Customer care excellence : how to create an effective customer focus

Contents......Page 4
Preface......Page 8
Acknowledgements......Page 9
Service in a competitive environment......Page 10
Changing customer behaviour and expectation......Page 12
Customer retention......Page 16
What is excellent service?......Page 25
Personal versus material service......Page 27
Embracing change......Page 29
Contact centres......Page 30
The internet......Page 33
Customer Relationship Management (CRM)......Page 36
The service/value chain......Page 42
Summary......Page 46
ACTION CHECKLIST......Page 47
Start from the top......Page 48
Mission and vision......Page 52
Values......Page 56
Objectives......Page 59
Strategy......Page 60
ACTION CHECKLIST......Page 96
Barriers to listening......Page 98
The monitoring of complaints and compliments......Page 100
The value of listening to customers......Page 102
Monitoring customer satisfaction......Page 104
Where and when to measure......Page 127
Continuous improvement......Page 128
Recognizing achievement......Page 129
Involving head office departments in the measurement process......Page 130
Canvassing the view of other stakeholders......Page 131
Best practice benchmarking......Page 134
Balanced scorecard......Page 137
Summary......Page 138
ACTION CHECKLIST......Page 139
Continuous improvement......Page 141
Marketing a service strategy......Page 144
Managers lead the way......Page 148
High or low key?......Page 149
Summary......Page 152
ACTION CHECKLIST......Page 153
Valued people value customers......Page 154
Myths about empowerment......Page 155
What should organizations do to encourage empowerment?......Page 161
Service recovery and empowerment......Page 165
Employee engagement......Page 168
Summary......Page 169
ACTION CHECKLIST......Page 170
Everyone has a customer......Page 171
Developing understanding of internal customer needs......Page 172
Process improvement......Page 174
Don’t forget suppliers, alliances and partners......Page 179
Standards and charters......Page 180
Service-level agreements......Page 186
Suggestion schemes......Page 187
Employee engagement......Page 188
Summary......Page 190
ACTION CHECKLIST......Page 191
The growing importance of training and development in customer service......Page 193
Identifying training and development objectives......Page 194
Training and development for managers......Page 198
Managers as trainers......Page 200
Customer service training for front-line and support staff......Page 201
The learning organization......Page 206
Build customer service into all training and development activities......Page 207
Summary......Page 216
ACTION CHECKLIST......Page 217
Disseminating the message......Page 219
Developing a communications strategy......Page 221
Sell don’t tell......Page 226
Reinforcing the message......Page 229
Tips on effective internal communication......Page 233
A communications case study......Page 234
ACTION CHECKLIST......Page 238
Motivation......Page 240
Performance management......Page 244
Developing a reward and recognition scheme......Page 247
Summary......Page 257
ACTION CHECKLIST......Page 258
10 Sustaining a customer focus......Page 260
Problems in sustaining the focus......Page 263
Developing a maintenance strategy......Page 266
Reviewing progress......Page 267
Summary......Page 277
Additional sources of information......Page 279
References......Page 281
Index......Page 282