Great article by Kate Nasser:
Choose Your Mindset – Not Theirs.
Before you start each customer service day, choose and fill your mind with the 5 best emotionally intelligent (EI) customer service thoughts. It will also transmit to every customer — the “rude” ones and the civil ones. So just as a satellite receives and sends signals, your mindset can do the same.
- Put Your Mindset on the Right Channel to Get a Clear Picture
If you set your mind purely on the emotion coming at you, you will most likely view the transmission emotionally. I hear the emotion so that I can empathize. Yet my mind is tuned to what the customer needs not to the emotion.
- Empathize Emotion; Don’t Analyze It! Trying to analyze or justify a customer’s emotion in the few minutes you have to deliver service is not feasible or logical. It takes therapists years to analyze a client’s emotions. Yours is to deliver service, not to change the customer.
- Don’t Trade a Shiny Heirloom Coin for a Slug. Why trade your positive mindset for the negative one coming at you? If you had a valuable heirloom coin and someone walked up and offered you a slug coin, would you trade it? Hardly. Hold on to your positive outlook. It will give you and your loved ones a lifetime of happiness.
- Positivity Beats Equality! During a recent workshop a technical support rep asked me “Why does a customer acting badly deserved to be treated well?”. I replied, “Because it works. Treating the customer well gets you to the end goal. Positivity beats equality as a winning strategy in customer service. Treating the customer badly will not get the customer to treat you well and it will veer you off course from business success.
- Recharge Your Battery. It takes energy to speak positively and energy can drain. Did you ever notice that you get less patient as you get tired? Most people do. So make sure you recharge your battery after work and throughout the day. Heck even cell phones lose their strength and we plug them in and give them juice. Do the same for yourself. You deserve it!
Remember, inner strength is its own billboard. When you find yourself thinking the 10 thoughts in the article noted at the beginning of this post, you are spraying graffiti on your own billboard — your precious mindset and happiness. The customer has not ruined your day. You have chosen to live their emotion. Live your life, not theirs.