What customer service staff need NOW
Having spent over 35 years working with, managing and training customer service staff I know what it takes to motivate them and I know what it takes to keep them positive. I also know what can break them. I’ve been broken too. I wrote a book just for them - the people in the workplace who manage no-one and answer to everyone; management and customers.
They are relied upon to be there, be positive, be polite and be professional - all day, every day with every customer - the good, the difficult and the demanding.
Let’s not mess around - what customer service staff need NOW are these 5 things;
My book “The A - Z of Service Excellence - the essentail guide to becoming a customer service professional”
Permission to make mistakes
Encouragement to keep going
Recognition of effort
Celebration of success
A customer service professional is a very special person who should be highly valued in every workplace. Customer service professionals have the right balance of hard (techincal) skills and soft (people) skills that customers rave about to everyone they know, for all the right reasons.
This perfect balance of skills means that customer service professionals have increased levels of job satisfaction, they work well as a team, they receive loads of compliments and see complaints as an opportunity to improve.
All of this leads to a more productive team who have lower levels of stress and the ability to leave work at work ie: no after hours worries about work.
To clarify further, here are the top 10 attributes of a customer service professional:
1. They have high-level people skills.
2. They can adapt their communication style to suit and delight every customer.
3. They willingly help other staff provide excellent service.
4. Their customers regularly compliment them on their service.
5. They handle customer complaints with ease.
6. They can be relied upon to represent a business professionally.
7. They are top sellers; customers willingly want/buy what they offer.
8. They proactively keep their product and service knowledge up to date.
9. They enjoy finding solutions to service problems.
10. They choose a positive attitude.
If you want to not only hire, but inspire Customer Service Professionals, then grab a copy of my book “The A - Z of Service Excellence “ , make it part of your induction pack and share it with your team.
Download the first Chapter for free
By Cate Schreck