Customer service excellence: are you delivering?
By Martin Shervington (September 2004 Issue)
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Customer service is not to do just with systems that remember people’s buying habits, it is about treating people in a way you like to be treated as well. At John Seymour Associates (JSA), we believe that customer service excellence can only be achieved by top quality training, as so often it is not second nature. The key to great service lies in attitude, culture, job role and procedures. But on many occasions the starting point is unclear, with people assuming customer service to be the responsibility of someone else in the organisation. It can be clearly illustrated through the following traditional tale.
There were four people whose names were Everybody, Somebody, Anybody and Nobody. There was an important task to be done and everyone was asked to do it. Everybody was sure Somebody would do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry because it was Everybody’s job. Everybody thought Anybody could do it but Nobody realised that Everybody wouldn’t do it. It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody when Nobody did what Anybody could have done.
(Anon)
When you listen to people’s language you will hear them say things like ‘Yes, but …’ followed by an excuse as to why they don’t take action themselves. Within an organisation we find that it is not only the external customers that deserve better service, but also the internal ones.
AN OVERVIEW MODEL
At JSA we have put together a model that gives a new perspective to customer service (see Figure 1). Our suggestion is that improved customer service will come from an understanding of attitude/knowledge, skills and behaviour, culture, and systems, and that all of these areas influence each other. However, you can intervene in some more easily to increase your customer service performance.
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