Jerry's morale plummeted. He came to work angry and resentful. Although he still loved his clients, they noticed his unease. Even though he tried to hide his unhappiness, his bad attitude oozed out in his tone of voice and his customers felt it, too. The company's CSI scores started dropping and lead to a serious decline in business. The new owners had no idea why the profitable business they had bought was losing its loyal customers. They weren't aware of the basic truths about keeping loyal customers.
What's the first thing you can you do to ensure that your customers are happy and loyal? You need to make sure that you have happy, loyal employees. There is a direct correlation between employee and customer satisfaction.
Happy employees are more likely to go the extra mile for a customer, taking personal ownership of their customer's experience. Because they talk positively about their places of work to friends and family, happy employees are a valuable source of advertising and goodwill. Customer service needs to come from the inside out. Before you concentrate on elevating your customer satisfaction scores, raise your employees' levels of satisfaction by doing the following:
Know What They're Thinking
Survey your employees to find out if they are satisfied with their work and work environment. How are current business conditions impacting them? Do they have the tools, training, and resources to do their jobs well? Do they feel empowered to resolve issues? What personal life issues are impacting their work? Remember that the proper balance of work and home life is essential to an employee's ability to provide exceptional customer service.
After listening carefully to your employee's ideas, opinions, and concerns, it's important to make the changes that will help them please your customers.
Communicate
Communication needs to be a two-way street between you and your employees. Be sure that you have clearly explained your company's goals, policies, and procedures. You also need to let employees know about the health of your business, as well as any customer feedback you receive, both good and bad. Employees shouldn't hear about impending changes through the grapevine.
It is also important that you make it easy for your employees to communicate with you. Take, for example, the head of an academic department at a major metropolitan hospital who has an open-door policy for all of his employees. They know they can talk to him whenever they need to. However, he does ask that when a group of employees needs to speak with him, they let him know the issue in advance so he can be better prepared by getting background information. His employees truly appreciate this openness and accessibility and rate their job satisfaction highly.
Focus on the Good
It is human nature to focus on problems. But when you are constantly "putting out fires," you tend to notice only what isn't going well. Employees can wear down when they hear only criticism. Criticism rarely inspires employees to be great. When you see only problems, the problems tend to increase.
Instead of focusing only on your employees' shortcomings, focus on what they do right. Though it seems like doing one's job correctly is a basic expectation, people like to be recognized and rewarded. For example, the service manager of a large automotive dealership put up a "Most Wanted" bulletin board to acknowledge employees for going "above and beyond." This effort, combined with an employee-appreciation barbeque, helped to elevate the department's employee-satisfaction scores.
Recognize and Reward
Remember, rewards need to be shaped to the individual. A blanket approach won't work as well as understanding what motivates each of your employees. Some might like a bonus; others may find time off more rewarding; others simply need an "attaboy" now and again. This isn't to say you shouldn't address problems in performance, but make sure, even if you have to take corrective action, it's done in a positive way that helps the employee learn and improve.
Train
Employees are much happier when they are trained to do their jobs well and know what is expected of them. Throwing a new employee into an unfamiliar work environment without adequate training is a recipe for disaster. If possible, create a mentoring system so that employees can help each other do better.
Get Out of Their Way
Micromanaging never makes for a positive work environment. Simply put, if you hired someone to do a job, get out of the way and let him or her do it. If your employees have been properly trained and you have effectively communicated your policies and procedures to them, it's usually best that they be allowed to make their work their own. This can also allow an individual to bring creativity to his or her work, which will improve your employee's morale, the service provided to your customers, and your bottom line.
Empower
For truly happy employees and satisfied customers, your employees must be empowered to do the right thing. Empowerment allows an employee to feel trusted and respected. Being able to take care of a disgruntled customer quickly ensures he or she will either become or remain a loyal customer. When an employee tells a customer, "There is nothing I can do about that," you've created a situation in which neither the employee nor the customer is happy.
Make Work Fun
Even the most difficult or sensitive work environment needs to be a fun place to work. Obviously, a beauty salon can be looser with its fun than an oncology clinic, but fun is always essential. Find creative ways to loosen things up, but be careful to include the customer in the fun or keep it apart from the customer's experience altogether. A customer who calls up and hears raucous laughter may be turned off.
Fun can be as simple as letting employees choose their own music. Or allowing them to have personal pictures at their desks. Make the fun fit your business, your employees, and, of course, your customers.
Focus your attention on doing the things you need to do to create happy, loyal employees, and you can guarantee your customers will be happy and loyal, too.
About the Author
Laurie Brown is an international speaker, trainer, and consultant who helps people improve their sales, service, and presentation skills. She is the author of The Teleprompter Manual for Executives, Politicians, Broadcasters, and Speakers. Laurie can be contacted through www.thedifference.net, at 877-999-3433 or at lauriebrown@thedifference.net.
