KateNasser.com

Kudos and a heartfelt thank you to Verizon Wireless CSR Lori-El.

Best CSRs Do This! Photo by:Photophonic

Customer service rep (CSR) Lori-El worked through confusing issues on my account with an inquisitive intelligent approach while taking care (and I do mean care) of me. I would definitely rate her as one of the best call center CSRs I have had in recent times.

In the last blog post I focused on The 25 Worst Customer Service Stories to Train the Best CSRs.

Today I am very pleased to outline how the best CSRs act in delivering customer service. Please add your best actions in the comments field below.

Best CSRs Action Checklist

Verizon Wireless CSR Lori-El did this well in delivering customer service.

1. Sincere conversation not a scripted recitation.
2. Listens for the customer’s personality and demeanor and then maps actions to it.
3. Listens to every piece of information the customer offers without jumping over words.
4. Shares control of the call with the customer instead of driving it through a predetermined path.
5. Listens to the customer’s level of knowledge and speaks to that level (not above or below).
6. Thanks the customer for input during the call not just at the end.
7. Apologizes once for the length of time it is taking to resolve it and keeps moving on resolving it!
8. Asks permission to access the customer’s records and then uses the information to go the extra mile.
9. Continues to listen to related questions and answers them clearly.
10. Uses confusing moments to learn and then teach the customer instead of saying. “I don’t know.”
11. Is honest about current obstacles to resolution and then finds a work-around!
12. Sounds happy to be at work even when doing overtime or having a tough day.
13. Streamlines future contact by giving an updated phone number to call.
14. Uses positive forward focused language instead of negative phrases.
15. The conversation shows responsibility and initiative in resolving the problems. Never blames the customer.
16. Resolves the current issues and then considers the customer’s future needs and forecasts solutions. (e.g. If you switch to a Blackberry or SmartPhone you might encounter this problem and we can fix that as well.)
17. Tone of voice throughout the call is sincere, focused, and action-oriented.  Closing remark reflects that as well.

Please feel free to add your best actions to this list in the comments field below.

Listening Low Cost Image By:Frederic Poirot

Listening up to the level of your customers’ expectations brings in your customers’ dollars.

1. Listen to your customers.
2. Provide action quickly.
3. Save their day to build customer loyalty.
4. Continuously train your staff to improve these customer focused skills.

Then why do companies put primary focus on uniformity of customer service that breeds non-listening and often unmemorable service? Almost every call center sounds the same, has the same scripted non-caring service, and does not build the customers’ desires to spend dollars.

The lowest cost step to customers’ dollars is to listen up to the level of their expectations and deliver unique and memorable service!

What fears are stopping most leaders from acting on this customer-focused common sense?

1. Empowerment and creativity as a culture is dangerous. Actually, empowering innovation and creativity throughout the business is critical in this decade.  Customers do not seek uniformity in service.  They want service that matches their individual needs.  GEN Y has grown up with personalized everything. They will not be loyal to cookie cutter call centers, service, or products.
   
2. We cannot measure non-standard interactions and if we can’t measure it we will fail. Metrics do not create success or breed failure.  Metrics measure success that you first create and there are many ways to measure it.  What you should fear is believing that measurement is a key business driver.
3. If we train our people on great listening and creative problem solving, they will leave and work someplace else. Quite the opposite. Study after study shows that employees love working in customer focused organizations that excite their minds, improve their skills, and value their unique talents.
4. It will cost too much. It works for high end services and products but nowhere else. I have one word to answer that — Zappos.
5. We will lose our shirts without standardized approaches to customer service.  Hardly. Listening and communication will actually “save your shirt” and protect you from losing customers. Billions of dollars are lost every year when customers’ leave your business because of how they were treated impersonally. A customer care culture in your company empowers every team member to seize customer loyalty through unique and personalized service.

If you are still unconvinced, keep a journal for one week of all the interactions you have with companies when you are the customer. Which ones are memorable? Why? Which would you give your dollars to, go back to and also recommend to other businesses?

Then get busy creating that culture in the business, department, or team you are leading. “A penny for your thoughts” is a phrase that can remind all your team members to listen to the customers and then deliver memorable service.

I am ready to train your teams to listen up to the level of customer expectations and take the lowest cost step to bringing in their dollars!
Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach

Are you a natural collaborator or a natural competitor?  The immediate answer from many people is I can do both.  Sure but that isn’t the question.  Understanding your natural style can be of great help in your work life.  It can have substantially deeper impact on your broader everyday life as it frames how you see and react to various situations.

A few questions to ponder.

Do you a have a strong reaction to either word — collaboration or competition?  When you hear these words, what thoughts jump to your mind?  Which word makes you feel better?

By:FenChurch!

Picture a highway where traffic is moving. You are in the far left lane.  Someone up ahead quite a bit signals they are moving into the left lane.  Do you generally speed up or stay at your speed? 

When someone jumps in and starts talking to you about something you are doing, what is your reaction?  Do you see their involvement as an intrusion and/or an attempt to direct you?  Or do you start out by assuming they are interested or collaborating?

If you were standing in the First Class/Elite line at a gate to board an airplane and someone came up and asked you “Are you in First Class?”, what would you think they were asking?  How would you respond?  I witnessed this.  To me it was clear that the passenger asking wanted to figure out if it was the First Class line.  The passenger that she asked, replied ”Yes, I can follow directions.”   She saw the question as a challenge to her competence rather than a need for help and collaboration.

How would you react to this recent tweet by @1paisley on Twitter?  “If U were arrested 4 being kind, would thr B enough evidence 2 convict U?” ~Author unknown.  My question here is not meant to suggest that competitors are unkind. Yet if you are turned off by this tweet, I propose that you are not a natural collaborator.

What difference does all this make?  Well both in work and in everyday life we encounter diverse people.  Relationships, teamwork, outcomes, and the possibility of success with other people depend on knowing yourself and understanding others.  

If you are a natural collaborator, realize that natural competitors may see your involvement as a competition or a challenge.  If you are a natural competitor, remember that natural collaborators may see you as uncooperative.  One key step for either type to use in bridging the gap — communicate your intention before your message.  Try it — it works!

Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach

Flickr: HugoVK

Is your positive attitude helping yourself and others?  Or are you so extremely positive that you drive others crazy?  Science Daily (July 3, 2009) published an article on the research of Dr. Joanne Wood and Dr. John Lee with interesting results about positive self-affirmations.   The results showed that some people do better when they are allowed to verbalize both the negative and the positive.    (See link below.)

I have a positive view of life and see life’s challenges straight ahead of me.  I take action to create a good life and learn from my experiences — both good and bad   However, I meet others who see the negatives more than the positives.  They live differently and I respect their choices.  Some have told me they were inspired by my positive outlook and actions.  Others go their own way.  I have also met people who try to convert me to their positivism before seeing how positive I already am!  This turns me off to what they have to offer.

So here are three steps to prevent positivism from being patronizing, controlling, and insensitive in everyday life.  [NOTE: In organizations and teams, positive can-do attitudes and positive disagreements are essential to meeting goals.  Too much negativity can slow momentum and derail end results.]

1.Coach only when asked.  In everyday life, don’t elect yourself someone else’s life coach.  Even positive words like “I would like to encourage you to …” are somewhat arrogant if the person didn’t ask for your help.   Live and enjoy your own positivism but don’t declare yourself Prince of PositiveLand and issue decrees.  You may become known as a royal pain in the a_ _.

2. Listen in the moment and understand others’ perspectives.  Listening builds trust through respect.  Extremely positive people are sometimes so busy encouraging others to be positive they don’t stop and listen to the moment others are in.  Everyone in this life is on a journey and they travel at different speeds.   Some get to positivism faster than others.  Some don’t even want to go there.  Exception: If you are a leading an organization through change and a true resistor is slowing the pace with mega-negativity, you will need to address that very clearly to ensure the momentum of change.

3.Disagree honestly and with respect. Become comfortable with honest respectful disagreement.  People disagree in life.  Working through disagreements often delivers great results.  Yet sometimes extremely positive people patronize during a disagreement because they seek immediate harmony.  Disagreement can be a positive if it is respectful.

Live positively and let others see your positive outlook and actions.  Be careful of pushing them to be positive — you could create the opposite effect.

I welcome your additions to this list and your other relevant comments below.  Here is the link to the Science Daily article mentioned above: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/07/090702110503.htm

Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach

MA Organizational Psychology

When I was a senior in high school, my father told me to take typing “because all girls should know how to type.”  WHAT, I screamed.  As I raged on about this remark and swore never to take typing, my mother offered another view. “You are going to college next year right?” Yes, I shot back.  “Well how will you do your papers if you can’t type?  It has nothing to do with being a girl.”

Despite my father’s attitude which made me scream, I did take typing as a graduating senior and my fingers still scream the keyboard at 90 words a minute.  I typed all my papers quickly in college while many pulled all-nighters. Moreover, I made money typing others’ papers from their handwritten drafts. 

After college I took a job as a computer programmer. My fingers screamed the keyboard at 90 words a minute.  As other programmers hunted and pecked their code, I took a longer lunch.  After my IT jobs, I started my own training/consulting practice where once again my fingers screamed the keyboard typing reports, email, and now for tweets on Twitter and discussions on LinkedIn.

Thankfully, I had seen the wisdom in my mother’s perspective.  Moreover, I learned something far more important than typing.  On your life’s journey, what sounds like bad advice isn’t always bad.  How you hear it makes the difference. You owe it to yourself to consider ideas before you make a choice.  This will affect your personal relationships, your team efforts at work, the customer experiences you deliver, the sales you make, and most importantly your life choices.

What colors your ability to listen, assess, and find a hidden pearl of wisdom?

• Dislike for the messenger’s attitude and other views
• Your map that doesn’t allow for a detour
• Internal noise – your thoughts saying no instead of hmm … what if
• Baggage and bad memories
• Fear
• Short-sighted view of life

How many people (older than Gen Y) imagined this online life at the keyboard?  How many including Gen Y imagined this terrible economic crisis?  Yet can you remember your grandparents saying save for a rainy day?  Did you dismiss it as old-fashioned and irrelevant?

Have you ever heard the expression: It’s amazing how wise your parents become as you get older?  That isn’t to say you should cling to the past.  Rather as you live in the present, improving how you hear things can open your life to new horizons.  You may discover an idea that will change your life.  

When I was unhappy with my IT jobs and struggling to create a happy life, a career counselor assessed my picture and told me that I wanted to be self-employed.  I was baffled and thought she’s crazy.  Then I thought, hmm …what if? 

I explored it, researched it, planned it and did it!  That was 20 years ago and I never looked back. She was right and it changed my life.  Thank you, Paulette Zimmerman, for that pearl of wisdom and I thank myself for thinking hmm… what if?

What advice would you give graduating seniors from high school, tech. school, and college?

I’ll start the list and ask that you add your advice below in the comments field.

• Learn as much as you can — everywhere you can. You never know what will become a pearl!
• Build fun and responsibility into your life starting today.
• Associate with people of all ages – your age, older, and younger. Pearls of wisdom are hidden in others’ experiences.
• Create your life with vision, persistence, patience, and the disciplined action to get there.

Now it’s on to my next hmm… what if? 

Update on this post: A couple of days after I wrote this article, I found an article in USA Today by Alan Webber, entitled “Hey, Grads, It’s Time to Write New Rules”.   He straight out says never stop learning.   He has published a book with many more rules called Rules of Thumb: 52 Truths for Winning at Business Without Losing Yourself. 

Parents, the book might be a great family read and discussion to mentor your teens and college grads into adult life! 

If you wish to share this info on other blogs and websites, please credit this URL.  I welcome your additions to the advice list in the comments field below and welcome your tweets at http://twitter.com/KateNasser.

Happy Mother’s Day Mom.

Many thanks for your pearls,

Kate Nasser, The People-Skills Coach