How often do you encounter a great customer service experience? A few weeks ago my son lost his cell phone. He managed to acquire another phone by helping his aunt with a small job. I’m glad he recognizes that most people need to work to eat. He asked me to activate the phone. No problem, I grabbed my youngest and we are off to the cell phone store. When we enter the store we noticed that every sales person was with a customer. A young woman greets us and I make it clear that I don’t have much time. She scanned the showroom and said we would have a 10-15 minute wait. In my mind, 10-15 minutes equates to a half hour. I wasn’t sure if the customer service representative is a manager, but her body language and demeanor shouted that she is a leader. She quickly read my micro expression of impatience and said, “what can we do for you today?” I told her that all I needed was to have a phone activated. She said, “I think I can handle that for and get you on your way.” She made me feel good, like I was getting a hook up! She briefly stepped away to close out what she was working on and quickly activated the phone. During that time we had a conversation about our families and we encouraged each other on the topic of raising our children. As my pleasant customer service experience ended, I walked out of the store with a smile. As we are walking toward the car, my young buck son said, “Dad, she was really good!”
Anatomy or breakdown of the customer service experience:
- Initiative: I was approached as soon as I entered the store. She took the initiative to give a solid first impression.
- Attunement: She was tuned into my body language and proactively addressed my lack of patience. (This was the second store that we visited that day. I left the first store after 5 minutes)
- Servant Leadership: I’m still not sure if she was the store manager. Does it really matter? She gave the impression as if she was in charge. I didn’t need to ask for a manager; she shifted gears and stood in the gap regardless of the task or her title. She simply had a mindset to serve.
- Rapport: During the process she built rapport by finding common ground, chatting about our kids. I quickly became an advocate for her store in a small amount of time.
My customer service representative was genuine, pleasant and competent. She has a heart and mind to serve others. She is built for customer service. Is this a good time to examine your staff? How are your team members and leaders performing when you are not present? Are you losing customers because you have the wrong people on the bus? Examine the anatomy of your organization before you need to conduct an autopsy.
The more you engage with customers the clearer things become and the easier it is to determine what you should be doing.
~ John Russell
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