Making the call......

There are certain organisations I try to avoid contact with because I know that as soon as I make the phone call, it will require hours of therapy afterwards. At the very least a debrief to vent.  

Without mentioning the various companies, think tax, banking, superannuation, public healthcare and family benefit organisations. Makes you shudder at the thought of the phone call doesn’t it. If I ever find myself in need of making a call to these companies, I prepare myself well in advance with a bathroom visit, a glass of water and a comfy cushion.

As I am currently working as a contractor I had to supply various details to my new company including my superannuation number. This can be easily found on a piece of paper somewhere in my house if I had a few hours to spare or the inclination to search, and I could also call my old company and ask the friendly ladies in payroll for it. Or I could call the company which seemed the most logical thing to do. I procrastinated on this one because the thought of spending an hour on the phone listening to Enya was not an attractive one, but it was a nicer thought than begging the payroll ladies.

As it turns out, there was no pain in this phone call at all!

Not only was my call answered within 2 minutes by a real person (yes, they do exist), she was friendly, polite and able to help me. She didn’t make me feel like a burden to her day and there was no Enya on the hold music. Her language was positive and I could tell she was smiling while talking to me.

Thank you Cathy from BT Financial for restoring my faith in customer service in financial institutions.

Flying High with a Smile

When I was young, I wanted to be an air hostess. I saw the glamour in the make-up and uniforms, the extensive travel opportunities and a nice long term career opportunity for a woman.

In the past decade I have averaged 20 flights per year both domestic and international. That’s a decent amount of time spend above clouds watching the glamour, and establishing that it’s much harder than I thought; smiling while serving a glass of bubbles at 30,000 feet suddenly did not look like fun. Throw in a drunken arrogant passenger, and it all turns into a nightmare.

On a recent trip from Sydney to Melbourne, I was in awe of the male cabin steward who had been dished up multiple grumpy customers in one flight.

After making his well articulated announcements (with a smile), he walked up the aisle and noticed me wedged between two enormous men. I’m not a frail figure myself, but in between these guys, I was looking deathly anorexic. After take off, he came to my seat and offered me a place in business class which was empty. I’m not sure if that’s allowed, so I wont mention his name, or the airline for fear he may join the unemployment queue with me. Lets call him Jim.

On arrival into Melbourne, two business men reached up for their cabin luggage which were two huge orange boxes (Hermes no less) that had filled up the entire space. Jim assisted them in getting the boxes down, much to the angst of another male passenger.

Once most of the passengers alighted, the man proceeded to vent to Jim about the airline allowing people with excess cabin baggage on board without checking. He went into a tirade (I remained on board for the show) and was apoplectic with rage after a few minutes. His face was red and he was panting, I think there may have also been steam coming off his head. He started making threats of never flying that airline again and was going to use every form of media (social and otherwise) to talk badly about the airline.

Jim handled this beautifully. His body language was open, he looked the man in the face and used nods to acknowledge the mans complaints.

He allowed the man to vent. He didn’t try to butt in or stop in (there would be no use), and after the man had provided a suitable pause Jim spoke in calm tones.

Jim firstly acknowledged the mans concerns and thanked him for expressing them. Without being condescending, he then went on to explain the airline guidelines for cabin baggage and that the boxes were indeed the right size. He confirmed the boxes had been checked by airline.

He apologised to the man that as a passenger his experience was not favourable, it was obvious that Jim was very good at his job and was very loyal to the airline. I was thrilled that he didn’t fall into the trap of agreeing with the complaining customer.

Being an air hostess is “in your face” customer service in difficult conditions for a lengthy shift. Thankfully I reconsidered my career choice before experiencing this first hand.

Corporate Street Begging

Here is a personal challenge I throw out to everyone.

Walk down Pitt Street Mall (Sydney) on any given weekday between the hours of 10am and 5pm: avoid a backpacking hawker trying to sell you a fantastic deal in hair pampering packages.

I loathe the street “corporate” beggars trying to sell me a monthly donation to a worthy cause. It’s not that I don’t agree with the causes, I just hate being aggressively sold to.

This is not exclusive to Pitt St mall, many charity organisations are now resorting to using backpackers as street marketers on a commission base salary. I have no idea of the success rate, the training or the commission - and would love to get some insight into this. (anyone?)

Today I was on a mission, I only needed a couple of things from my local supermarket and had a firm plan on my attack: Walk into the store, buy my vine ripened tomatoes and walk out. Mission accomplished.

At the entrance were three charity branded polo-shirted women smiling and waiting to pounce.

Once eye contact had been made, it was obvious that I was going to be the target of an alpha-female backpacker with pen and clipboard.

“Before you say no......” she screamed from 5 metres away. I said “No” and kept walking.

In customer service, language (body language included) is crucial. Her mistake was using negative language. Before I even had a chance to speak, she had already told me that I’d said “no”.

When training my team of customer service executives, I was very keen on ensuring the language used was always positive with the aim in every phone call, “getting to yes”. My team were not salespeople, they were contact centre staff in emergency assistance, however the message was the same. The customer on the other end of the line had called for something, and my team were there to provide it. When it wasn’t possible to deliver what the customer wanted, the goal was to influence the customer to accepting what could be done for them. Even if it was nothing more than someone to listen to them.

As a customer and a manager, the words I never wanted to hear were:
- Unfortunately
- Impossible
- Cant
- No

I doubt I would have made a donation today to the corporate beggar regardless of the language she used, but it would have been a less aggressive “NO” back at her if the approach was laced with a positive sentiment.