Not everyone has the patience of Ban Ki-moon. Or the numberless memes of the Dalai Lama – actually, we rather doubt the success rate with customers of a wisdom that suggests “silence is sometimes the best answer”.
So how do we keep our cool when dealing with someone who has lost theirs?
“It becomes easier with practice,” says Hannah Maclaren, a customer service veteran with more than 15 years of experience in dealing with the public.
Hannah, from Glasgow, has worked for a variety of organisations, from the NHS to major telecoms and internet providers, as well as in the education sector.
She says her philosophy has always been to put herself in the shoes of the customer, no matter how illogical or unreasonable they become.
It’s sound advice for the broad range of roles in the Customer Service sector, from the First Line Manager, who can be charged with delivering an entire group’s customer-focused values, right to the front line and those vital, people-empowering roles of Tele Sales, Advisers, Receptionists and even Meter Readers.
Hannah has also taken the view that, if a customer turns to her for a query or a complaint, it is her task to resolve the problem and not simply pass it on to someone else.
“Once you’ve made up your mind to do that,” she points out, “it actually gets easier to reach a satisfactory outcome because the customer recognises they are dealing with someone who is actually on their side and that can be enough to calm them down and get them to discuss the problem in rational terms.”
Yet Hannah is also quick to dismiss the commonly held preconception that working in customer services is all about conflict resolution – most of the time it is about helping people who need information and guidance, which can be richly rewarding.
She is one of the new breed of customer service providers who takes an empathetic and empowered approach to the job, using forensic questioning to get to the heart of the issue and having the clout within the organisations she works for to deliver a solution.
Currently on s1jobs.com there are many vacancies for go-to experts just like Hannah, whose focus is all about the customer and who will hold the organisation they work for to account to ensure that it delivers on its promises.
Of course, it takes exceptional communication skills and a combination of subtlety and strength in order to do this kind of work – but companies are increasingly recognising these are exactly the qualities they need to instill in all their staff, if they want to maintain a great reputation.
Hannah says: “Even when something goes wrong you have the opportunity to convert an unhappy customer into an enthusiastic advocate for your company, but really it is best that things don’t go wrong in the first place.
“The most impressive organisations I have worked for are the ones that talk regularly to those of us on the front line and who channel what we’ve learned about how mistakes happen back into the business.
“That way they can take steps to prevent mistakes from happening in the first place, and that’s the best way to guarantee happy customers!”
For all the latest Customer Services vacancies visit s1jobs.com