We produce customer service training movies for a living. As you might imagine, many of the topics covered in our products are born as the result of actual situations that have happened to people on our development team.
In that spirit, here are some service-related topics I’ve been thinking about:
• Every time I leave home, it’s a visit to our research and development lab.
The thing about poor customer service is you don’t need to go looking for it. It normally finds you. But instead of getting furious when I receive poor service, I’m usually taking mental notes about what this person is doing, what they should be doing and what effect their actions are having on me, the customer. It can be enlightening and you can benefit in the same way. At your next staff meeting suggest each participant bring a story about a sour service encounter they had. This endeavor will prove to be cathartic, humorous and most important, will raise awareness when you discuss how that company should have conducted the situation. People learn from stories.
• Moving from good to great is easier than moving from bad to average.
The thing about judging customer service is that, by definition, it’s measured in the eyes of the beholder. Everyone is an expert. If you’re a customer, then you define what great customer service means to you. And you decide whether an organization has met your expectations.
When someone I meet learns that our company markets service training DVDs and Web-based courses they normally shoot back with something like, “Oh my gosh! You have to call XYZ Company. Their service is absolutely horrible and they need you guys really badly!” But my answer sometimes surprises them. Excellent service or terrible service usually isn’t an accident. Instead, service levels are normally a by-product of that organization’s culture. And while we love peddling as many training solutions as possible, experience has taught us that the best prospects are normally already pretty solid at caring for their customers. You read that correctly. The most receptive prospects for our training programs are normally already in the “B+” or higher range. Why is that? Their corporate mindset is one of putting the customer first and making continuous improvement a priority. Organizations that deliver poor service are normally that way for a very good reason. The lack of a focus on the customer permeates their culture. Ironically, these organizations are also the most difficult to convince that change is needed. Helping organizations move from good to great seems to be easier than helping them move from bad to average.
• More leaders need to become an undercover boss.
You’ve seen the CBS show on Sunday nights, right? That’s the reality show where a boss assumes a new name and look, then goes incognito to work at different jobs within his organization. A similar theme runs through each episode; the big boss finds out that working on the front line is always more complicated and difficult than predicted. The boss normally can’t perform the basic duties that rank and file employees do. And most importantly, the boss always learns valuable inner details about his or her organization from being on the front line. The real question is, why is this basic tenet of management such a revelation? What leader isn’t regularly checking out the experience that their customers run into? Apparently many. Every time I’m punching through endless options on an automated attendant, I wonder if the CEO of that cable company or bank ever experiences this painful exercise. Probably not, but that organization would be better off if they did.
• Service so awful, you couldn’t even put it in a training movie!
When we make a new training course, one of the keys is that our vignettes must be believable. Frequently, things happen to us in life that you couldn’t duplicate in a training movie. Our customers would literally reject the scene as too ridiculous to be useful for training purposes. It happened to me recently at a department of motor vehicles office. (Shocking, I know!) I stood waiting patiently for about 20 minutes. I was the third customer in one of two parallel lines. All of a sudden, the counter agent for my line finished with the first customer in my line and threw up his “Position Closed” sign. He then headed for his lunch break. He left me and another person just standing there. Are you kidding me? I was stunned and didn’t immediately react. I honestly was initially concerned that I might be starring in some viral YouTube clip about how customers react when put in ridiculous situations. When I realized I was safe I discussed the problem with the office manager who eventually filled in to help the customers in my line. But this manager’s cavalier attitude (“Well, what would you like me to do sir?”) showed me why this employee thought closing his line with customers standing in queue would be okay.
David Friedman is the producer/general manager for Telephone Doctor, a customer service training company in St. Louis. Telephone Doctor has helped over 22,000 organizations improve the way they communicate with customers. For information, visit w
