People
Skills and Service
In Mark's recent
travels he's
come across varying levels of customer service at various locations. He
found himself speaking several times to several people about the
importance of operational/technical skills AND people skills for the
people in customer service roles. (By the way, there are many 'customer
service' casts in Manager Tools/Career Tools' future - it's an area of
particular interest for Mark).
It seems that very few
organizations - and that means managers- have figured out the
importance of hiring for both the technical AND the people skills.
Imagine you check into
a hotel
and the desk clerk never smiles. Conversely, imagine you check into a
hotel and the clerk is chatty, friendly and outgoing and makes two
mistakes. Hopefully, you'll agree neither of the two scenarios achieve
a high level of service. Yes, we know that there are those of you who'd
say "I don't need the clerk to smile at me". (We don't imagine any of
you would say, we don't mind the mistakes made in the second
scenario!). For those of you who feel that way, half of the world
disagrees with you.
High
levels of effectiveness in
roles interacting with customers is only achieved with high levels of
operational/technical skills AND the ability to be pleasant and
friendly with customers. Many of
you remember the podcast where Mark
said that for high success look for employees who are SWaNs. That
stands for Smart, Works Hard, and Nice. Too many hiring managers spend
so much time establishing whether someone can do the technical aspects
that they forget to evaluate the candidate's people skills.
On the other hand, if
you're a
manager of an existing team what do you do with those members of your
team who are technically competent but don't have great people skills?
Like it or not, EVERYONE on your team has some customer interaction
(even if it's internal). As managers we have an obligation to give all
of our directs positive and negative feedback about their customer
service skills.
It's not enough to be
smart. One
must also be nice. For those of you who think, "ok, how?" The answer is
easy. Give feedback on smiling and saying please and thank you. This
alone will improve the perception of many technical/operational
professionals.
This simple step
follows the
quote "In the land of the blind.." because it doesn't take much in
today's world to be above average in customer service. But it does take
smiling, and saying please and thank you.
iPhone
App
You may have seen on
the website, that we now have an app in the
iTunes app store for the iPhone. We're excited at this development,
since we hope it will allow us to reach even more managers who perhaps
haven't explored the podcasting world, or who prefer to access
information on the move. The app has our 'basics' feed on it,
beginning at the beginning, for any manager who is new to
Manager Tools. It also contains new summaries and checklists for that
material, so that even those of you who are familiar with it, can have
a quick reminder with you at all the times. There is quick access to
the forums and the blog, which the beta testers have found allows them
to keep up with the volume of new information more easily. You can
click through to leave a comment instantly, which we hope will mean
even more interaction. We enjoy your contribution enormously.
If you're a long time
Manager Tools member, we hope that you will use
apple's catchphrase "there's an app for that" to encourage others to
discover the Manager Tools recommendations when they are struggling
with their management practice. If the app proves as popular as we
hope, we'll get it converted to the Android, Blackberry and other
popular platforms. Mark already has his hands on a iPad and we have
big plans for that platform too.
With our travel
schedules, these projects always take longer than we
hope. We want to give you more and more value to being members, and
especially premium members, this year and we're prioritizing that
effort. Of course, our mission is to change management, and to that,
we need to reach as many managers as possible. Your contribution, in
spreading the word, is all we ask in return.
Distribution
Those
of you who have
premium
content know that use of that content is only for that particular
member. This newsletter is not premium content, and we'd love for you
to forward it to anyone who would find it interesting and useful.
If
someone forwarded it
to you,
and you'd like your own copy in future, become a Manager Tools member here.
It's free!
|
