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You Have Customer Service Goals – But Are They Missing the Mark?

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Any staffing service can create customer service goals:

  1. Interview each applicant in less than 5 minutes.
  2. Prevent client billing inquiries.
  3. Achieve a perfect Net Promoter score.

But as these (intentionally) ridiculous examples illustrate, there’s a big difference between setting goals and setting THE RIGHT goals.

Most staffing and recruiting firms have the best intentions when establishing customer service objectives; good goals help you to focus your team’s efforts, measure their success and ultimately improve results for your clients, candidates and your agency.

But are your customer service goals helping team members deliver shareworthy service…

…or just biting you in the rear end? Scrutinize your agency’s service objectives, considering whether any of them may inadvertently:

  1. Divert your staff’s attention away from customer service (i.e., reward an employee for doing something that’s not in your customers’ best interest).
  2. Reward individualism over team results.
  3. Rely on extrinsic motivation (e.g., incentivize employees to provide great service for monetary gain).

Bad customer service goals are more than just ineffective; they can be downright harmful. They can cause employees to undermine their colleagues (“Here, I’ll just transfer this angry client to my coworker so I don’t have to deal with them”) or focus more on earning a bonus than doing what’s in their customer’s best interest (“Please, please, PLEASE give me a perfect rating on this customer service survey”).

Where’s the sense in that?

Want to set great customer service goals?

Here’s how to create goals that serve customers’ best interest, maximize satisfaction levels and protect your reputation:

  • Check your goals against the three hallmarks of bad goals, listed above. Make sure goals focus attention on providing great service, rewards teamwork and relies on intrinsic motivation.
  • Make your goals specific and quantifiable. Define parameters for success, so it’s easy to tell if you’re hitting them.
  • Set service goals that are sufficiently challenging. To improve service, you need to aim high – or risk losing ground to your competitors. But while goals should require work to achieve, they shouldn’t be impossible. If you set a lofty goal, break it down into smaller milestones to be reached along the way.
  • Follow “The Rule of Threes.” At Haley Marketing, every service goal we set (and every decision we make, for that matter) must meet these three criteria:
    • It must be good for the client.
    • It must be good for our team members.
    • It must be good for our company.
  • Keep goals flexible. Things can change on a dime in our industry. So, while you should write down and commit to long-term goals, be willing to adapt them when it makes sense. Periodically revisit and revise your customer service goals to ensure they: support your overall business objectives; align with your culture and values; and keep the customer at the heart of everything you do, as the economy, industry, technology and competition evolves.

What customer service goals is your firm setting for 2019? Our team is here to help you achieve them – ask us how we can help!

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