Educational Procurement Journal - September 2007 - (Page 15) word relationship means connecting with another person to accomplish something. Go back under the sink and visit with your seemingly solitary plumber, and you’ll discover that he or she has relationships with customers, vendors and fellow plumbers. The same applies to the schoolteacher, who not only has relationships with the students but also with their parents, fellow teachers and school administrators. IRS auditors likewise have relationships with tax accountants, citizens and the U.S. government. Although your job has many functions, communicating and establishing relationships are at its essence. As a customer, you feel more recognized – and consequently more connected – whenever the sales assistant takes the time to smile at you and call you by your name when handing your credit card back to you. On the other hand, a bad impression can develop just as quickly. When you call a company on the phone and the telephone rings 10 times before someone answers it, what kind of bond has that company established with you? More than likely, the poor response created a negative relationship before any business has transpired. These brief actions or instant connections are what Jan Carlzon (the former president of SAS Airlines) calls moments of truth. A moment of truth occurs whenever a customer comes in contact with your organization and forms either a negative or positive memorable impression. These moments of truth usually take no longer than 20 seconds but have a lasting impact on a customer’s judgment. Creating positive moments of truth is easy when you’re not under pressure. However, when you’re faced with having too much to do and too little time to do it, you can get so caught up in your daily to-do list that it’s all too easy to forget that the essence of your job is serving the customer. If you forget this principle, the customer suddenly becomes an inconvenience, and you project an attitude that the customer somehow is interrupting your job. That attitude is what leaves customers with the feeling they’re unimportant to you and that the organization has little or A moment of truth occurs whenever a customer comes in contact with your organization and forms either a negative or positive memorable impression. no regard for their needs. Alternatively, when you create a customer-friendly attitude by viewing the customer as the job, the customer feels valued by your organization. “I don’t have the time to create a relationship with every customer.” An often-heard comment, but consider this: When you have a customer-friendly attitude, you naturally develop a partnership with the other person, and solving a problem with a partner takes much less time than it does with someone who’s an adversary. One survey found that 98 percent of customer interactions were faster and more efficient when the service provider took enough time to establish a relationship and create rapport with the customer. Karen Leland is co-founder of Sterling Consulting Group and co-author of Customer Service for Dummies – 3rd Edition. Her company specializes in customer service training and consulting. Contact her at www.scgtraining.com. www.naepnet.org EDUCATIONAL PROCUREMENT JOURNAL 15 http://www.scgtraining.com http://www.naepnet.org
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