Business Advice | Customer Service Solutions, Inc. - Page 42

Home  /  Sample “Direction of the Team” Letter  /  Business Advice

Acting on the Guiding Principles for Great Customer Service - 11/19/24


In last week’s tip, we shared 5 Guiding Principles for Great Customer Service.  This week, let’s address what “taking action” looks like on those key principles.  If last week was about what to do and WHY, this week is about the HOW. Engage with Interest: To engage with interest, proactively Read more

Guiding Principles for Great Customer Service - 11/12/24


It’s hard to know every procedure, every policy, every technique possible to handle every situation correctly.  After all, maybe our procedures are standard, but our customers are not.  Maybe our policies stay pretty consistent, but our customers’ needs and issues, their attitudes and actions can change from customer to Read more

From a Simple Question to an Exceptional Experience - 11/5/24


Phyllis loves her job.  It’s not just because she loves being a customer service representative, not just because she really likes her co-workers, and not just because she enjoys her company.  It’s because she really appreciates her customers, as well. A customer had ordered a register book off the company Read more

Fix One Problem without Creating Another - 10/29/24


If you’ve ever had an issue with your dishwasher, this will sound familiar.  I’ve dealt with so many dishwashers over the years, and they always seem to have some kind of an issue.  Maybe it’s because of the mix of water and technology, but for whatever reason, these never Read more

Delight Your Customers - 10/22/24


Buddy the Bug Man was different.  His company was new, and the only reason why Janet tried him out was that the service she had used for years just wasn’t working.  Whether it was mosquitoes in the yard, ants in the kitchen, or cockroaches flying through on their way Read more

A More Complete Definition of Responsiveness - 10/15/24


I was purchasing something recently that was being custom-developed.  At one point, the company’s employee and I had a good 20 e-mails going back and forth - 10 from each of us.  Unfortunately, I broke my own rule, and I did not pick up the phone after 2 or Read more

Have a Game Plan to Address Their Anxiety - 10/8/24


It seems like we all get deliveries - whether it is UPS, USPS, FedEx, Amazon, the local courier, or all the above.  We order.  They deliver.  Or do they? It’s times like these, when we’re expecting that package, that item that we’re looking forward to or need urgently or are Read more

How Persistence Saved the Day - 10/1/24


Sherrie saw the customer walk into her store holding his cell phone, and Sherrie immediately knew that was William.  She had spoken to William on the phone about an hour ago, he said he would be at Sherrie’s cell phone store in less than an hour, and there he Read more

Notice the Little Changes - 9/24/24


“My, how times have changed.” Yes, times have changed.  As a matter of fact, one of the biggest reasons why an organization’s customer service deteriorates is that times have changed…customers have changed…and the company has not… If we think about customer service delivery today v. decades ago, changes in technology alone Read more

Don’t Hurry…Be Quick - 9/17/24


No, this is not a take off on the Bobby McFerrin song:  Don’t Worry Be Happy. It’s actually a take off on the John Wooden quote:  Be quick, but don’t hurry. When I read Wooden’s book with this title, I liked the concept, and not just because John Wooden was a Read more

•••••

Sample “Direction of the Team” Letter

Posted on August 23, 2012 in Business Advice, Sports Please leave a comment

There are many reasons why fans stay and why they go – it’s not just about wins or the high profile player. It’s not just about the weather or the visiting team. For many fans, whether they remain fans or whether season ticket holders renew is based on the Direction of the Team. Particularly when there’s a change in ownership, worsening performance on the field or in the arena, or some significant change in personnel, many fans want to see some reason for hope. They want to know the Direction of the Team.

Last week, Houston Astros General Manager – Jeff Luhnow – wrote this “Direction of the Team” letter to season ticket holders (STHs). Check it out…

In short, he’s empathetic about the poor season, talks about lofty future goals, and tries to connect those dots with personnel moves being made. But one interesting thing he addresses is corporate culture. Although a large part of the reason for the letter is to convey hope and retain the STHs, one of the main ways to get the Direction he wants for the organization is to get everyone to experience winning, experience success. Even if this culture-building activity is starting in the minor leagues, Luhnow realizes that a change in mindset is required to truly change performance, and he realizes that changing a culture is a longer-term process.

So what’s the Direction of Your Team, or Your Business, or Your Organization? Clearly articulate it. Identify your “today,” and identify the desired tomorrow.

Define those activities that connect the dots between today and tomorrow, and make sure you intentionally change the culture at the same time.

Interested in improving your organization’s performance? Check out our Sports Industry Services! http://cssamerica.com/csssport.htm


Making Student Retention a Real Focus

Posted on August 22, 2012 in Business Advice, Education 1 Comment

Vincent Tinto, a Syracuse University professor, recently wrote a paper on Taking Student Retention Seriously. In the paper, he laments that most colleges/universities don’t take effective approaches to improving student retention. They too often think of a new program, a new activity, and a new offering to increase retention. Unfortunately, many of these new ideas result in “student experiences [which] are increasingly segmented into smaller and smaller pieces; their relationships with faculty, staff, and each other becoming more narrow and specialized; their learning further partitioned into smaller disconnected segments.”

So what does Tinto recommend? He suggests the need to create these 5 conditions which are supportive of Student Retention:

  • When students are expected to succeed, they are more likely to succeed. Success leads to retention.
  • When students are provided clear and consistent communications about requirements and advising on how to progress toward their goals, they are more likely to succeed.
  • When students receive “academic, social and personal support,” they are more likely to stay.
  • When students are involved “as valued members of the institution,” they are more likely to stay.
  • When students are in “settings that foster learning,” they are more likely to succeed and stay.

Tinto focuses on getting at the root cause of issues before defining the required action plans. But many organizations – when faced with customer or employee (or student) retention issues – often jump from symptom-to-solution. They offer the next great idea du jour…and hope it works.

Try to avoid jumping from symptom-to-solution. If you’re having student/customer/employee retention issues, get to the root cause first.

Find what makes students stick with you.

Check out our Education Industry Services: http://cssamerica.com/cssed.htm


Compassion and Customer Satisfaction

Posted on August 16, 2012 in Business Advice, Healthcare Please leave a comment

We always say that the 3 Drivers of Customer Satisfaction in ANY business are the Attitudes/skills/knowledge of employees, the service delivery Processes, and the Products themselves. And if you begin digging deeper into the components of Attitude, Process, and Product, you realize that Attitudes and Processes are what make up the Customer Service portion of overall Customer Satisfaction. And when you dig deeper into the Attitude piece itself, you realize that this means different things to customers of different industries.

For example, a recent study showed that the aspect of Attitude that is most important to cancer patients is compassion. More than any aspect of the Processes or Products/Services received experienced by the cancer patients as well, having “a compassionate team of care providers…access to a knowledgeable, competent physician…and…being treated as human beings…are the most important correlates with patient satisfaction.”

Why is this important to know? When you think of the hundreds of interactions that a patient and their family may have with employees and physicians on the phone, face-to-face, and via e-mail over the course of an inpatient stay and soon thereafter, when you think about all the processes the patients experience, and when you think of all the services provided to them, it’s a daunting task to try to improve EVERYTHING to have a positive impact on patient satisfaction.

Instead, if a hospital knows the primary drivers of patient satisfaction, it gives them a focus, a “bang-for-the-buck” improvement strategy, and a way to get everyone to rally around a particular aspect of the patient experience.

So think about this for your business as well. Don’t feel the need to try to improve EVERYTHING. We work with many clients including hospitals to identify – in a precise and quantitative fashion – just this: What are the 1 or 2 or 3 aspects of the customer experience with the most significant impact on their willingness to recommend you to others or to return themselves?

Find the “compassion” correlation that applies to your business and your customers.

Interested in improving your company’s customer service? See more at… http://www.cssamerica.com/


« Previous   1 2 ... 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 ... 109 110   Next »