HOW CAN I TRAIN YOU TODAY?

Experiential activities can liven up customer service training.

By Lorraine Ukens  

Customer service representatives act as liaisons between customers and companies.  Their attitudes and actions directly influence the customer’s perception of a product or service and the organization as a whole.  In the customer’s point of view, the people performing the service are the company.

            Customer satisfaction helps an organization build a valuable reputation of dependability and quality performance.  This strengthens customer loyalty, which in turn means continued business for the organization.  Although many businesses tout quality customer service as their priority, most people can share anecdotes of disappointing customer experiences at such places as airports, banks, or restaurants.  The message from the customers is clear:  Organizations can do better.

            There are several exercises that can help customer service staff members appreciate the need for consistent customer service.  First and foremost, the organization must create a culture that promotes quality products and service. The company’s philosophy should recognize that customers are more than a means to make money.  Employees must really believe that customers are the reason they are employed.

            Experiential activities provide an excellent way to enhance customer service training programs.  By actively engaging participants, these activities provide an innovative and enjoyable format to stimulate discussion and learning, and help participants stay focused, enthusiastic, and motivated.  Many of them are short—they typically last an hour or less—and involve discussion once the activity is concluded.

Customer advocacy

There are two levels of customer-service training.  The first level involves specific technical knowledge required to answer questions and solve problems.  It deals with the content of the service transaction and involves everything from product characteristics to company policies.

            The second level deals with the way in which the employee interacts with the customer.  At a minimum, service staff members need to learn how to create a positive image of their organization, communicate effectively, and build customer rapport.  During training sessions, trainers should provide case studies to illustrate both positive and negative customer exchanges.

            The company must establish procedures for handling different types of customer complaints.  Established priorities help the service staff gauge the degree of customer satisfaction and know when a case needs to be referred to a supervisor. 

            Trainers can structure that allow staff to create a customer service philosophy.  One method calls for gathering new or existing employees and asking them to think of their own customer service slogans and write them on a poster board.  Participants write one word that best describes a quality customer experience.  When all the cards are collected, the group begins a discussion about which words are the most representative of a positive experience.

            Another useful training method that highlights the importance of customer service is identifying cases of poor service.  Staff members perform a skit fashioned after a poor customer exchange.  The purpose of the skit is to allow trainees to identify what points of the experience were handled poorly and what can be done to offer better service.

An attentive ear

Customer service representatives must have good listening skills to understand and properly address customers’ inquiries.  To build this crucial skill, trainers can lead listening exercises whereby participants enter a discussion on the condition that they can adequately summarize the comments made by the preceding speaker.  Before the next participant speaks, he must follow the same rules:  listen, summarize, and provide comment.

            Customer service representatives also need to develop a vocabulary that is appropriate for dealing with customers and avoid words that invoke strong reactions.  Trainees can address the tendency to use negative words in conversation by identifying the 10 most common negative words, excluding obscenities, that provoke negative reactions.  The exercise will help trainees think twice about what they say when speaking to unhappy customers.

            For multinational organizations, body language and interpersonal gestures are of paramount importance.  Representatives who deal with customers face to face should learn the intricacies of personal contact.  For example, nodding your head signifies “no” in Mediterranean countries.  Using an index finger to point is considered rude in parts of Asia .  In Japan , passing an item with one hand is considered a rude gesture.

            While offering a consistent training program is important, hiring the right candidates is absolutely necessary.  Service representatives must have a combination of good interpersonal skills, competent knowledge of the business, and proficient problem-solving abilities.

            However, the practical meaning of good service extends far beyond established policy and technical expertise.  Providing quality service means flexibility in responding to the changing conditions and needs of the customer.  This is where critical thinking skills become so important.

 Active learning

Although technical knowledge can be taught using more traditional means such as reading, lectures, and videos, course participants can easily succumb to boredom and inattention.  Trainers can present content in a more active way by using some cooperative-learning designs. 

            These include group inquiry, where participants study information in pairs; guided discussion, where the trainer poses a series of Socratic questions; learning tournaments, where teams are quizzed on material; information searches, in which participants find the information themselves; and a card sort, where information is “chunked” into appropriate categories.

            Another effective method is the jigsaw design.  The learning material is broken in several parts and small groups are asked to master one section.  They then form new groups with a representative from each section teaching the material to the others.  The large group reconvenes for a review and to answer questions. 

            In today’s service environment, the challenge lies in teaching employees new skills, behaviors, and attitudes such as communication, creativity, teamwork, initiative, and self-empowerment.  If a trainer wants to teach people how to interact, she has to show them how, and she can’t do that by merely sharing information with them. 

            Trainers must select activities that are pertinent to the specific needs of their audiences and tailored to their organizations.  The most important thing is to be clear about the learning objectives.

Invisible facilitator

Unless an activity calls for the facilitator to take an active role, participants should be allowed to experience the event on their own.  They should be allowed the freedom to make mistakes.  This also is an excellent way to examine the situation and learn from its outcomes.  The facilitator should intervene only to address questions about procedure and give only as much details as needed to answer the inquiries without influencing the results.

            The feedback session is the most important step in making the connection between the activity and the learning goal.  This is where participants talk about what happened, how they are feeling, what insights have been gained, and how the concepts can be applied to the real world.

            The facilitator needs to ask probing questions that will guide participants to see how the event relates to the learning objective.  Discussing and reflecting on the shared experience helps employees own the knowledge they have gained.

            Action learning, where participants work as a group to solve an actual problem in the workplace, can provide a very powerful learning experience.  It is important to remember, however, that this endeavor involves accountability.  A leader must closely monitor the process and be available for counseling.

            More than ever, companies need employees who can identify problems and develop quick solutions.  That doesn’t mean seeing everything as a potential problem, but rather thinking about what is happening, what outcomes are expected, what resources are needed, and what alternative solutions might be available.  This is critical thinking at its best.

            Along with structured hands-on experiences, development efforts should include personal assessments, questionnaires, checklists, best practice ideas, action guidelines, and process models and techniques. 

             A properly trained and well-informed staff will help deliver a winning performance that keeps both internal and external customers satisfied. 

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Lorraine Ukens is an HRD consultant and owner of Team-ing With Success; www.team-ing.com. Some of the ideas in the article were adapted from her most recent publication, 101 Ways to Improve Customer Service.