Customer Service_No Brainer!

Marketing Guru, Philip Kotler had asserted that the customer is king! JW Marriott taught us that if you take care of your employees, they will take care of your clients resulting in the business also being looked after well. If you treat your employees right, they will treat your customers right. Do unto others as you would have others do unto you is another phrase that resonates with many.

Be it internal or external customers, people are the most important asset! Another beautiful thought learned was 'people don't care how much you know till they know how much you care'. At the heart of everything, is your most important asset: people! Putting it all together sums up how important and basic customer service is. It's not rocket science to excel in customer service and be a market leader. You just need to have the right mindset which then determines your behaviour, since your thoughts control your actions! Put your heart where your mind is and watch things flourish.

I landed myself in the BPO industry after a Masters degree in Cultural & Media Studies, a PGDBM and being a freelance radio jockey in Durban, South Africa. Little did I know what this industry was about when I first became a customer care representative. I liked talking to people and found it easy due to my global upbringing and exposure to different cultures. I was passionate and enthusiastic and loved life and being me! I underwent voice & accent training and then went onto learn about the product. During transition, on my second day, I faced my first irate caller. Till date I remember how I tried to help and say something but my customer was so angry that he did not let me speak! He just venting out his anger and hung up! I felt traumatized after the call; all I had wanted was to help and give it my best but failed. My call was being recorded and I felt like this customer had taken away my remote control from my hand. I was in tears! I had to logout and couldn't take the next call because I was emotionally distraught. That is how passionate I had been to help but had failed. What was the customer's issue? He was in a black-out zone for the NFL and not able to watch his game! Now I understood what it meant to him because I had lived in the USA and knew the passion for NFL. Yet, I hadn't been able to manage my customer!

My Team Leader took me for a coaching session. He patiently sat with me while I composed myself and calmed down. I then had my first in-depth coaching session with him where the 'soft skills' of managing such customers were shared with me. I felt better and bounced back to take calls. That was the day I realized I want to become a trainer & coach, for I felt that there is a lot of scope for excellence in customer service and I wanted to welcome the future of this industry with wide open arms.

A decade later (current day), after having trained people & worked with Australian and UK clients and servicing their customers, I feel that customer service or customer relationship, call it by any name, is still the need of the hour because our people remain our most important assets. Develop your people to self-develop and develop the business, no matter what domain you're in. Being enthusiastic about your goals, your work and your customers (internal or external) creates a domino effect on the people around you, positively influencing the work culture. That positivism will define your demeanor in all your interactions. Add on other elements of training and coaching and you are all set to thrive in customer service! It's not going to happen overnight because the road isn't always smooth. The challenges that come your way just need to be converted to identified opportunities and capitalized on.

Customer service is like baking a cake! You can't bake a cake if you don't have the required tools (measuring cup, measuring spoon, baking bowl, oven, etc.) and ingredients, where every ingredient plays a different role. Yet, when they all come together, the end product is a coherent blended result of all inputs. Most importantly, the most magical essence required is your passion and interest! Without that, you will have an end product but it won't be 100%. So customer service starts with the mindset of wanting to do assist customers; well begun is half done. Hence, customer service is a no brainer!