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Learn This Customer Service Training Secret In The Shower

This article is more than 9 years old.

Once when I'd been camping and away from running water, my hair got really, really dirty; it felt like there could be earthworms living in it. When I was finally home and under the  blissful flow of the shower head, my temptation was to wash that grubby hair eight or nine times in a row.

Which didn't really do anything more than the usual once-through. There was no additional benefit, nor could I stock up pre-shampoos against future days when I might again be deprived of running water.

A single dose of training doesn't last a lifetime

The same limited-returns reality applies to customer service training.  You can’t pour it all on in one dose (or overdose) and expect that to last a lifetime.

Yes, there is a big benefit to an inspirational start: a powerful orientation when new employees arrive. And to annual all-hands sessions as well. But getting that message to stick requires building on the initial push, reinforcing it, throughout the year.

Staying focused on memorable customer service

The technical aspect of a customer service position tends to get reinforced on its own. Why? Because service professionals perform the technical parts of their jobs day after day. If someone is a gate agent at Delta or a retail clerk at Bloomingdale’s, she will perform the technical aspects of her job daily. She’ll check people in and out, process transactions, scan items, run credit card payments, day in and day out. And she will end up being very, very good at it.

This, however, is only a portion of her role in the organization. What maintains a customer service employee in the portion of her role that demands the delivery of caring service—over and over, in a tireless and always subtly different manner? If a company wants to maintain great service, it needs to find a way to discuss service on an ongoing basis and to include everyone from frontline workers on up in the discussions. One way you can do so is with a daily standup meeting.

Ritz-Carlton, early morning © Micah Solomon

The Ritz-Carlton daily lineup

The approach used by the Ritz-Carlton — the daily lineup — is a famous and fabulous example of this: a couple minutes (truly just a couple), once a day, where one of the key principles of customer service is reviewed.  And I’ve seen it work wonders in other companies in widely disparate industries as well.

Here's how to do it

Here’s how to go about it: Schedule a daily meeting time for every division of your company at once. In these little, simultaneous meetings, discuss a single aspect of service (for example, one of your guiding service principles, as exemplified by an encounter with a particular customer). You may want to visibly demonstrate your commitment to brevity and focus by holding the meeting standing up, assuming there aren’t attendees with physical disabilities who are put at a disadvantage in this setting.

This “daily lineup” procedure gets inspiration from, and yet is 180 degrees removed from, the old hospitality tradition of a check-in with staff (‘‘lineup’’), where daily specials and other mundane updates are shared. The difference is, in today’s world, the challenge of providing great service is not in such nuts and bolts, skills-and-details-related updates. (Put those on your wiki.)

The challenge is that even if you start off strong with a great orientation, the grind of working with customers every day will ensure that functional issues ultimately end up overwhelming your company’s actual purpose of providing memorable service to your customers. A daily lineup meeting is a chance to keep your company focused on your overriding purpose and to ensure that all staff are aligned to fulfill it. It only takes a few minutes, and the difference it makes can be crucial.

Every company, every industry, is different -- but try this approach on for size

I know that every industry and every company culture is different. I’m far from dogmatic about applying what you could call the daily ‘‘standup routine’’ to every business situation. I have, however, seen companies make revolutionary improvements from implementing this approach.

Try it on for size. There is no more powerful way to create an extraordinary experience for your customers than to maintain a fully aligned company—and there is no better time to align a company than once a day, every single day.

Micah Solomon is a customer experience consultant, customer service speaker and author.