Manage Conflict Through Negotiation – Basic
In the increasingly demanding environment of public interaction and dealing with customer service issues, the need for staff to be well prepared in dealing with difficult customers and their complaints is vital in maintaining and building your client base as well as maximising your welfare in the work place A complaint poorly handled can, in a very short space of time, escalate.
Improved negotiating skills can help you avoid unnecessary stress in the work place and depending on your work environment, improve your own safety. The consequences of a complaint turning into a verbal dispute can affect the individual staff member and the employer: –
- Verbal and written complaints to the Company.
- Loss of custom and revenue to employer.
- Negative publicity.
- Stressful work place environment.
- You may begin to dislike your job.
- Illness caused through stress.
The public you deal with can at times be very demanding and unreasonable in the way they speak to you, or by an unrealistic expectation of what they consider, good customer service.
Customer service becomes more challenging when dealing with unsatisfied customers; anybody can interact with a happy customer. Being able to resolve a complaint is the highest level of customer service, it is a skill that takes continual practice.
This course of instruction on avoiding and resolving customer complaints is the first unit from the Negotiation and Crisis Intervention training package and is intended to assist you in your dealings with the public. By using the philosophy of a Negotiator and the techniques taught in this course, you will be better equipped to handle complaints from emotional or difficult customers.
The customer may not always be right, however the customer is always the customer and should always be treated as such.
Course Aim
Our intention is to help you improve and maintain your work place negotiating skills by avoiding customer conflicts and improving complaint resolution skills.
Objectives
At the completion of this introductory course on Avoiding and Resolving Customer complaints, the participant will gain a greater understanding of:
- Recognise the difference between Customer Service and achieving exceptional Customer Service.
- Detecting early warning signs and avoiding escalation of the complaint.
- The basic principles of conflict resolution.
- The importance of body language and tone control.
- How to create empathy.
- Understanding more about emotion.
- Various strategies in improving personal safety.
- Helpful behaviours in face-to-face negotiating.
- How to create ownership and move towards a resolution.
This course has been designed to be interactive with information being delivered via : Seeing ; hearing, doing and Reviewing. Your active participation will enhance your day.
Should you at any time feel the need to clarify or question aspects of this course please do so. A firm grounding in negotiating principles will assist you make your work place less stressful and the difficult customer seem less difficult.