A Guide to Customer Service Skills for the Help Desk Professional

Rating:
Summary: Excellent advice on the basics
Review: This book addresses the essence of support - people skills. State-of-the-art tools and technology, and the most efficient processes ever devised will not guarantee a successful help desk or technical support organization if the human interaction techniques provided in this book are not used.

Ms. Knapp provides every essential skill in a systematic order. She starts with an excellent, astute discussion on the key elements of achieving customer satisfaction, then begins the systematic process of describing how to develop and use the necessary skills for achieving this goal. This starting point is the most basic skill that is as important to our everyday life as it is to customer satisfaction: listening. This is also a skill that, regrettably, most of us need to continually work on. She gives excellent advice on how to be an active and empathetic listener, and also how to effectively communicate back to the speaker. This skill is reinforced with another that is essential to providing top notch customer support: telephone skills. A telephone, even with the growing trend toward e-support and electronic mail, is still a help desk (and call center) professional's primary tool. Because we cannot depend on facial expression or body language it is of the utmost importance to not only have good phone skills, but to also use these skills in conjunction with listening skills to "read" the customer's mood and adjust our approach accordingly.

Writing skills, the next basic skill that Ms. Knapp addresses, has always been important. This is because documenting issues and actions conveying this to other support professionals who may also work on an incident of case cuts down on unnecessary follow-ups that poorly written documentation causes. Also, this skill is rapidly growing in importance because of the increasing use of e-mail as a customer communications vehicle. The tips on writing given are excellent.

Difficult customers are a way of life. Someone who is frustrated enough to pick up a phone or who feels resentment towards the organization whose products or services you are supporting is going to want to take it out on the first person who answers the phone. Defusing these situations and refocusing angry customers on the issues instead of emotions requires real skills and the ability to subordinate your own emotions. Ms. Knapp gives excellent advice on how to handle irritated customers and, believe it or not, turn the experience into one in which the customer comes away not only satisfied, but a good reference for your product or service. This is one of the most valuable parts of the book and my personal favorite.

The remainder of this book covers problem solving (and prevention) techniques, team building and some great advice on how to relieve stress and keep from burning out. All in all, this is an excellent book that should be read by help desk and call center professionals (as well as tier-2 support analysts), and can be effectively used as a training outline by help desk and call center managers.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent advice on the basics
Review: This book addresses the essence of support - people skills. State-of-the-art tools and technology, and the most efficient processes ever devised will not guarantee a successful help desk or technical support organization if the human interaction techniques provided in this book are not used.

Ms. Knapp provides every essential skill in a systematic order. She starts with an excellent, astute discussion on the key elements of achieving customer satisfaction, then begins the systematic process of describing how to develop and use the necessary skills for achieving this goal. This starting point is the most basic skill that is as important to our everyday life as it is to customer satisfaction: listening. This is also a skill that, regrettably, most of us need to continually work on. She gives excellent advice on how to be an active and empathetic listener, and also how to effectively communicate back to the speaker. This skill is reinforced with another that is essential to providing top notch customer support: telephone skills. A telephone, even with the growing trend toward e-support and electronic mail, is still a help desk (and call center) professional's primary tool. Because we cannot depend on facial expression or body language it is of the utmost importance to not only have good phone skills, but to also use these skills in conjunction with listening skills to "read" the customer's mood and adjust our approach accordingly.

Writing skills, the next basic skill that Ms. Knapp addresses, has always been important. This is because documenting issues and actions conveying this to other support professionals who may also work on an incident of case cuts down on unnecessary follow-ups that poorly written documentation causes. Also, this skill is rapidly growing in importance because of the increasing use of e-mail as a customer communications vehicle. The tips on writing given are excellent.

Difficult customers are a way of life. Someone who is frustrated enough to pick up a phone or who feels resentment towards the organization whose products or services you are supporting is going to want to take it out on the first person who answers the phone. Defusing these situations and refocusing angry customers on the issues instead of emotions requires real skills and the ability to subordinate your own emotions. Ms. Knapp gives excellent advice on how to handle irritated customers and, believe it or not, turn the experience into one in which the customer comes away not only satisfied, but a good reference for your product or service. This is one of the most valuable parts of the book and my personal favorite.

The remainder of this book covers problem solving (and prevention) techniques, team building and some great advice on how to relieve stress and keep from burning out. All in all, this is an excellent book that should be read by help desk and call center professionals (as well as tier-2 support analysts), and can be effectively used as a training outline by help desk and call center managers.