In which a smile is my umbrella

Good morning, this is Violet. How may I help you?

You couldn't tell (probably) that I was smiling as I typed the previous paragraph. I've relaxed it to a pleasant grin, but still, I am radiating love. Love for you, dear reader. I hope it comes through.

Yesterday I took a mandatory class entitled "Excellence in Customer Service," where I learned that you should smile when you speak on the phone. Because the customer can hear that! And he wants you to be smiling, even if all you're saying is, "I am unable to complete your request because I have to leave right now to attend mandatory customer service training." Even if you have a crippling headache. Even if you�ve just received devastating personal news. Even if you think the caller is the dimmest bulb on the whole string. A smile, as I understand it, will mask all those feelings and allow you to continue business unhindered by nasty letters addressed to your boss, criticizing your lack of professionalism.

In my job, I do not really deal with "customers," per se, so the instructor--a high-energy blonde with a chipper voice and self-professed "low threshold for icky things" suggested that I concentrate on the "internal customer." It turns out that the "internal customer" is unrelated to the "inner child," but is instead the term for coworkers in other departments. (I had always just called them "assholes," but it turns out that doing so is not considered "good customer service.")

The instructor--whom I'm going to call Corki, because she is both perky and slightly retarded--showed us a film and told us to write down all the things we found wrong with it. This exercise was right up my alley--I've always considered it unfair that I was not chosen to replace Gene Siskel--so I watched with rapt attention. The plot of the film centered around the a busy medical office and its staff, who made the following glaring customer service errors:

  1. Ignoring patients to concentrate on personal calls;

  2. Canceling appointments to accommodate a physician's racquet ball date, within hearing of the patients;

  3. Rolling their eyes when mispronouncing the names of Hispanic patients.

With the exception of the physician, who seemed well-educated, each staff member could have been plucked from the ranks of my own company. The errors we were instructed to find were too simplistic and obvious to bother writing down, so instead I concentrated on the wooden performances and made a detailed critique of Corki's attire, beginning with her purple aluminum eyeglass frames and ending with the ball fringe at the hem of her gypsy skirt. I began to add a sketch, but the film ended before I could finish.

I did not get a chance to share my comments, because when the lights came back up, one of the �internal customers� in the class shouted out a list of every mistake he had found. �Very good!� praised Corki, �You get a cookie!� That there were no actual cookies was something of a bait-and-switch, hence poor customer service, but there was no opportunity to raise my concern.

When I left the class, I thought about what I had learned, which can be boiled down into this statement: Never let the customer see how much you despise him.

Yesterday afternoon, I had to call someone in another department about a document I�d received. She was someone I�d always thought of as a real Internal Customer, but I figured things might be different, seeing as she�d been in the training with me. I explained that I�d received the document and asked what to do with it. She paused just long enough to let me know she thought I was an idiot before saying in a weary voice, "I'd just discard it."

As I thanked her for her help, I made sure I was smiling extra-hard, just for her.



Star of the day. . .Dolores Herbig
posted @ 12:03 p.m. on April 29, 2005 before | after

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She lay awake all night,

zzzzzzzzzzz......