Delivering and Improving
Effective Customer Service
Outline for today
• Introductions and welcome why are we here
today?
• Customers, and customer service
• Customer Identification exercise
• What exactly do we mean by good customer
service?
• Customer Relationship management
• Customer complaints – best and worst examples
• Managing customer expectations and complaints
• Key attributes of an effective customer service
How today’s session will run
• I am here to stimulate your learning
• I will set you various exercises and tasks, there
are no right or wrong answers.
• Be honest and open
• Contribute fully
• You are all here to learn
Applied knowledge
• This course isn’t just about giving you some of
the theory of delivering and improving an
effective customer service.
• You can get that from reading books.
• The course is about you developing practical
skills as well as knowledge and you will learn
most effectively after the course if you start to
make changes in the way you do things and
apply new ideas during your work
The fundamental belief of a customer
focused organisation
“Customers are the
reason for work, not an
interruption of work”.
Moment of truth:
• Defined as “Any episode in which a customer
comes into contact with any aspect of the
organisation and gets an impression of the
quality of service” (Albrecht 1988).
• Good customer service is all about improving
the moment of truth
Customer, User, direct and indirect
is there a difference?
• Customer – person or organisation who receives or uses
‘something’ produced by us, regardless of whether they pay
for it or not.
• User – person or organisation who directly uses the
product/service, sometimes called ‘end-user’
• Direct = direct recipient or user.
• Indirect = indirect recipient or user. They may be 2 or 3 steps
away from us, but our quality affects them.
• E.g. I didn’t buy the computer I use in my office, I am not a
direct customer of the computer supplier, nor of the
purchasing department but I am a user or indirect customer.
Customer, User, direct and indirect
• Your organisation has all of these.
• MINI EXERCISE QUESTION - Should you treat
any of them any differently? Or should they
all be treated in the same way ?
What do we mean by the term
‘customer’?
• Anyone who interacts with us or the service
we provide, either directly or indirectly, or is a
affected by the quality of the product or
service, whether they are paying for it or not,
either indirectly or directly, whether they are
internal to the organisation or not.
• They do not have to be in a contractual (i.e.
paying) relationship with us.
Mini exercise
• When you hear the words ‘customer service’
what does it make you think of?
Terms associated with customer
service
•
•
•
•
•
•
Customer focused
Delighting the customer
Satisfying the customer
Meeting the customer’s need
Exceeding the customer’s need.
Giving the customer what they want, not what
we think they want.
Customer service makes the
difference
• Once differences between competitors are
fairly similar then good customer service
makes the difference for customers.
• Once: price, delivery times, quality of product
are similar then customer service makes the
difference as to whether a customer comes to
you, stays with you, or goes elsewhere
Internal and external customers
• Staff who work within your organisation are
internal customers of each other.
• You are all customers yourselves
Internal - external
• Staff at other branches/depots/offices/sites in
Hull may be internal customers of both your
Hull site and, for example, of your stockyard
in Pontypridd (South Wales) and storerooms
in Leeds.
• Do they receive the same service from each
place/site within your organisation?
Individual Exercise
• Who are the internal customers within YOUR
organisation?
• Make a list.
• How many other internal customers does each
internal customer link to
• Spider diagram?
• May be surprising – sometimes the ‘least
important’ staff link with many more people
than the senior staff do.
Individual Exercise
• Now try and , then try and group or categorize
the internal customers
• For example by: size, location, power,
influence, reputation, quality – what is
important to you
What do we mean by the term
‘customer service’?
• For the purpose of today we will take it mean that it
is the set of behaviours which an organisation
undertakes during its interaction with its customers
and how customers perceive the behaviours.
• ‘Service quality comprises the degree to which
attributes of the service desired by the users are
identified and incorporated in the product and
service and the degree to which desired levels of
these attributes are perceived by the users to be
achieved’ (Jacques Horovitz, 1987)
In other words
• It’s not always what you do.
• It’s how your customers pereceive what you
do that makes the difference
But it isn’t easy
Difficulties/Problems with measuring and
assessing the quality of customer service
Extremely subjective
Quality is more frequently judged by price because there are less
likely to be other ‘measurable’ factors. BUT once price
amongst your competitors is similar to your prices; then it’s
customer service that makes the difference
Each customer is different and has a different perception of what
they expect/need/demand/want
With products a customer can see it before they buy it, with a
service the quality can only be experienced
It’s not what you do but how
others see it....
• ‘The quality of a service is determined by the
user’s perception’ (Murdick, Renders, Russel,
1990).
• It’s not what you do, nor the way that you do
it, but how your customers perceive what
you do and how you do it that determines
the quality of your customer service.
Discussion point
“It’s not what you do, nor the way that you do
it, but how your customers perceive what
you do and how you do it that determines
the quality of your customer service”.
• To what extent do you think that the above
statement is true or false?
It’s easy to spot ‘poor quality’, sometimes
difficult to identify good quality.
• When evaluating whether or not a product or
service meets his or her needs a customer will
typically wrap everything into one.
• This means that ‘everything’ to do with the
product /service is considered together as
‘part of the overall package’. What this means
is that for your organisation to be able to
provide a quality product/service you have to
get everything right. The overall package.
Getting it right
- the overall package
• Getting some of it right, or some of it ‘perfect’
(whatever perfect is) is no good if something
else isn’t right. So your ‘perfect’
whatdoyamacallit may be let down and
regarded as poor by the customer by the surly
member of staff who takes 3 days to return a
customer’s phone call because they have
‘better things to’, or may be let down by the
delivery being late.
Getting it right
the overall package
• A great product and your organisation’s
reputation may be let down by the delivery
driver who walks dirt into the customer’s
carpet or who is scheduled to arrive at 2pm
but arrives at 4:30 without having let the
customer know.
• Your subcontractors and suppliers affect your
reputation
Exercise ‘the overall package’
• What do you think might typically form part of
your organisation’s ‘overall package’ from a
customer’s perspective?
• And to what extent do your suppliers and
subcontractors affect your overall package?
you think different customers have different
perspectives?
What types of things or attributes are
customers likely to consider as being part of
your overall package?
Customers will typically consider all the
following as being ‘part of the package’:
•
•
•
•
•
•
Product or service reliability.
Consistency.
Speed and timeliness of delivery.
Accuracy of paperwork.
Courtesy of telephone answering.
The value of information you give e.g. accuracy and
‘useability’ of any instructions on how to use it.
• The service provided by the delivery organisation.
• The attitude of staff - can do or “not my job guvnor”
Getting it right
the overall package
• Customers include everything as ‘part of the
package’ - so you can never us the excuse – “that is
the other department’s responsibility”, or “It’s the
delivery driver’s fault”, or “It’s a computer problem
that caused it”.
• A customer expects everything to meet their
expectation – so you have to ensure that everything
which forms ‘part of the package’ is ‘spot on’ – even
if part of the service is outside your control or
authority. And that may be difficult to do.
The two dimensions of quality customer
service
• 1 procedural dimension
• Systems, procedures and processes - the way
how things get done. The mechanisms by
which customers’ needs may be met.
Normally they are systematic, formal and
organised.
• 2 personal dimension
• The human or interpersonal side.
Personal dimension
• The human or interpersonal side includes the
attitudes, behavioural patterns and verbal
skills which are present in every interaction
with the customer.
• Unless the organisation is customer focused
and staff are customer focused. It’s easy to
lose sight of how important the personal
touch is. Things such as our: appearance,
attitude, communication style, telephone
manner, friendliness,etc
• An organisation can manage the procedural
dimension.
• An organisation can help develop the
personal dimension and set standards.
• As individuals you can improve, develop and
enhance your personal dimension.
Skills Audit ?
• After today you might want to have a go at
producing a skills audit?
• A self review of your own skills, for your own
personal and professional development.
• Simply write down in a list:
• All your skills you have that you use
• All the skills you need for fantastic service
• Rate them from 1-10
Skills audit part 1
Skills you already have
Rate How good you feel
they are 1-10
Rate how good they need
to be 1-10
For any 10s ask what
evidence is there?
E.g. telephone skills
6
9
Computer word processing
3
5 as you rarely use a
computer
Skills audit part 1
• Where there is a difference in your numbers
for a skills then think about how, where and
when you will develop that skill in order to
‘close the gap’
Skills audit part 2
Skills you need to develop
now and for the future
Why are they important?
Where and how are you
going to learn these skills ?
Negotiating with
customers
Important to be able to
negotiate
Learn from colleagues,
shadow them and ask
them to explain
Better telephone skills
Very important for good
customer service
Attend training course
Presentation skills
I’ve been asked to explain a Training course plus watch
new product to potential
others learn how they do it
customers
Short break ?
Ok now we’ll look at
external customers
External Customer Identification exercise
• Who are your external customers?
• Use the handout ‘customer identification grid’
purple coloured handout sheet
• Remember Direct = direct recipient/user.
• Indirect = indirect recipient/user e.g. may be 3
stages away from us, but our quality affects
them.
Your best and worse customers
• Who are your best and worst customers to
deal with and why?
• Discuss in pairs or in threes and write up main
points
QUESTIONS
• How do your customer see your
organisation?
• Is it a pleasure to do business with you?
• Do they look forward to it?
• Are your systems easy to use?
• Are your people easy to deal with?
• Are staff friendly and helpful?
• Do they enjoy doing business with you?
• Are they delighted to do business with you?
Question
• How do you think your customers see you?
• Would they classify your organisation as being
one of their best or worse customers?
• There will be an exercise to help you think in
more detail about this later on this.
Service characteristics
• Before you can systematically start to improve
your service you need to understand its
characteristics.
• The next exercise will help you do this.
What are your characteristics?
Exercise
• What are your organisation’s service
characteristics?
• See white coloured handout What Are your
service characteristics?
• Complete the handout sheet in pairs or threes
and then we’ll discuss the results.
What are your characteristics?
Exercise
• Your results ?
• If you had to draw a picture of this what
would it look like?
Now an exercise on customer care
Excellent and poor customer service
exercise
• See green coloured handout sheet ‘customer care
exercise’.
• Think of two examples which you regard as being
excellent customer service; one from inside your
organisation, one from outside of the organisation.
• Thinks two examples which you regard as being poor
customer service; one from inside, one from outside of
the company. For each example identify:
• The key factors that contributed to the experience,
• Your feelings and reactions at the time,
• Your feelings and reactions now.
Quick break?
What did you list for excellent
customer service?
• ?
Typical factors you might have listed for
excellent customer service
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Knowledgeable and friendly staff
Professional manner of staff
Staff listened to me
They did what they said they would do
They seemed to care
They responded to me promptly
They seemed genuinely concerned
They smiled
They treated me as a real human being; not a distraction
They seemed proud of what they did and of the organisation
Courteous, friendly and efficient service
What did you list for poor
customer service?
• ?
Typical fact is you might have listed under
poor customer service
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Nobody seemed to have a clue what they were doing
Nobody explained
I was kept waiting
They ignored me
They treated me as though it was my fault
They never got back to me; I had to chase them
They blamed it on the system, the managers, the
computers, their suppliers,
• They fobbed me off
• They were busy doing something else and I was an
interruption and a distraction from their main work
How long did your reactions to poor customer
service last?
•
•
•
•
•
•
Hours
Days
Weeks
Months
Years
A lifetime
And how many people have you told about
the poor service?
Typically
• Feelings about really bad experiences last for
years?
• We tell at least five other people (and how
many people do they then tell?).
• The organisation rarely knows how badly we
feel
Some fundamentals…
4 fundamental principles for delivering good
customer service
1 the organisation is fully committed to providing
excellent customer care and the customer is the key
focus throughout the organisation.
2 all staff are aware of and committed to, the vision of
excellent customer care.
3 all staff are trained to provide the highest quality
customer care.
4 systems and procedures are designed to enhance
customer care.
(F & R Bee 2003 reprint)
Mini exercise
• Draw an annotated picture of what you
perceive to be the essential characteristics a
person who is able to provide excellent
customer service.
• Be prepared to explain any aspect of your
diagram
Mini exercise
• Draw an annotated picture of the ideal, or
best environment for providing an excellent
customer service.
• Be prepared to explain any aspect of your
diagram.
How do we know if we are measuring or meeting
our customer’s needs?
• It’s often a problem. There are a number of
reasons for this:
• We tend to rely on anecdotal evidence.
• We tend to only really believe the positive
things but often don’t want to hear the
negative things.
How do we know if we are measuring or
meeting our customer’s needs
• We tend to over rely on the opinions of a
small number of highly articulate and or
wealthy customers particularly those who are
of high status.
• We tend to ignore the views of customers who
we don’t like or who we believe are difficult
customers.
How do we know if we are measuring or
meeting our customer’s needs
• We tend to ignore the views of one-off or new
customers as they don’t understand our
systems.
• Why should THEY have to understand YOUR
systems? If it’s difficult for them the new
customer won’t become a repeat customer.
How do we know if we are measuring or
meeting our customer’s needs
• We tend to rely on feedback from complaining
customers which might give us a distorted
picture of the situation.
• Conversely we tend to rely on a lack of
customer complaints as being an indicator
that everything is OK and our customers are
all very satisfied. WE MAY BE WRONG!
How do we know if we are measuring or
meeting our customer’s needs
• We tend to over rely on outdated conceptions
about our organisation’s customer service - if
it worked well 3 years ago it must still work
well today.
• We tend to over rely on complaint filtering
systems. Often only very major complaints get
dealt with. Minor ones tend to get filtered out
so we don’t know about them so we can’t do
anything about them.
Now let’s have a look at your internal and
external suppliers (and subcontractors)
• Use the pink coloured handout ‘Supplier’
quality service influence and control grid.
• List down major suppliers. They affect your
reputation and quality
• Are they direct or indirect to your organisation
i.e. do they supply your suppliers or supply
you directly?
• Can you influence them or control them to
any extent?
Relationship learning
• Relationship learning is the capacity to
manage interdependencies with different
stakeholders on a day-to-day basis under
conditions of more or less uncertainty.
• The reputation of the individual and the
business depends on these relationships.
Relationship Learning
Teams and relationships - relationship
learning and stakeholders
• Relationship learning is the process by which
stakeholders (that is both people and parties
who have an interest in an organisation such
as: government, shareholders, managers,
employees, family, professional services,
regulatory bodies and agencies and most
importantly customers) are engaged in a twoway process for mutual benefit.
• We will use it to look at your customers
Relationship Learning Exercise
• This exercise will help you to develop skills in
identifying the needs of your customers and
seeing the reasons/needs for things from their
perspective.
• Seeing things from someone else’s
perspective
• You’ll split into 2 groups.
Relationship Learning Exercise part 1
• Group 1 Educating the customer
dark yellow handout sheet
• Read the handout – don’t show it to the other
group. May need to be in a different room for
this?
• Group 2 Learning from the customer
light blue handout sheet
Relationship Learning Exercise part 1
• Group 1 are preparing a maximum 5 minute
presentation talk for group 2.
• Group 2 are busy producing something.
Group 1 educating the customer mini presentation
• Now we will hear the mini presentation from
group 1
Relationship Learning Exercise part 2
• We will now repeat the process but from
opposite perspectives - with the company
thinking about what they would need to know
about a potential customer and the customers
thinking about what the company would need
to know about them.
• So group 1 prepare a list and group 2 prepare
a mini presentation.
Group 2 educating the supplier mini presentation
• Now we will hear the mini presentation from
group 2
After the presentation
• How did the 2 group’s lists differ?
• What similarities were there?
• What crucial differences were there?
•
How did the information differ this time?
– Quality?
– Type and amount of information?
– Level of detail?
– Specific items added?
– ????
• Did either group feel a vital point(s) was(were)
missing?
Relationship Learning
• After today’s session you may want to reflect
on this exercise – how could you use the
information from it?
Captive customers
• Internal customers are often captive, that
means we can’t go anywhere else for the
service.
• E.g. You have to go to your finance dept to sort out
an invoice?
• E.g. You have to contact your sales person about a
sales issue
• You can’t control what they do; but you may
be able to influence them in some way.
Captive customers and poor service
• What often happens with poor internal
service is that we bypass the system, we ring
up somebody else instead perhaps, or do it
ourselves.
• The net effect of this is detrimental to the
efficient and effective working of your
organisation
Internal customer reputation
• It’s very easy to get a reputation for being
unhelpful, never delivering the goods on time,
not knowing what you doing, being
obstructive.
• Probably everybody in this room can think of
at least one person they have to deal with to
which the above applies????
• Do you bypass the system and work around
the unhelpful person in order to get the job
done?
Is Odlings Tour Ready?
• Tour Ready
• The concept of organisation always being
“presentable” should the Queen or other
person such as a major new customer decide
to pop over and have a quick tour of your
area.
• What would their impression of your
organisation be?
Mini exercise – another picture
• Draw a new annotated picture of the ideal, or
best environment and person or people in
that environment for providing an excellent
customer service.
• Include in words any current barriers there are
which prevent this environment or people
from being in place today.
• Be prepared to explain any aspect of your
picture.
Customer Perception
• Quality of a service is about customer
expectation and perception. Exactly the same
product or service may be perceived as being
good or poor depending upon the customer’s
expectations.
• Customer perception of the product or
service is often just as or even more
important than the service itself!
• It’s not just what you do but the way that you
do it.
Customer expectations
• Customer expectations change over time
(usually becoming more demanding) and are
influenced by their previous experiences and
their experiences of dealing with other
organisations.
• Almost every customer is unique; but we can
categorise them.
Ways of categorising customers
• Prospective customers i.e. not yet a customer – and
that’s always more customers than you already have
• New
• Old long term
• Repeat customers
• Local and regional
• National and international
• By how much they spend
• By how quickly they pay
Mini discussion point
• How does your organisation categorise its
customers?
Some facts
• Typically 68% of customers are lost through
poor customer handling. i.e. They don’t come
back. But it’s cheaper to keep customers than
to gain new ones
• Customers are not obliged to tell you if they
are unhappy.
• Customers are not obliged to tell you if they
are happy.
Short break?
Complaints
• Do we like complaints?
• Customers don’t just complain for the sake of
it! Nobody wants to complain; they complain
for a reason.
• How we manage the complaint is crucial to
our reputation and to whether they will want
to do business with us again
Quick question
• How would you as an individual feel if you had
made what you felt was a valid complaint, and
the organisation/company dismissed it as
being of no concern and not worth sorting
out?
• What would you be likely to do?
• Discuss
12 tips for resolving customer complaints
1. Treat the person as an individual who has feelings,
values and a sense of self worth
2. Let the customer have their say
3. Say you sorry to hear what has happened
4. Listen actively
5. Get the facts by questioning effectively
6. Keep an open mind, don’t make assumptions
7. Don’t argue or be defensive
8. Try and find out what outcome the customer wants
12 tips for resolving customer complaints
9. Concentrate on what you can do and explain what
you cannot do and why
10.Don’t impose your own solution – you must reach a
solution which the customer finds acceptable
11. Summarise and check that the customer
understands and agrees
12. Agree a timescale which is acceptable to the
customer for resolving the complaint
How do you currently manage complaints?
• Note ‘manage’ rather than handle or solve or
deal with.
• Manage implies a pro active approach.
• Do we allow the customer to complain in any
way they want to?
• What systems and procedures do we have in
place?
• Do we learn from them?
Exercise complaint handling
• List the what happens when a complaint is received
by your organisation.
• Who/where does it come from?
• Verbal complaints...
• Written complaints...
• Where does it go?
• What happens.......?
• Any specific examples you can think of?
• Are there any gaps in or problems with the system?
Procedural or personal?
Review of your results from your
complaint handling analysis
A proactive view of customer complaints
• Complaints are welcome, without them we can’t
improve.
• We learn from complaints.
• We must make it as easy as possible for
customers to complain to us.
• We take customers very, very seriously.
• Customers really are right.
• Solving a problem at our expense is an important
investment in our customers.
A proactive view of customer complaints
• Customers must always be respected and treated
accordingly.
• We want no unhappy customers. We will do
whatever it takes to make all our customers
satisfied and happy with our service.
• We respond quickly to all our customer
communications.
• The way in which we solve every customer
service problem has crucial or long-term
ramifications, not only on customer loyalty but
ultimately on the success of our organisation.
A proactive view of customer
complaints exercise
• See yellow coloured handout A proactive
view of customer complaints.
• In pairs choose two of the points and consider:
• Would it apply to you?
• If yes – how can you prove this? What evidence is there? Give
examples.
• If no – why not. What barriers are there in place preventing
you from doing it? Personal or procedural?
• How might you overcome the barriers?
Beware of Complaint filtering
• Or our ‘complaints system’ filters out the
‘unimportant’ complaint so that only the
major complaints get properly dealt with.
• ‘Less important’ complaints don’t get dealt
with.
• Yet to the customer the complaint IS
important!
Question
• Do you have any complaint filtering in
operation within your organisation?
• Are you sure?
• If you don’t think you do then - How do you
really know that you don’t?
Complaints – difference between a complaint
and a suggestion – eliminating the ‘but’
The word “But” is either a ‘complaint’ or a
‘suggestion’.
If it’s a complaint - sort it out!
If it’s a suggestion - it gives you the opportunity
to develop new product or service
differentiation. With differentiation you can
charge more for your product or service!
Complaints – difference between a complaint
and a suggestion – eliminating the ‘but’
E.g. “Your chips were really nice, but the batter
on the fish was a bit soggy.”
This is a COMPLAINT – sort it out.
E.g. “Your chips are really nice, but it would
have been nice to have had a choice of batter
or breadcrumbs on the fish.”
This is really a SUGGESTION – the customer
noticed good quality. If you eliminate the
‘but’ you’ll differentiate your product/service
and enhance customer loyalty.
Complaints LLOVE acronym
• Love the customer
• Listen to their complaint
• Offer an apology
• Verify the complaint/query
• Execute a solution
Good customer service ?
A Possible definition…
• One possible definition of quality or good
customer service is that it is “supplying
customers with what they want, to the
standard and specification they want, with a
predictable and acceptable degree of liability
and uniformity, and at a price that suits their
need”
•
(Perfect Customer Care – all you need to get it right first time – by Ted Johns 1999).
Quick break?
Factors which could add value to the
customer service
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
staff displaying appropriate body language
staff being friendly on the phone
callers not being placed on musical hold
staff who actually know what they are talking about
appropriate opening hours
one-stop shop
approachable staff
friendly staff
user-friendly
prompt service – or reason for delay is explained.
Factors which could add value to the
customer service
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Friendly and helpful staff
Staff with ability to listen
Appropriate tone, pitch and pace of voice
Approachable staff
Staff displaying appropriate body language
How staff greet the customer
Understanding the customer’s needs
Staff with good soft skills
Did you spot anything the points on the 2 previous
slides had in common?
• They are all virtually zero cost.
So how do we add value to the
customer experience?
• It isn’t easy
• Need to know our customers needs inside out –
this in itself is not easy
• Need to be aware of different customer’s needs
• Need to be aware of changing customer need
• Need to know what our customers expect of us
• Need to know what it is that our competitors do
differently or better than us - and learn from it
• Need to be consistent, yet improve over time
• Small things count
Adding value to the
customer experience?
• How can you add value?
• What can the organisation do?
• What can you as individuals do to make a
difference?
• Ideas and suggestions from you.
Ideas – overcoming barriers to making
changes to improve customer service
• Good ideas can often be ruined or ‘killed’
before they are even properly considered.
• In order to improve our customer service we
might need to consider some new ideas and
not kill them off.
• The next few slides are typical idea killers
Idea killers
•
•
•
•
•
•

We tried it last year and it didn’t work
It would take too long
It’s not my job to…
You may be right, but...
Our department is too big
Our section is too small
We don’t do it that way
Idea killers
•
•
•
•
•
•
We have always done it this way
If it ‘aint broken it don’t need fixin’
It sounds ok in theory, but….
It would cost too much
Something that cheap obviously won’t work
That company down the road tried it and they
wasted a lot of time and money and scrapped
it in the end
Idea killers
•
•
•
•
•
It’s impossible
It’s too simple
It’s too complex
It’s obviously not going to work
We need more time to research the full
implications
 We need more time…
Idea killers
•
•
•
•
•
•
Why should I bother
My staff are too busy
We are all suffering from stress
Our budget has been cut
Our team has its own way of working
Maybe next year we’ll re-consider it
Idea killers
• We need more …………. before we can implement
it
• It seems like a good idea; but…..
• I need more information before I can make a
decision
• I need others to make a decision before I can
make a decision
• I can appreciate that there is a problem, but…
• I can’t; because….
Tool and Technique
The SWOT analysis
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Allows us to consider our:
Strengths
Weaknesses
Opportunities
Threats
All can be internal or external or both
Can be done for the company as a whole, the
Hull branch, a department within the Hull
branch, or an individual person.
SWOT Analysis grid
Strengths
Weaknesses
Opportunities
Threats
Exercise
• Have a go at producing a SWOT analysis for
your organisation. Think about:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Complaints
Customer service
Systems
Procedures
People
Barriers to improvement
What else is important to you?
Review of your SWOT analysis
Problems – the problem with problems
• Customers are not bothered about your problems,
the problems of your supplier, your manufacturer,
your staff, or your employees.
• Why should a customer be bothered about your
problems? Customers are not always bothered about
your shortage of staff, the fact that your computer
network has gone down, power cuts, rail strikes,
leaves on the line, frozen points, portion control
policies, your customer service policy, your need for
a lunch break etc.
Why should the customer be
interested in your problems?
• The customer is not interested in these things,
don’t bother telling him or her about them,
you will only make him or her angry and
bored. They seem like feeble excuses.
• No matter how good your tests, your quality
assurance system, your customer services,
your systems have usually been designed by
you, not by your customers.
The moral
• The moral is that quality service is not what
your internal guidelines or tests or market
surveys or policies or procedures or
statements indicate is satisfactory.
• Quality and customer service is what the
customer says it is, not what you say it is.
And
“Customers are the
reason for work, not an
interruption of work”.
A question to consider later -Future
proofing ?
• How might the key characteristics of your
service change in the future if the
customers and their expectations
change?
Exercise for you after today?
• Have a go at producing a personal SWOT
analysis for your own skills and knowledge.
• Do you need to work on developing any skills
and knowledge?
And don’t forget your skills audits
Skills audit part 1
Skills you already have
Rate How good you feel
they are 1-10
Rate how good they need
to be 1-10
For any 10s ask what
evidence is there?
E.g. telephone skills
6
9
Computer word processing
3
5 as you rarely use a
computer
Skills audit part 2
Skills you need to develop
now and for the future
Why are they important?
Where and how are you
going to learn these skills ?
Negotiating with
customers
Important to be able to
negotiate
Learn from colleagues,
shadow them and ask
them to explain
Better telephone skills
Very important for good
customer service
Attend training course
Presentation skills
I’ve been asked to explain a Training course plus watch
new product to potential
others learn how they do it
customers