Posts Tagged ‘bad service’

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

You can’t make all customers happy all the time … but try

December 8, 2009

One of things I teach is customers are more apt accept your answer or your policy if you explain why. But what happens if the customer decides not to accept your reason?

Shirley (not her real name) called me one day to tell me she had done exactly what I had told her, avoiding saying “policy” and instead explaining the reason. This particular customer refused to accept the reason and was very angry after Shirley said there was nothing more she could do.

The watch company Shirley works for accepts repairs in two ways: through the jewelry stores that sell the watch or directly from the customer. Both repairs end up in the company’s repair center, but the company doesn’t accept credit cards for repairs while the stores do. However, the stores also charge more than the company does for the same repair.

For this customer, Shirley explained that the number of direct repairs they get doesn’t justify the money the credit card company charges them. In other words, she was telling the customer he wasn’t worth the extra cost. Not only didn’t he buy her reason, he promised never to buy one of their watches again.

I understood her reasoning but asked her, “How do most people pay for things these days, especially when it involves sending something or ordering something through the mail?”

She agreed that most people pay with credit cards. She also agreed that they had a right to expect the watch company to accept the cards for repairs. But then she reiterated the reason.

The company didn’t encourage owners to send the watches directly because it wanted the jewelry stores to get the repair business – the direct repair was just a courtesy. So, the company made a conscious decision to accept repairs, but not to accept credit cards for the repairs, despite most people charging such things on their cards.

“I believe your reason is a good one,” I said. “But that doesn’t change the fact that most people expect to pay for repairs with their credit cards. The customer’s expectations are everything. People will decide whether they want to continue to do business with you based on whether you met, exceeded or didn’t meet their expectations.

In the end, every decision a company makes regarding policies and procedures has a consequence. You may be perfectly right in your reason but the customer didn’t think so. In the customer’s view, you weren’t being very customer-centric. Your reason said you cared more about the company’s bottom line than making it convenient for the customer.”

When faced with these types of situations, you’ve got to make a decision: Will I lose more money by disappointing a certain amount of customers than I will by doing what the customer wants? This company apparently decided they would lose more money if they did the latter. That’s perfectly okay, but the customer will still be unhappy.

Every organization has to strike a balance between making the customer happy and not giving away the store. Sometimes, the reason for the policy is valid and will hurt the company if you don’t enforce it. Other times, it’s worth giving up something to make the customer happy. You can’t make every customer happy all the time. But you do have to measure the consequences of not doing so.

Tags:, , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | 3 Comments »

ComcastCares fixes only some of the problem

November 23, 2009

Back in the late 1980s, I read a story about how Chrysler was offering the longest and most thorough warrantee in the automobile business. It was an attempt to compete with the Japanese who had a better reputation for quality than did American cars.

The reporter who wrote the story took the initiative to call the CEO of a leading Japanese automaker and asked if they would match the warrantee. The CEO said, “No.” When asked why, he replied, “Our cars don’t break.”

The CEO was really saying, “If your car is in the shop all the time, who cares how good the warrantee is?” It’s not that the Toyotas or Hondas at the time were unbreakable; they just didn’t have as many problems as the American cars did. And if your product has problems, it doesn’t matter how many miles the warrantee covers or how polite or nice your customer service representatives are. And if you start a new customer service initiative based on talking to people on Twitter or other social media, it’s never going to be enough if your product is lousy or if the bulk of your customer service inquiries go to a place where problems aren’t solved.

Comcast has been getting a lot of great publicity because of its Twitter program, ComcastCares, with which it keeps in touch with its customers who have problems. It’s a great initiative, but it doesn’t solve its service problems. I recently called Comcast about a situation. I got the IVR, punched the right prompt, was told (by the recording) that they were transferring me, and immediately got a busy signal. Tried five minutes later, five minutes after that, ten minutes after that and got the same busy signal. Finally, I tweeted about my situation.

About 15 minutes later, I went out to eat, shutting down my computer. When I came home, we tried Comcast again and this time, spoke to somebody who fixed the issue. When I went back online, there was a message from ComcastCares saying, “I’m so sorry you’re having trouble. How can I help?”

That’s very nice. And I’m happy Comcast is trying.  Sadly, Comcast (and sadly, other cable companies) have a reputation for lousy service that is well-deserved. As I travel from city to city giving customer service seminars, I continually hear horror stories about technicians who arrive with the wrong service order, incorrect bills, refunds that are never issued, installers who have to come back because they had two boxes when they needed three, and a plethora of problems with CSRs who don’t know what they’re doing. Personally, I had one experience with a CSR who couldn’t figure out the problem and wanted to send in a technician when I had already figured out the problem was on their end. I spent 10 minutes trying to convince her that they could fix the problem through the signal box but she wasn’t buying it. Eventually, she sent me to a supervisor, who agreed with my diagnosis and fixed the issue.

It’s not just Comcast, but all Cable companies. What is it about that industry that facilitates this kind of anger and frustration? Clearly, there is a remnant of a time when Cable TV companies had no competition or perhaps they don’t see the satellite companies as competition. Or maybe they just don’t care.

In my customer experience seminars, I teach that there are two types of problems in customer service: people issues and system issues. Bravo to Comcast for doing something with social media to connect with customers. That works on the people issues. Now, they (and other Cable companies) should reconnect internally to figure out how to how to fix the system issues that are the main cause of its poor reputation for service.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

You don’t have to say “NO!”

October 8, 2009

Nothing bugs me more than watching an employee make a customer angrier than he has to be. Why would they do this?

Customers are often talking to you in a state of increased agitation. They’re upset and they want satisfaction, but so often, if we find we can’t do what the customer wants us to do, we say the word guaranteed to increase the agitation: NO!

Even when the answer is no, we need to make sure that “no” is the only answer we can give before we say it. We may not be able to do what they want us to do, but often, something other than what they’re asking for will do. But we can’t find out unless we ask some questions.

For instance, I was working with the employees of an institution of higher learning. In the class were people who worked in virtually every department at the college: registrar, bursar, counseling, guidance, writing center, library, financial aid, office of the dean of students, etc. I asked them if there were times they have to say no to a student. An employee of the financial aid office said, “When a student has gotten all of the financial aid available to him from the school and wants more, whether in straight assistance or loans.”

I clarified that the student had taken out student loans and received some minor scholarships but there was still a good amount left on his tuition and fees. Then I asked a non-question question, “So, by taking out all of those loans and receiving those scholarships, he had exhausted what the college could do for him.”

“Correct,” she said, with all the certainty of a woman who had been asked if the sky was blue on a clear day. “What does the student want?” I asked.

The class participants were puzzled. I heard the words, “More financial aid” from several people, but it was muted. So I asked again, “what does the student want?”

A brave soul called out, “More financial aid!” So I asked, “How can we help him get more financial aid?” They looked at me like I had four heads. I repeated the question.

A woman in the back of the room said sheepishly, “By telling him about other scholarships and aid that may be available to him from other sources.” Yes, the school was not the only source of aid. There was a whole community out there to provide financial assistance.

“So what question or questions could we ask him to find out if he wants to go that route?”

They quickly volunteered such questions as, “Have you considered looking in other places for scholarship money?” “Do your parents belong to a union from which you may be able to get a scholarship?” “What service organizations do you or your parents belong to?” “Do you have a disability that might qualify you for more money?” and so on. It was amazing the amount of questions and possibilities that broke loose when they pulled away from the idea that the only thing they could do for this student was provide assistance directly from the college or traditional government loan sources.

You and your business have your own similar situations. If you think you have to say no, seek out ways to avoid doing so and find alternatives to what the customer requested.

I’m not saying you should never say no to a customer. There are times when no is the only answer. In those cases, we let the chips fall where they may. However, if this process can reduce the number of times you have to say no by even 40%, you will have less angry or upset customers and less need to deal with all the grief they bring you.

Customers have good intentions most of the time. They just want to get something done. They have a problem, they want you to solve it, and if you do, they’re happy. They can be like children and stomp around, especially when you tell them “no”. Like children, if they can’t have the toy they want, perhaps they’ll settle for a Tootsie Roll. In any case, the more you can find a way to make them the least bit happy, the better the customer will feel about you and your company, and the happier and calmer you will be.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

Don’t make employees deal with stupid rules

September 8, 2009

People in my customer service classes always ask me, “What makes customers so angry?” Here’s an example.

According to the New York Times, flyers on some recent flights have been told they cannot place any items in the seatback facing their seat. When asked why, flight attendants have blamed the FAA for the rule, which seemed strange since nobody had ever run into this rule before, especially on the same airline.  After numerous inquiries, the FAA admitted that when an airline enforces such a rule, it is following FAA guidelines from a 2007 directive on cabin safety.  Most airlines contacted by the Times said they weren’t aware of the ban, with one United Airlines spokesperson saying, “The seatbacks are absolutely there to be used for personal items.”

Why would this bother customers? One, because the rule doesn’t make any sense.  Frequent flyers had never heard of such a thing and had been using the seatback to hold books, newspapers, and other items forever. To our knowledge, no item ever went flying out of a seatback, hit a pilot in the back of the head and caused the plane to crash. And a hijacker isn’t going to grab my copy of Newsweek and threaten a flight attendant with it.  Two, because flyers already are feeling more and more helpless being told they have to pay to check items, having no overhead room to store items they want to take on board, and being asked to take off their shoes when they go through security.  Now they can’t use the seatbacks. Third, and last, the FAA admitted it has such a directive, but didn’t say why.

It’s enough to make you scream – at the next airline employee you see.  I feel for the airline employee who has to take the brunt of a stupid rule.

One of the things I’m always sharing with my audiences is how companies (and government agencies) make rules that affect employees and customers and don’t explain why they came up with the rule. First, companies come up with the rule without asking whether it makes any sense at all or asking what impact it will have on the customer experience. The rule is not vetted to any great extent before it is foisted upon the employees who have to enforce it.  The managers have to tell employees about the new rule without having a good explanation, so they take an attitude of “Hey, they told me we have to (or can’t) do this. I’m just telling you what they said.”

The person who the rule affects most is the customer. And the person with whom the customer has most contact is the customer-facing employee. The customer-facing employee is given the responsibility to enforce the new rule, not knowing what to say to the customer who asks “why?” Then the customer gets upset, screams at the employee, who feels betrayed by her boss who didn’t give her the tools to make the customer happy.  The employee has lost any connection to the company she works for, argues with the customer and drives him away.

Who doesn’t feel the effect of this problem? The person, department, or agency that made the rule. They just go on their merry way thinking of new rules that make customers angry and drive customer-facing employees to treat customers poorly, go through the motions, or quit, both figuratively and literally. And who can blame them?

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

Social media should terrify you and your business

August 19, 2009

Chew on this – “80% of Twitter usage is on mobile devices … people update anywhere, anytime …imagine what that means for bad customer experiences.” (www.socialnomics.com)

Now, remember the last time you got really angry about something and were so glad later on that nobody was around to see you lose control. Then, ponder the above statistic again and think about all the people who will tell everyone who follows them on Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, and everything else that they had a horrible experience, way before they calm down.

Now, imagine that the name of the company or person they are texting, posting, or talking about is you. If you don’t find this terrifying, you must be awfully customer-centric or you’re fooling yourself.

The idea that people will post their anger about their customer experience while it is still happening is terrifying. How many times have we had to deal with the wrath of an angry customer who contacts us or our call center and lets loose with high-octane screaming and frustration about what happened? The only person who knows about that extreme anger is the CSR or other employee who is talking to them. Also, if we fixed the situation, their stories to friends about the incidents would be tempered by time and would include a happy ending.

The worst time to have somebody complain about your product or customer service is when the anger and frustration is still white-hot. And today, using social media to tell others about their anger is equivalent to somebody standing in the middle of your office or store and calling everybody they know to complain. In the old days, the anger might have calmed down by the time they got to the tenth person. Now, they can tell thousands (My daughter, Hannah, has 590 “friends” on Facebook. If Hannah complains about your product, 590 people hear about it instantly. Terrifying).

Even if they cool off a little, the customer you just ticked off may be one of the 200,000,000 bloggers out there. And statistics show that 54% of these bloggers post new information daily and 35% of bloggers post their opinions about products, services and companies.

What can we do about this?

  • Make a firm commitment to become customer-centric by implementing new procedures, systems and processes where the customer is the most important person in the conversation or the process. If you’re not sure how to do this, here are two books you can start with: Passionate & Profitable: Why customer strategies fail and 10 steps to do them right by Lior Arussy and The Best Service is No Service: How to liberate your customers from customer service, keep them happy & control costs by Bill Price & David Jaffe.
  • Make a major effort to map your customer processes. Identify the dozens, if not hundreds of touch points where your company touches the customer in any way (even those where the department or person doesn’t touch the customer directly). Identify which are most important and find out where you need the most improvement by talking to your customers. If you can’t do the surveying yourself, hire somebody (Arussy’s Strativity Group is a great consultant on these issues)
  • Get on Twitter NOW and set up a way for your customers to reach you there.
  • Train, train, train your customer-facing people in techniques to diffuse situations when they are in the white-hot stage. A calm customer with a problem is less likely to tell the world than an angry customer with a problem.

People now trust their peer’s recommendations over advertising by a factor of more than five-to-one. You should be terrified.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | 4 Comments »

It’s not rocket service!

August 17, 2009

Here’s a great exercise you can try to create outstanding customer service.  Get an easel chart with a pad. If you’re a manager, gather your people together. If you’re not, you may want to do this with some co-workers or friends.

Break the group into two or three smaller groups and ask each of the groups to remember when they were customers. Then tell them to write down the things they hate about dealing with customer service or customer situations, whether on the phone, in person, on email or anything else. Tell them they have to come up with at least 10 things (this should be pretty easy considering the stories I hear every day). If they can come up with more than 10, that’s even better.  Make sure you join in with one of the groups to add your two cents.

Stop the group when it seems they’ve listed enough items or when five minutes passes. Then go to the easel chart and taking one item at a time from each team, list the items on the pad. I want you to take one at a time because there will be repeat items. If the items fill up the easel chart page, hang it on the wall and start another page.

Once you have exhausted everybody’s list, ask them if there are any other items they want to add.  After you are sure there are no more items, have somebody (if not you) read the items aloud. Then say the following:

“These are the actions you said annoy you to no end when you deal with customer service. They drive you up a wall. So when dealing with your customers, DON’T DO THESE THINGS! Why? Because these things annoy people!”

It’s not rocket service. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist or any other genius to figure out how to treat customers. We all know what it’s like to be a customer. We all know what it’s like to get good service. Most importantly, we all know what it’s like to get bad service, and as the great Hebrew sage Rabbi Hillel said in the 1st century, “What is hateful to you, don’t do to other people.” The golden rule of “treat people the way you want to be treated” is all well and good, but even more important may be “don’t treat people the way you don’t want to be treated.”

Most problems with customer relationships would go away if most people and companies followed that rule and did the exercise above. People who deal with customers aren’t stupid and they know what’s right but are too often affected by poor work environments, lack of authority, and policies that force them to decide whether to treat the customer well or treat the customer quickly. Most people I know would like to have their problem solved quickly, but if given the choice, they would appreciate it more if it was done right.

What do your customers say about you when you’re not listening? Are they accusing you of the same things you put on your list? Here’s what you should do:

  • Take the list you made from the exercise above.
  • Turn it into a code of commandments (you can even use the “thou shalt not …” expression). Make the list extremely difficult to avoid in your office or other workplace.
  • Review the list at team meetings.
  • Show customers the list and ask them to let you know when the team (or you) has fallen down on the job.

It doesn’t take a genius to figure this out. It’s not rocket service.

Tags:, , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

Survey says: Great customer experiences are more profitable

August 10, 2009

For 14 years, I’ve been preaching the benefits of creating outstanding customer experiences. The companies I work with seem to understand on an emotional level that better customer experiences bring loyalty from customers. But then they ask, “What is loyalty? What does it mean?” Behind those questions is skepticism that there isn’t really much to the whole concept. I’ve heard the line, “Our customers only care about price and they’ll remain loyal as long as our prices remain low” more often than I can count. In this economy, I’m hearing it more often than ever.

Now comes the 2009 Customer Experience Consumer Study from Strativity Group, Inc.  (http://bit.ly/GVH8I) which backs up the emotional understanding of exceptional customer experiences with one based on consumer opinions of their own experiences.  Based on surveys of 1,994 consumers, Strativity found that “Consumers … indicated they penalize companies that fail to deliver the desired experiences either by demanding discounted prices or by terminating their relationship altogether.”  The numbers show that:

  • 52% of unhappy customers say they will continue doing business with the company that made them unhappy only if it offers a discount of 5% or more. When we make customers unhappy, they want something in return.
  • Even in today’s difficult economic times, 40% of loyal customers (customers significantly happy with their customer experiences) are willing to pay an additional 10% or more to continue purchasing from the companies delivering great experiences. And while the study says only 9% of unhappy customers are willing to pay more, I see it this way: 91% of customers who are continuing to do business with you even though you’re not making them happy will bolt for the door if you raise your prices for any reason.

The study also notes that exceptional customer experiences result in significantly lower customer attrition. According to the report, “Loyal customers with exceptional customer experiences are almost three times as likely to continue doing business with companies for another ten years or more than the dissatisfied customers.” In addition, “Customers who received an inferior customer experience are ten times more likely to cease doing business with companies within the next 12 months than loyal customers.”

What does all of it mean? As Strativity puts it, “consumers want the maximum value rather than the lowest price.” If exceptional customer experiences are not among your competitive differentiators, you’re going to find yourself losing customers or selling your products and services at a lower price than you would like. In this economy, when revenues are down significantly already, can you afford to charge one penny less for your goods and services than you should? Deliver exceptional customer experiences and you not only won’t have to, you’ll probably be able to charge more.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

On the phone for 2 hours for an obvious mistake. Why?

August 6, 2009

This is a fascinating story from the Associated Press:

“A New Hampshire man says he swiped his debit card at a gas station to buy a pack of cigarettes and was charged over 23 quadrillion dollars. Josh Muszynski checked his account online a few hours later and saw the 17-digit number — a stunning $23,148,855,308,184,500 (twenty-three quadrillion, one hundred forty-eight trillion, eight hundred fifty-five billion, three hundred eight million, one hundred eighty-four thousand, five hundred dollars).”

This story has been all over the web. Most people talked about the bank’s incredible mistake – “Can you believe it? 23 quadrillion dollars?” The mistake is too silly to make a big deal over.

Or is it? In reading the story, it wasn’t the ridiculously large number that caught my eye. It was this passage:

“Muszynski says he spent two hours on the phone with Bank of America trying to sort out the string of numbers and the $15 overdraft fee.”

TWO HOURS? What could have been happening on that call for two hours? Did the representative(s) have to follow every procedure the right way in order to figure out that he didn’t spend that kind of money? In a TV interview, Muszynski said the CSR didn’t quite know what to do with it.

Here’s what should have happened: Muszynski sees the number on his statement. After going back to the gas station, he calls Bank of America. A representative answers the phone and says,

“How may I help you today?”

Muszynski says, “There’s a charge on my debit card for $23,148,855,308,184,500.”

The rep says, “Hmm … Let me call up your account … I have it here, Mr. Muszynski. Oh, wow, I do see that number. That is clearly a mistake. Let me check into it and remove it from your account. I’ll call you when it’s done. What is the best number to reach you?”

And that would be that. No two hours on the phone, no holding for help, no confused representatives making him wait.

It should have been this way because the mistake was so obvious, so ridiculous that anybody could see that it was a mistake. There was no way the bank was not going to remove the charge or blame him for charging that much (Muszynski said he thought his identity was compromised and somebody used his card to buy Europe). The customer did not have to wait or explain while the bank figured out what happened, how it happened, and whose fault it was (It turned out to be Visa’s fault – 13,000 other customers had the same mistake). Why did it take so long?

The bank should have removed the charge and the service fee immediately because it was so obviously a mistake. If the systems didn’t allow that quick a change, then they should have done what I recommended. The customer should not be penalized because somebody on the provider side made a mistake.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

Are companies throwing marketing dollars out the window?

August 3, 2009

I ran across an article in Telephony Online with the intriguing title, “Are marketing billions being wasted?”(http://telephonyonline.com/global/news/service-provider-customer-retention-0803/)  It told of a survey of Chief Marketing Officers at telecom service providers in which the CMOs admitted that their efforts to gain and retain customers (are being) crippled by internal barriers (and) IT inefficiencies.”

Yes, they are. And it’s not just telephone and wireless companies who are doing it. It’s what I call being “pennywise and billions foolish.” The article might as well have been called, “It’s Not Rocket Service: You’re Wasting Your Marketing Dollars.”

A few years ago, I was teaching a customer service course to a wireless telephone company. The company had 23% turnover in customers over the past 12 months. I told them, “Having 23% churn means that at least 23% of your marketing dollars are being spent to replace customers you already had and could have kept!” What a waste! Telcos and other organizations skimp on hiring the right customer-facing people, keep wages of those people low in an effort to cut costs, create bureaucracies that stop customer-contact people from having any authority to fix the customer’s problem, and have no idea what the customer expects. And then when churn is higher than they want it to be, what do they do? They increase the marketing budget and invest in advanced CRM systems that tell them everything about the customer except the way he or she wants to be treated.

Three things popped out at me from the survey by the CMO Council and its Customer Experience Board: One, more than half the CMOs said “their companies need to improve their responses to customer pain points” two, 89% said they need to handle and respond to customer problems better, and three, “more than half believe their organization is not culturally or organizationally aligned around the customer.” And they wonder why they’re seeing higher rates of churn.

Sadly, these numbers are not unique to the telephony business. The same range of numbers comes out in survey after survey in industry after industry.

The answer is twofold:  One, figure out what roadblocks are stopping your customers from having the experience they expect and deserve. People buy again and again because they like the experience – the experience of using the product and the service they get when they buy and need help with the product. In the article, writer Carol Wilson talks about using news forums, blogs and other social media to track what people are saying about the issues with the products. Customer surveys won’t tell you half as much as finding out what people are saying online.

The other answer is to invest in hiring and training truly customer-caring people and paying them well. Then, give them the authority to fix customer problems the way the customer expects. Yes, it’s going to cost more, but if you don’t spend it on increased service levels, you’re going to waste the money on marketing anyway.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

The Gates/Crowley incident has lessons for customer service

July 28, 2009

Was there a lesson in the interaction between Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates and Sgt. James Crowley in Cambridge, Massachusetts? Yes, but not the one you think there was.

I don’t know what really happened there. There is the officer’s side of the story and there is Gates’. There is the screaming by those who feel the incident was racial and those who believe that the Sgt. Crowley is the victim of reverse racism, and that people are impugning a good man. I’m not going to comment on either of those accusations, because I wasn’t there.

But I do know one thing: the Gates/Crowley story has a big lesson for those of us who deal with customers, employees, or children. That lesson is: with authority comes responsibility not to use that authority unless it’s absolutely needed. I’ve learned that lesson over and over, from my child psychology professor, from baseball umpires and from watching customer service people turn disappointed and upset customers into raving lunatics.

As a big baseball fan, I can never understand why umpires yell back at players and managers when those players and managers yell at them.  The umpire has all the power. He made his decision and all the arguing and yelling in the world isn’t going to change that. If the umpire has had enough of the manager or player’s behavior, he can throw them out of the game. He never has to say a word except the “strike”, “ball”, “safe”, or “out” call he’s already made. There’s no reason to yell back.

What is the umpire trying to prove when he yells? I suppose he’s trying to show that he is the authority on the field and nobody is going to talk to him that way. But he’s already the authority on the field. He doesn’t have to say anything. With the authority comes the responsibility not to use it. When the umpire yells, he only makes matters worse and gets the manager or player angrier.

I’ve seen this with customer service people too.  The frustrated customer, having spoken with five people already, blows her stack and takes it out on the poor service person. The service person says in a stern tone, “Please don’t talk to me like that or I will hang up (or get security, etc.)” When the customer gets more upset because nobody seems to want to help her, she yells some more. At that point, the employee yells back, puts her on hold (forever) or hangs up. This only exacerbates the situation.

The service person has all the authority. She can be nice or nasty. She can fix the situation or not. She can get help from a supervisor or solve the problem herself. Just because the customer is angry doesn’t make it okay for the service rep to get down in the dirt with her. As I say to my class participants, “they’re not getting paid to be nice and patient. You are.”

The same goes for supervisors and parents of young children. The parent has all the authority—as does a police officer.

Once Sgt. Crowley ascertained that Professor Gates was in his own house, he should have excused himself and walked away – no apology needed. It didn’t matter whether the professor was screaming and yelling like a maniac or not. The sergeant had all the authority. With authority comes the responsibility not to use it when it’s not absolutely necessary.

Tags:, , , , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Uncategorized | Leave a Comment »

« Older Entries
Newer Entries »
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.