Exemplary Customer Service It just might save your life Michael D. Morgan
What is Customer Service? Customer service is listening to your customer and truly understanding their needs, wants, and desires helping them achieve their goals. It’s not about giving things away for free; it’s simply about caring and acting sincerely in their interest, not yours. Jim Logan
The Fantastic Five • Empathy • Positivity • Patience • Clarity • Self Improvement
Empathy Empathy is the single most important customer service skill.
Empathy • Does not mean agreeing them about everything • Trying to view it from their perspective • Be genuine, use your own experiences
Empathy When showing empathy to a student it’s important that employees understand what happiness and success means to students. and To best serve students that are in an unfortunate situation, it’s crucial to understand exactly how being in that situation is making the student feel, then simply step into the student’s shoes.
Positivity As a customer service skill, positivity is about the language you use to communicate with your students. Subtle differences in word choice can make a huge difference in the way a student perceives what is being said.
Examples of Negative Language • Unfortunately: I’m about to tell you something bad. • As you know: I’m putting you in your place, and confirming your worst suspicions. • I’m afraid that…: Just like “As you know”, this one invariably always comes before bad news.
Examples of Positive Language “As you know…” We sometimes say this because we don’t want to come across at patronizing by saying something which we assume the other person already knows. But what if they don’t already know? We then come across as condescending. What the person thinks to themselves is “I guess I’m stupid, because I didn’t know that.” Instead, use “I just learned that…” this phrase allows you to share some information in a way that makes whoever you’re talking to feel knowledgeable if they already have the information you have shared. (Steimle, 2013)
Examples of Positive Language Use "what questions do you have," instead of "do you have any questions." Using “what questions do you have” allows the student to feel that you are open to and will welcome additional questions.
Examples of Positive Language Instead of Unfortunately use “As it turns out” Apple employees are banned from saying "unfortunately" when delivering bad news to a customer, urged instead to replace it with the more positive "as it turns out." And management apparently takes the ban seriously: One former Apple employee tells us that his coworker was put under a 90-day probationary period because he said "unfortunately" too much at the Genius Bar. (Chen, 2011)
The Power of Positivity Negative phrases immediately put the listener on the defensive. On the other hand, positive phrases can completely change the way students interpret what you’re saying.
Patience Patience is more than a virtue. It’s also a customer service necessity .
3 Things You Will Encounter • You will deal with angry students. • You will deal with students who need extra attention to understand some things. • You will deal with some very challenging situations.
The worst thing you, or anyone on your team, can do is lose your cool.
Patience not only helps you deliver better service, but one study from the University of Toronto found that being impatient not only impedes our ability to enjoy life, but it makes us worse at completing things that are difficult (like delivering great customer service).
Understand the Addictive Nature of Anger, Irritation, and Outrage • The more you feel these emotions, the more likely you are to keep feeling them. • Understanding brings clarity as to why it’s so important to be patient.
Upgrade your attitude towards discomfort and pain In uncomfortable situations with students where you feel your patience wearing thin, remind yourself that “this is merely uncomfortable, not intolerable.”
Pay attention to when the irritation/pain starts. Find the cues that cause you to lose your cool. That way, you can correct course before it’s too late.
Control your self-talk . The things we say to ourselves have an uncanny ability of coming true, whether they’re positive or negative. So when you say “this student is really starting to piss me off,” instead of, for example, “this is a tough situation, but I’m going to stay calm and do what it takes to solve the problem,” it can have a big impact on what the reality becomes.
Clarity Clarity in communication is probably the easiest skill to spot in job applications and interviews, and one of the most important things that everyone should learn, especially those of us in student services.
How to Increase Clarity Take complex topics and write concise, simple and clear explanations. Show these explanations to someone who has no knowledge of the subject matter to see if they can understand it instantly. The more you practice this, the clearer you will become.
Improvement The final critical customer service (and really, life) skill is continuous improvement. Train to get better every single day, week, month, quarter and year.
Training to Improve Use the one percent goal: every day, strive to improve just 1%. • Use 1% more positivity in your emails • Respond 1% faster to incoming email • Be 1% faster in seeing students • Treat your other team members 1% better
1% seems like a small amount. And it is a small amount. It’s tiny. It’s easy. It’s doable. Today.
Remember 1% a day compounds. If you improve 1% a day You will improve 3800% in a year
Enhance the Experience • Listen • Personalize • Exceed
Listen, Listen, Listen • Stop what you are doing and listen. • Focus all of your attention on the student that is in front of you. • Make eye contact with the student. • Use active listening skills.
Personalize The Service People suffer from not being recognized, being just another face in the crowd. With increased student populations and traffic within our offices we become more and more impersonal; more faceless; and seemingly more uncaring. Be the difference in someone's life today, it may actually save your life.
Personalize the Service • Personal service interactions, show the student that we remember YOU, your likes, dislikes, desires. • Personalized service is individualized service.
Vocal Qualities • Tone and speech rate – I am happy to be here today. • Accents?
Eye Contact • Power differential • Culturally appropriate • Observe the students’ reaction and style – How well you are doing will be reflected
Body Language • Face them squarely and lean slightly forward • Have an expressive face • Use encouraging gestures • Be yourself
Summarizing and Paraphrasing • Using their own words • Using your words
Mature Interpersonal Relationships • Healthy and positive relationships characterized by tolerance and reciprocity • Increased appreciation of differences • Acceptance of flaws in self and others
Exceed Their Expectations The key is to set realistic customer expectations, and then not to just meet them, but to exceed them -- preferably in unexpected and helpful ways. Setting customer expectations at a level that is aligned with consistently deliverable levels of customer service requires that your whole staff, works in harmony with your brand image. Richard Branson
Something to think about If you continue to believe as you have always believed, you will continue to act as you have always acted. If you continue to act as you have always acted, you will continue to get what you have always gotten. If you want different results in your life, you must first change your mind. Think Grow Prosper
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References Markidan, L., (2015) The Ultimate Guide to Customer Service Training, Groovehq.com, Retrieved from https://www.groovehq.com/support/customer- service-training Chen, A., (2011) Working at the Apple Store: Tales from the Inside, Gizmodo, Retrieved from http://gizmodo.com/5812622/working-at-the-apple-store-tales-from- the-inside Steimle, J., (2013) 10 Phrases You Use That Are Killing Your Business, Forbes Online, Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshsteimle/2013/08/12/10-phrases- you-use-that-are-killing-your-business/ Chickering, A. W. & Reisser, L. (1993). Education and identity. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass
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