Elements of a Service Culture

A positive service culture is crucial for organizations that want to remain competitive and build brand and customer loyalty.

Many elements define a successful service organization. Some of the more common are:

Service philosophy or mission: The direction or vision of an organization that supports day-to-day interactions with the customer.

Employee roles and expectations: The specific communications or measures that indicate what is expected of employees in customer interactions and that define how employee service performance will be evaluated.

Delivery systems: The way an organization delivers its products and services.

Policies and procedures: The guidelines that establish how various situations or transactions will be handled.

Products and services: The materials, products, and services that are state of the art, are competitively priced, and meet the needs of customers.

Management support: The availability of management to answer questions and assist frontline employees in customer interactions when necessary. Also, the level of management involvement and enthusiasm in coaching and mentoring professional development of employees is crucial in creating a positive service culture.

Motivators and rewards: Monetary rewards, material items, or feedback that prompts employees to continue to deliver service and perform at a high level of effectiveness and efficiency.

Training: Instruction or information provided through a variety of techniques that teach knowledge or skills, or attempt to influence employee attitude toward excellent service delivery.

Source: Customer Service Skills for Success by Robert W. Lucas

About Robert C. Lucas

Bob Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

The key to successfully making money as an author and/or self-publisher is to brand yourself and your company and to make yourself and your book(s) a household name. Part of this is face-to-face interaction with people at trade shows, library events, book readings, book store signings, blogging or guest blogging on a topic related to their book(s). Another strategy involves writing articles and other materials that show up online and are found when people search for a given topic related to a topic about which the author has written.

If you need help building an author platform, branding yourself and your book(s) or generating recognition for what you do, Make Money Writing Books will help. Bob’s popular book addresses a multitude of ideas and strategies that you can use to help sell more books and create residual and passive income streams. The tips outlined in the book are focused to help authors but apply to virtually any professional trying to increase personal and product recognition and visibility.

Characteristics of Organizations with Strong Customer Service Cultures

by Robert W. Lucas

Characteristics of Organizations with Strong Customer Service Cultures

Many organizations struggle to gain and maintain strong customer and brand loyalty. However, what they often fail to do right is to create a service culture that nurtures and supports customers.

The following are some common characteristics for leading-edge customer-focused organizations that you might use to help create a positive customer service culture in your own organization.

They have and support internal customers (for example, peers, co-workers, bosses, subordinates, people from other areas of their organization) and/or external customers (for example, vendors, suppliers, various telephone callers, walk-in customers, other organizations, others not from within the organization).
Their focus is on determining and meeting the needs, wants and expectations of customers while treating everyone with respect and as if he or she is special.
Information, products, and services are easily accessible by customers.
Policies are in place to allow employees to make decisions in order to better serve customers.
Management and systems support and appropriately reward employee efforts to serve customers.
Reevaluation and quantitative measurement of the way business is conducted is ongoing and results in necessary changes and upgrades to deliver timely quality service to the customer.
Continual benchmarking or comparison with competitors and related organizations helps maintain an acute awareness and implementation of best service practices by the organization.
The latest technology is used to connect with and provide service to customers, vendors, or suppliers and to support business operations.
They build relationships through customer relationship management (CRM) programs.

For additional ideas and strategies for building a strong service culture, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success.

About Robert C. Lucas

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

Customer Service Culture Quote – Jerry Fritz

by Robert W. Lucas

Customer Service Culture Quote – Jerry Fritz

Effective customer service cultures are driven from the top down in organizations where everyone takes ownership of interacting positively with customers and giving 110 percent in an effort to stand out from the competition.

Customer service cultures are made up of numerous elements (e.g. employees, quality products and services, effective service training, policies that address customer needs, wants and expectations, and physical service environment).

The following quote by Jerry Fritz helps define the importance of customer service cultures.

“You’ll never have a product or price advantage again. They can be easily duplicated, but a strong customer service culture can’t be copied.” Jerry Fritz

For ideas and strategies on how to create and maintain a positive customer service culture in your organization, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success.

Learn All About Robert C. ‘Bob’ Lucas Now…

Understand Why He is an Authority in the Customer Service Skills Industry

Robert C. ‘Bob’ Lucas has been a trainer, presenter, customer service expert, and adult educator for over four decades. He has written hundreds of articles on training, writing, self-publishing, and workplace learning skills and issues. He is also an award-winning author who has written thirty-seven books on topics such as, writing, relationships, customer service, brain-based learning, and creative training strategies, interpersonal communication, diversity, and supervisory skills. Additionally, he has contributed articles, chapters, and activities to eighteen compilation books. Bob retired from the U.S. Marine Corps in 1991 after twenty-two years of active and reserve service.

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

In my book Customer Service Skills for Success, I define customer service as “the ability of knowledgeable, capable, and enthusiastic employees to deliver products and services to their internal and external customers in a manner that satisfies identified and unidentified needs and ultimately results in positive word-of-mouth publicity and return business.”

How to Improve Customer Satisfaction

by Robert W. Lucas

How to Improve Customer Satisfaction

Customer satisfaction is different from one person to the next. Thus, the answer to “How do I improve customer satisfaction?” is a complex one to answer. At the root of the solution is the acceptance by customer service representatives and others in an organization that all internal and external customers are unique and have different needs, wants and expectations. They must, therefore, be addressed as individuals and not as a group based on outward appearance (e.g. race, gender, age, ethnic or religious background and other factors typically used to label people).

Obviously, training and education to raise awareness about factors related to human behavior, diversity, customer service skills, interpersonal communication, and the organization’s products and services are crucial in providing quality service. Successful organizations and managers realize this and strive to provide quality information to everyone in their system on a regular basis. Above that, it is the individual service provider’s responsibility to adopt an attitude focused on customer-centric behavior and actively take opportunities to discover customer needs, wants and expectations and then apply their knowledge and skills to satisfy them.

While there is no one solution to the issue of customer satisfaction, there are many roads to success if service providers take the effort to act in a professional manner and work with customers to partner on successful outcomes for both the customer and the organization.

To get a better understanding of factors related to different customer groups and potential strategies for identifying and addressing their needs, wants and expectations, get copies of Please Every Customer: Providing Stellar Customer Service Across Cultures, Customer Service Skills for Success and How to Be a Great Call Center Representative.

Quotes on Customer Trust – Robert W. Lucas

by Robert W. Lucas

Quotes on Customer Trust – Robert W. Lucas

“Trust us the basis of any customer-provider relationship. Without trust; you have no relationship.” Robert C. Lucas

Learn about Robert W. Lucas – Author and Expert in the Customer Service Industry

Robert (Bob) W. Lucas, B.S., M.A., M.A., CPLP

Bob Lucas is an internationally-known award-winning author who has written and contributed to thirty-nine books, compilations, video training manuals and hundreds of articles. He is also the owner of Success Skill Press, a micro-publishing company and Principal at Robert W. Lucas Enterprises — a learning and performance consulting firm. He has four decades of experience in and customer service, human resources development, and management in a variety of organizational environments.

For over two decades Bob has shared his knowledge with workplace professionals from organizations such as Walt Disney World, SeaWorld, Martin Marietta, and Wachovia Bank in the Webster University Master of Arts program in Orlando, Florida. In addition, Bob has provided consulting and training services to numerous major organizations on a variety of workplace learning topics.

These topics range from personal branding, customer service, presentation skills, creative training and management program development, train-the-trainer, interpersonal communication, adult learning, diversity, team building, to and including employee and organizational development. Bob regularly gives presentations to various local and national groups and organizations such as ASTD (formerly the American Society for Training and Development), Florida Writers Association, and the Florida Authors and Publishers Association.

Bob was the 1995 and 2011 President of the Central Florida Chapter of the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD). Bob has lived, traveled and worked in 62 different countries and geographic areas.

Listed in Who’s Who in the World, Who’s Who in America and Who’s Who in the South & Southeast, Bob is also an avid writer. His book – Customer Service Skills for Success— has been the top-selling textbook on the topic since 2001.

His other publications include:
-The Complete Guide to Ocean Cruising: Everything You Need to Know for a Great Vacation
The Survivor’s Family Guide: A Resource for Loved Ones After Your Passing
-231 Ways to Say I Love You…and Mean It
-Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors
-Please Every Customer: Delivering Stellar Customer Service across Cultures
-Energize Your Training: Creative Techniques to Engage Learners
-Training Workshop Essentials: Designing, Developing and Delivering Learning Events That Get Results
-Creative Learning: Activities and Games That REALLY Engage People
-People Strategies for Trainers: 176 Tips & Techniques for Dealing with Difficult Classroom Situations
-The Creative Training Idea Book: Inspired Tips & Techniques for Engaging and Effective Learning
-The BIG Book of Flip Charts
-How to Be a Great Call Center Representative
-Customer Service Skills & Concepts for Success
-Customer Service: Building Successful Skills for the 21st Century
-Job Strategies for New Employees
-Communicating One-to-One: Making the Most of Interpersonal Relationships
-Coaching Skills: A Guide for Supervisors
-Effective Interpersonal Relationships
-Training Skills for Supervisors
-Customer Service: Skills and Concepts for Business.Additionally, Bob has been a contributing author for the Annual: Developing Human Resources series by Pfeiffer & Company since 1992 and several compilations by various publishers.

Bob earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Law Enforcement from the University of Maryland, an M.A. degree with a focus in Human Resources Development from George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, and a second M.A. degree in Management and Leadership from Webster University in Orlando, Florida. Further, Bob was one of the first people in the world to attain the ASTD designation of Certified Professional in Learning and Performance (CPLP) in 2006.

Here is what his readers are saying about Robert C. Lucas…

Lesley Moreno – 5.0 out of 5 stars – For a Customer Service book

Reviewed in the United States on June 21, 2019
“What I liked about this product is that I learned a lot of things about customer service.”

E. Liz – 5.0 out of 5 stars For Customer Service Skills for Success

Reviewed in the United States on March 8, 2017
“This book was easy to read and required for one of my classes. Amazon had the best price.”

Customer Service Quote – Henry Ford

by Robert W. Lucas

Customer Service Quote – Henry Ford

The phrase quality customer service is often bantered around in organizations. While some employees strive to deliver the best customer service possible, others simply show up for work and go through the motions. Likewise, some supervisors and managers are satisfied with just meeting minimal standards and do not continually look for ways to improve the system and enhance the customer experience.

It is a shame that in an economy where good jobs are hard to find, many employees are just “waiting to get another job” instead of dedicating themselves to give the best customer service possible each day. What these people fail to realize is that when they slight their internal and external customers by providing minimal effort, they not only taint the reputation of the organization and cost it money; they also damage their own professional image and limit opportunities and rewards for themselves at the same time.

Henry Ford summed up the reason to develop and maintain a customer-centric organization when he said the following:

“It is not the employer who pays the wages.

Employers only handle the money.

It is the customer who pays the wages.”

– Henry Ford

For ideas and strategies on how to effectively create and maintain a customer-centric organization, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success and How to Be Great Call Center Representative.

About Robert C. Lucas – An Award-Winning Author and Customer Service Expert

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

Process Improvement Quote – Stephen Covey

by Robert W. Lucas

Process Improvement Quote – Stephen Covey

“If we keep doing what we’re doing,

we’re going to keep getting what we’re getting.”

– Stephen Covey

Customers generally do not like being kept waiting when your system is not functioning properly. They rightfully view their time as valuable. In today’s “I want it and I want it now” society, inconveniencing your customers will likely lead to emotional reactions, complaints and customer defection to a competitor. To expect them to patiently wait while a new cashier tries to figure out the registration codes, someone gets a price check because the product was coded incorrectly, you have to call the office for information or approvals, and so on, is unfair and unreasonable.

To counter potential problems, all employees should be empowered to handle customer complaints and issues to some degree. Additionally, they should be trained to constantly look for ways to improve the service delivery system and enhance the customer experience.

For ideas and suggestions on strategies to help create a more customer-centric environment, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success.

Who was Stephen Covey?

Stephen Richards Covey was born on October 24, 1932, in Salt Lake City, Utah. His formal education was done at the Brigham Young University, David Eccles School of Business, Harvard Business School, and The University of Utah. Stephen Covey was an American educator, author, businessman, and keynote speaker.

Stephen Covey’s most popular book was The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People. He also wrote numerous other books which include First Things First, Principle-Centered Leadership, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families, The 8th Habit, and The Leader In Me — How Schools and Parents Around the World Are Inspiring Greatness, One Child at a Time. He past away on July 16, 2012, at the Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center in Idaho Falls, Idaho.

Here are a few more amazing quotes by Stephen Covey…

Start with the end in mind.
Seek first to understand, then to be understood.
The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.
The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule but to schedule your priorities.
Effective leadership is putting first things first. Effective management is discipline, carrying it out.
Management is efficiency in climbing the ladder of success; leadership determines whether the ladder is leaning against the right wall.
The way we see the problem is the problem.
There are three constants in life… change, choice, and principles.
Live out of your imagination, not your history.
Trust is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It’s the foundational principle that holds all relationships.

Learn more about Robert C. Lucas, Your Customer Service Blogger, and Award-Winning Author

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

Before you go, enjoy a few more quotes by Stephen Covey…

“There are three constants in life – change, choice and principles.”
“Make time for planning; Wars are won in the general’s tent.”
“Begin with the end in mind.”
“You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage – pleasantly, smiling, nonapoloegetically – to say ‘no’ to other things. And the way to do that is by having a bigger ‘yes’ burning inside.”
“Put first things first.” Stephen Covey
“Seek first to understand, and then to be understood.” Stephen Covey
“Most people do not listen with the intent to understand. Most people listen with the intent to reply.”
“Trust is the glue of life. It’s the most essential ingredient in effective communication. It’s the foundational principle that holds all relationships.”
“Treat your employees exactly as you want them to treat your best customers.”
“The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule but to schedule your priorities.”
“Leadership is a choice, not a position.”
“I am not a product of my circumstances, I am a product of my decisions.” Stephen Covey
“Strength lies in differences not in similarities.”
“Listen with your eyes for feelings.”
“The way we see the problem is the problem.”
“Most of us spend too much time on what is urgent and not enough time on what is important.” Stephen Covey
“Highly proactive people don’t blame circumstances, conditions or conditioning for their behavior.”
“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things.”
“He who has a why can deal with any what or how.” Stephen Covey
“Our ultimate freedom is the right and power anybody or anything outside ourselves will affect us.”
“The only thing that endures over time is the Law of the Farm. You must prepare the ground, plant the seed, cultivate, and water it if you expect to reap the harvest.”
“A personal mission statement becomes the DNA for every other decision we make.”
“Courage is not the absence of fear but the awareness that something else is more important.” Stephen Covey
“To achieve goals you’ve never achieved before you need to start doing things you’ve never done before.”
“Sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny.”
“Every human has four endowments – self-awareness, conscience, independent will and creative imagination. These give us the ultimate human freedom. The power to choose, to respond, to change.”
“I teach people how to treat me by what I will allow.”
“Motivation is a fire from within. If someone else trie to light that fire under you, chances are it will burn very briefly.”
“You can change the fruit without changing the root.”
“Our character is basically a composite of our habits because they are consistent. Often unconscious patterns, they constantly, daily, express our character.”
“Be patient with yourself. Self-growth is tender; it’s holy ground. There’s no greater investment.” Stephen Covey
“If I really want to improve my situation, I can work on the one thing over which I have control – myself.”
“What you do has a greater impact than what you say.” Stephen Covey

The Customer Is Always Right Quote – Stew Leonard

by Robert W. Lucas

The Customer Is Always Right Quote – Stew Leonard

“Rule 1: The customer is always right.

Rule 2: If the customer is ever wrong, re-read Rule 1.”

– Stew Leonard, CEO of Stew Leonard’s

Who is Stew Leonard and why is he so important?

Stew Leonard started a small dairy store founded in 1969 in Norwalk, Connecticut. He started with just seven employees, since then, Stew Leonard’s has grown to become not only the World’s Largest Dairy Store. This is due to his customer service skills and his strategy in building a good business model. Now, many decades later it has become one of the most renowned grocery stores, with annual sales of almost $500 million and more than 2,500 Employees.

Okay, so it clear to see that Stew Leonard’s is a grocery store chain. It has as of this writing, seven supermarkets in Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey. Stew Leonard’s grocery store chain now includes six stores in Connecticut and New York. The newest location opened the fall of 2019 on September 18, in Paramus, NJ.

Many people don’t know that Ripley’s Believe It or Not! deemed “The World’s Largest Dairy” vs. so many other retail chains that simply self-proclaim themselves the largest of something. Also, the company was featured in Fortune magazine. It was listed as one of the “100 Best Companies to Work For”.

Unfortunately, Stew Leonard Sr. also made some mistakes in business as well. Stew Leonard, Sr. was convicted of having committed tax fraud via an elaborate scheme to divert more than $17.1 million in cash register receipts over a 10-year period in 1993. The fraud, which involved a computer program designed to skim off sales, was directed by Stew Leonard, Sr., in concert with the company’s Chief Financial Officer and a company’s Store Manager.

The skim worked as such, the money was placed in bundles then it was moved offshore. In June of 1991, Stew Leonard, Sr. was caught carrying $80,000 in cash while he was traveling to the island of Saint Martin. He pled guilty and was sentenced to 52 months in prison. In June 1997, he was released early for good behavior, thus he only served 44 months of his sentence.

Learn about Your Blogger and Award-Winning Author – Robert C. Lucas

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

Definition of a Customer – Quote by Mahatma Gandhi

by Robert W. Lucas

Definition of a Customer – Quote by Mahatma Gandhi

Customers come in all sizes, shapes, and descriptions in this multicultural, diverse world. Chances are that you will encounter many people daily who are not like you, who do not think like you and who do not want or expect the same things that you do. This is why it crucial for every employee, from the executive level to the front line, to adopt a customer-centric approach to dealing with people.

Everyone in the organization should strive to increase their knowledge and skills related to people, cultures, and different human factors (e.g. age, gender, race, etc) so that they have a better perspective on how to potentially interact on an individual level with current and potential customers.

Additionally, all employees should keep something that Mahatma Gandhi once said about customers in mind:

Learn about Robert C. Lucas – A Big Fan of Mahatma Gandhi

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.

Here are a few more quotes to enjoy reading from Mahatma Gandi…

In a gentle way, you can shake the world.
What barrier is there that love cannot break?
In doing something, do it with love or never do it at all.
Gentleness, self-sacrifice, and generosity are the exclusive possession of no one race or religion.
The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others.
A ‘No’ uttered from deepest conviction is better and greater than a ‘Yes’ merely uttered to please, or what is worse, to avoid trouble.
A man is but the product of his thoughts what he thinks, he becomes.
They cannot take away our self-respect if we do not give it to them.
Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.
To lose patience is to lose the battle.
My faith is brightest in the midst of impenetrable darkness.
That service is the noblest which is rendered for its own sake.
Even if the paradise of material satisfaction, which they envisage as their final goal, realized on earth, it would not bring mankind either contentment or peace.
The difference between what we do and what we are capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world’s problems.
I suppose leadership at one time meant muscles, but today it means getting along with people.
It is unwise to be too sure of one’s own wisdom. It is healthy to be reminded that the strongest might weaken and the wisest might err.
You can chain me, you can torture me, you can even destroy this body, but you will never imprison my mind.
To give pleasure to a single heart by a single act is better than a thousand heads bowing in prayer.
There is nothing that wastes the body like worry, and one who has any faith in God should be ashamed to worry about anything whatsoever.
There is a sufficiency in the world for man’s need but not for man’s greed.
Honest disagreement is often a good sign of progress.

Customer-Centric Quote – Ray Krock

by Robert W. Lucas

Customer-Centric Quote – Ray Krock

Too many people dislike the jobs they have. If you are one of those folks and occupy a customer service position; this can create challenges for you, your customers and your organization. The reason is that what you do impacts you professionally and your customers directly. It also has an impact on the organizational bottom line, which again affects you (e.g. potential salary and benefits).

Ray Krock, the founder of Wendy’s restaurant chain, once summed up the need to be customer-centric when he said:

For ideas and strategies on how to project a customer-centric image to those, you encounter throughout the day at work, get a copy of Customer Service Skills for Success.

Learn All About Robert C. ‘Bob’ Lucas Now

Understand Why He is an Authority in the Customer Service Skills Industry

Make Money Writing Books: Proven Profit Making Strategies for Authors by Robert W. Lucas at Amazon.com.