Now THAT'S Customer Service

Back in 1995, at the ripe old age of 25, I had the opportunity to conceptualize, build and then manage a new business unit for my company. I started with a team of four and a small budget and grew it to over 30 staff with annual revenues nearing $5M in under 2 years. It was, without a doubt, the catalyst for my current career. It also taught me MANY, MANY lessons about life. In one case--the careful use of spell check.

The department was mostly clerical staff that were responsible for verifying the credentials of health care providers (mostly physicians) on behalf of state medical boards. If any of you have ever worked directly with physicians or their office staff, you know that they can be a demanding lot (and I say that nicely). The truth is, physicians fall into two camps: 1) kind, nurturing, level-headed, humble folks; and 2) arrogant, demanding, impatient pricks. From my experience, I'd say 98% fall into category one. It's the other 2% that I had to deal with on a regular basis.

One one occasion, I had a telephone representative curse at who turned out to be the cousin/sister/nephew/lover (can't remember) of one of our Board members. Now I can't lie--the guy deserved to be cursed at, if not taken out behind the barn--but that's never an option in the customer service world. I was immediately summoned to the CEOs office following a call from said big-wig and was forced to terminate the customer service rep on the spot. After I did it, I sent an all staff e-mail to remind everyone of the importance of being nice. It was SUPPOSED to go something like this...

Team,

It is with great disappointment that I report the termination of _____, effective immediately, due to inappropriate conduct with a customer. While I would have preferred to have avoided this course of action, senior staff felt it was critical to communicate the importance of our work in the context of our clients, our members and the providers we serve on a daily basis.

As I've said before, customer service is the backbone of our success. As a new and highly-contested business, we must shine at every moment. No exceptions. If we cannot earn the basic respect and trust of our clients from the moment they contact us, we'll never get the opportunity to show them how well we work and add value to their daily lives.

So let me reiterate... In order for us to succeed together, Dr. Winn (our CEO) and I expect that each of you will provide outstanding courtesy to our clients at every opportunity. ESPECIALLY when it seems like they deserve it the least.

Thank you all for your continued outstanding work.

Dave

Now, this isn't the exact letter I sent. I accidentally omitted an "r" in the word courtesy as I was typing it in MS Outlook. And when spell check rolled around, I must have clicked through the Ignore/Change buttons a little too quickly. The result, unfortunately, was for me to communicate an expectation that no manager before had ever asked his entire team to do...

So let me reiterate... In order for us to succeed together, Dr. Winn (our CEO) and I expect that each of you will provide outstanding coitus to our clients at every opportunity. ESPECIALLY when it seems like they deserve it the least.

As you might imagine, they never let me live that one down!