or insulting me didn’t turn on an interpreter super power in my brain where I could instantly suddenly comprehend the customer.   I could have used some strategies to effectively service my customers in the reality of my environment.

The Gurus’ Training Solution to Help Non-Native Speaker Employees

The Gurus 3B Service Mantra is Be Nice, Be Right, Be Here™.  Customer Service organizations can still Be Nice and address the issue of language mismatch between customers and employees.

1. Immediate Take Action Now Solution - Train your contact center agents to confidently and kindly say, “I truly want to help you, and I am having trouble understanding what you mean.  Would you help me and please slow down just a little then I can figure how to best solve/assist you?”   The key here is a sincere and calm tone from the representative.   It is very difficult to stay upset with someone who is genuinely trying to help, despite language obstacles.

2. Longer-term Organization Health Solution - Circulate through internal communication platforms common complex issues and the common phrases English speakers could use to explain them.  Customers do not call contact centers anymore for simple problems.  Help upskill your employees to handle the difficulties and nuances of service recovery language. 

Always reinforce with your non-native speaker staff what a wonderful skill it is to be bilingual.  It is an essential part of your operation, so celebrate the diversity, but be respectful about the realities of working with US customers.   The world has changed a lot for customers in the last 10 years, have a touch of empathy for that.

The goal is not fluency, but kind comprehension and sincere effort coming from the heart.  That can be accomplished in any language.