Guest Blog: What Improvisation Teaches Us About Customer Service
This week on our Friends on Friday guest blog post my colleague, Adam Toporek, writes about how important improvisation is in frontline customer service. It is also important to hire customer service reps that care, and who already have the personality to succeed in a customer service position. – Shep Hyken
For those on the front lines of customer service, perhaps the only constant is variability. Few customer service interactions are exactly the same. At best, reps deal with similar interactions; at worst, they confront a wildly varying landscape of fluid and unpredictable encounters.
To succeed with customers, reps must be able to think on their feet, adapting and improvising with each new customer interaction. Improvisation is a key component of frontline customer service.
Improvisation is also a mechanism for training and improving skills, as our colleagues in the arts know well. Musicians and actors use improvisation to hone skills, to improve reaction times, and to become more adept at adapting to changing circumstances, and in their improvisational explorations, we can find lessons that are applicable to customer service.
Customer Service Patterns and Scripts
Improvisation is at the heart of many musical styles, from rock and roll “jam sessions” to the solos of jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker. Yet, no matter how off the cuff it may sound, great musical improvisation begins with structure and patterns.
Musicians know that to be great at improvisation they first have to learn chord structure and scales. They have to practice patterns or “licks.” And they have to learn to put all of those things together to successfully improvise in real time.
In customer service, we don’t have scales and licks, but we do have language and scripts. The principle is the same.
Many customer service experts are averse to the idea of scripts; however, I believe that customer service scripts are a great starting point for many customer-facing positions, particularly for inexperienced or new-to-the-position reps.
However, scripts should never be a crutch or the complete solution, only a base upon which to build skillful, sincere communication. As Shep says, “You can’t script sincerity.”
The problem with most organizations is they treat scripts like sheet music, something that should be read note for note, instead of as a base of knowledge upon which to improvise authentic dialogue.
Learning key phrases for general customer service and scripts for specific customer service roles can provide a superb foundation for successfully improvising in the moment.
The Power of Yes in Customer Service
Improvisational theater, or improv as it’s called for short, has a rich history in the theatrical community. It is most associated with improvisational comedy, the type made popular by the show Whose Line Is It Anyway and by famous troupes such as The Second City in Chicago.
Like musical improvisation, theatrical improvisation incorporates learned patterns or “bits,” but it also has another convention that is incredibly useful for customer service: “Yes, and…”
One principle of improv is that you are not supposed to say “no” or to negate what your improv partner says. The goal is to accept whatever your improv partner throws at you and work from there. That’s what keeps the scene moving forward.
If your improv partner says, “I just bought a frozen yogurt from the Queen of England.” You shouldn’t say, “That makes no sense.” Instead, you accept the premise and draft off of it.
“You did. Wow, what flavor was it?”
“Royal Raspberry, of course.”
In customer service, “Yes, and…” has a powerful relevance, found in such principles as never telling a customer “no” or pivoting a conversation to what you can do.
Too many reps start off by negating what a customer has said. They want to correct the customer and to defend the organization, themselves, or both. And while there is a place for clarification and correction in customer service, it is rarely the place to start.
Almost every customer interaction is better served by beginning with acceptance instead of rejection. The first helps focus the conversation on what the customer is saying and makes them feel understood; the second focuses on the reps own feelings and makes the customer feel unappreciated.
As customer service consultant John DiJulius often says, “The answer is YES; now what’s the question?”
Of course, there are limits to everything in customer service, but as principles go, you can go along way by accepting what your customer is saying and pivoting your response from there.
Staying in Character while On Stage
Another principle of improv comedy is staying in character. An actor who breaks character during a scene brings the whole sketch to a grinding halt.
Similarly, when we work “on stage” with customers (to use Disney’s classic customer service framework), we are playing a role. Now, “playing a role” does not mean that we are being fake or inauthentic but simply that we are maintaining a professional persona and demeanor.
Often, when frontline reps falter in difficult situations, it is because they break the character of “service professional” and allow their natural reactions to come forward.
The moment this happens; the interaction becomes about the rep instead of the customer.
Remembering to never break character can help anyone working directly with customers depersonalize difficult exchanges and maintain the professionalism that can help successfully resolve even the most challenging of situations.
Improvisation is both art form and training method. By incorporating these three concepts from the world of improvisation, we can better prepare ourselves and our teams for the dynamic world of frontline customer service.
Adam Toporek is an internationally recognized customer service expert, keynote speaker, and workshop leader. He is the author of Be Your Customer’s Hero: Real-World Tips & Techniques for the Service Front Lines (2015), as well as the founder of the popular Customers That Stick® blog.
For more articles from Shep Hyken and his guest contributors go to customerserviceblog.com .
Read Shep’s latest Forbes Article: How To Create A Better Customer Experience
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The post Guest Blog: What Improvisation Teaches Us About Customer Service appeared first on Shep Hyken.
