Handling challenging customers and situations

How do you cope with challenging customers and situations in the workplace?  This workshop sets out to demonstrate how engaging customers properly can benefit both the employee and customer.

Effective customer service can change a company’s reputation for the better. Through this workshop, participants will gain a new perspective on how to react to negative customers and leave the customer satisfied and as a returning customer.

Customer service is a necessary position in the job world today. It helps companies give customers what they want and what they need. Although many customers can be difficult, with the right training, skills, and knowledge, any difficult customer can be handled properly and effectively. With a positive attitude, your employee can deal effectively with the most difficult customers and both parties can end the conversation satisfied.

Who should attend?

Anybody who has a customer facing role, either face to face or via the phone and who has experienced difficult or awkward customers. The workshop would suit people with a sales role, customer service or customer support managers, executives, front-line service staff as well as staff in back-up and support roles.

Workshop Objectives

• Cultivate a positive mental attitude
• Manage internal and external stress
• Develop abilities to listen actively and empathise
• Build a rapport with customers in person and over the phone
• Understand the diverse challenges posed by customers
• Develop strategies to adapt to challenging circumstances

Agenda

Introductions and objectives

Why are some customers difficult?

• Example of challenging customers and situations discussion

Handling Conflict

• What do difficult customers want?
• How to improve the customer!
• Difficult customers can be an opportunity
• How to stay calm

Limited Thinking

• How limited thinking can increase difficult conversations
• The importance of your personal PMA (positive mental attitude)
• Changing personal habits
• Re-framing

Identify and manage your own internal and external stressors

• Exercises

Questions

• How to discover customers’ real concerns and issues
• The different types of questions

• How and when to use questions
• Using questions to avoid conflict

Listening actively

• Listening and not hearing!
• How effective listening can reduce difficult calls

Building Rapport and empathy

• Understand the role of Transactional Analysis – how it helps and hinders
• Understand your customers’ communication style (Controller, Analyst, Facilitator, Enthusiast)
• The different ways to build rapport over the phone and face to face
• How rapport can build trust
• The use of voice and language in rapport
• How rapport helps dealing with awkward customers & situations
• How to demonstrate empathy without necessarily agreeing!

Sensitivity and your strategies to deal with different customer types

• Mr Angry
• Mr Rude
• Mrs Grumpy
• Ms Chatty
• Mr Impossible

Personal action plans

Information

Number of delegates: up to 12

All participants will leave with a  workbook for future reference

Duration: 1 day