Creating a Call to YOUR Customer! - 5 Tenets of Service

In the 35 years I’ve had the pleasure of contributing, observing and leading Customer Service, the landscape and options for supporting it has transformed and evolved immensely. By leaps and bounds, the technological changes have been amazing. Never before, has it been easier to measure, monitor and track performance, progress and trends.

Those of us who have been doing this for a while understand technology is great, and very much a necessity – but it’s how you use the technology to support your customer that’s key!

Whether yours is a Call Center, Contact Center, Help Desk, Service Desk or other iteration – the one instance that should never change, is the Customer being at the core and heart of all your initiatives and endeavors. This is an effort that must be performed internally.

What steps should leaders take to ensure the Customer is at the heart of service delivery? There are 5 key elements that must be present within both the tactical and strategic plan.

1.      Recruit people – who like people.

Contrary to popular belief, you cannot sit a monkey in a chair, give it a phone and headset and create success. The art of customer service is complex. Let’s be real, no one’s contacting your center just to say – “hello.” Often times a diffusion and de-escalation are required and it takes someone who genuinely cares and can put themselves in the shoes of that person who gets the desired result. These soft skills are hard to come by. To recruit correctly – Leaders must understand that the process for finding these folks is lengthier than for technical positions.

If as I’ve often heard leaders state, “We care about our Customer” is true – then take the time required to recruit the right people by performing the due diligence of understanding who you need and/or replicating the folks that are creating success today. The types of personalities I’ve found really work, thrive and create phenomenal results enjoy gathering the knowledge that incorporates being a Jack of all trades. They possess the following traits; generally happy – always smiling, love people, can easily connect patterns and trends, love sharing – making for insightful staff and educated Customers and they are often-times very quirky. However, they are masters at connecting with people.

2.      Incentivize the right thing.

Too often, we give our energy, time and effort to those exhibiting negative behaviors when it should be the opposite. How often – especially in a customer service environment do we spend time coaching those who are absent rather than those who show up, show out and work diligently to serve and support the customer every day? Then “we” wonder why the morale is low?

One of the strategies I consistently use and find works towards creating a strong cohesiveness within the Team is to stack rank the staff by top (green), mid (orange), low (red). Then I create visibility and transparency by implementing; reporting, dashboards and recognition programs that reward the behaviors I want to see. Along with this is taking the time to hire folks who exhibit these traits. It doesn’t take long to begin seeing the transformation. You will lose a few folks, however, the ones who remain will be the ones who really want to be there and who create the results you and your Customers want to see.

3.      Make it easy.

When Customers contact Customer Service, they do so with the expectation that the Representative they speak with knows everything about them. Not an unrealistic expectation – however, as we Customer Service Professionals know, very often this is not the case. We know there may be several systems a Rep must use to pull together one-tidbit of information. I’ve led at least three centers where the Reps used 14 systems that barely communicated with each other, if at all. And the expectation was set that there would be no hiccups in the process. Very unrealistic.

Customer Service Leaders have wonderful technology at their disposal – great strides have been made here. However, the ability to make it easy – not so much. My experience tells me that you can expect all you want but if it is not easy, it will not happen. I am as dedicated as they come, however, I worked for one company that expected monthly to prepare a report that took 2 weeks to complete. Is this a reasonable ask? I’ll let you decide.

When the asks are not reasonable and the task is difficult to complete, the human psychology will re-prioritize the tasks and activities it believes it can control and be more successful at doing. Unfortunately, these tasks that are not being performed may be high value items that should and need to get done. From my perspective, it is the job of Leadership to remove barriers, mobilize information, document processes and at minimum make it easy to complete and get things done that matter and lead to success.

4.      Measure, Monitor & Track.

What gets monitored – gets managed. But…how do you measure, monitor or track anything?

Customer Service is a fast-paced environment and “asks” are coming at you hard, strong and frequently. However, it is Leadership’s role to slow down the momentum and ask the relevant questions; what are the key performance metrics, what are the tools that will be used to monitor and/or track them? Where is the data? Is it in a format it can be interpreted? Or…will it need to be exported into a readable, interpretable format and what does that look like? Can we answer the questions that need to be answered?

It is imperative that Leadership knows when to re-prioritize, re-strategize and how to impact and control the outcome. As an example – you arrive to the office and the Service Level is 100%, then 15 minutes later, you notice it has dropped to 89%. What do you do? The goal is ≥95%...to control the outcome, the Leader must know when to add more people, to re-align breaks, lunches – and to perhaps get seats in seats.

Technology advancement has made the task of controlling outcomes much easier. Leaders are able to establish high, mid, lows and assign triggers and alerts to undesirable states. They are able to create dashboards using visual cues. There’s no longer a need to be tied to your desk and monitor, many of these technologies are web and mobile based and are just a mobile device away.  

Although many of us still do it - gone are the days of pulling data, creating view(s), analyzing information then distributing it.  Many call center technologies allow Leaders to setup on-demand customizable views represented in the way they need/like to see it. And better yet, the same can be done for staff – giving them the opportunity to self-correct prior to the issue coming into the leader’s purview; making it easy for all concerned.

5.      Hire Leaders who like People.

I’m going to refer to tenet #1 and strongly recommend hiring Leaders to lead your Customer Service efforts and initiatives who like people as well. Too often, and I have not figured out quite why – Narcissistic Sociopaths are placed in leadership positions who only care about money and their own Agendas. Even more baffling to me, is they are seen as effective. Does anyone use as a measuring stick, the impact on the Team?

They might, however in my experience, it does not seem to be the case. There is no way to ensure a happy Customer without taking into the consideration the direct impact a bad leader has on the psyche of the Team. It is a known fact when the Representatives are happy, they are more likely to make your Customers happy. Despite this rationality, too many organizations do not spend enough of their resources ensuring employees, in general, are happy, that leadership is close to the day-to-day going’s on and that the right leaders are in the right place. Unfortunately the Customer’s Experience suffers.

The types of Leaders I’ve seen be successful in the Customer Service environment are skilled at translating intangible cost center concepts into tangible cost center ones. They are excellent listeners who inspire and motivate the Team. They are fair, consistent and respectful.  They generally put the Teams needs ahead of their own and through their listening skills stimulate innovation, creativity and a community of people who are committed to the cause.

The true success in implementing these five strategies is by aligning internally, ensuring your Representatives have the tools, systems and resources needed - you create a voice and a call externally to the right Customers for you.

I’d like to hear from you. Feel free to share, like the article or connect with me.

Tonya Haynes is the Chief Efficiency Officer for Phoenix Business Development Group and sits on Rutger’s University – Customer Experience Board.

Since 2002, Phoenix Business Development Group through education, IT Solutions and Project Management has been supporting Fortune 500 Leaders design and engineer organizations that are efficient, streamlined and performance – driven!