3 Reasons People Aren’t Successful

An interesting perspective from a guy called Larry Winget who is a motivational speaker from the UK and who keeps sending my colleague emails. He is very direct !! However there is a ring of truth to what he says - Enjoy!

3 Reasons People Aren’t Successful
Want to know why most people are not living lives of success, happiness and abundance? There are only three reasons: They are stupid. They are lazy. They don’t give a damn.
I dare you to come up with a reason other than those. Let me explain. Few people are actually stupid. Everyone knows enough to be successful at something. So it is rare that someone is really too dumb to be successful. The problem is not that we don’t know, the problem is that we don’t do what we already know . . . which means we are lazy. How sad to know how to be successful and be too lazy to do it. It must mean you don’t care enough to be successful - in other words, you don’t really give a damn! How do you explain that to your family? How can you look yourself in the eye? Was that rerun of Seinfeld really all that important? Could you really afford to take that nap? Don’t you care enough to do all you can?
Face it. You could do more. Stop telling yourself how busy you are. Stop the excuses. Just admit to yourself that you could do more than you are doing. You could turn off the TV, come in a little earlier, stay a little later, and work a little harder. The issue is not could you but will you?

Cool Brand Delivery

Stuff happens. Someone else screws up and you're expected to take the rap. Customers will get hopping mad. Angry exchanges are part and parcel of the customer service. We all know that. But does it have to be that way? A good friend of mine defines anger as ‘a condition in which the tongue works faster than the mind’. The choice you make today will usually affect tomorrow. Choose well.

Most of the time, if you've been speaking to customers awhile, harsh words expected (even missed!). But sometimes, even a seasoned veteran can just completely lose his or her cool - everyone has his or her fair share of bad days. Harsh words break no bones but they do break hearts (and minds). So if everything goes pear shaped, and you're about ready to throw in the towel completely upset, remember this:

For every minute you are angry with someone, you lose 60 seconds of happiness that you can never get back. What’s worse, you can't change the past, but you can ruin the present by worrying over the future!

Beware of Garbage Trucks

Delivering the brand requires constant attention to the varying moods of your customers... and front line staff! David J. Pollay provides an interesting perspective he picked up 16 years ago in the back of a New York City taxi cab. He explains what happened:

"I hopped in a taxi, and we took off for Grand Central Station. We were driving in the right lane when, all of a sudden, a black car jumped out of a parking space right in front of us.. My taxi driver slammed on his breaks, skidded, and missed the other car's back
end by just inches!

The driver of the other car, the guy who almost caused a big accident, whipped his head around and he started yelling bad words at us. My taxi driver just smiled and waved at the guy. And I mean, he was friendly. So, I said, 'Why did you just do that?

This guy almost ruined your car and sent us to the hospital!' And this is when my taxi driver told me what I now call, 'The Law of the Garbage Truck.' Many people are like garbage trucks.

'They run around full of garbage, full of frustration, full of anger, and full of disappointment. As their garbage piles up, they need a place to dump it. And if you let them, they'll dump it on you. When someone wants to dump on you, don't take it personally. You just smile, wave, wish them well, and move on. You'll be happy you did. "

Life at the sharp end of the phone

Call centres and contact centres in general are the bane of life. Nobody really wants to talk to a call centre agent unless they really have to. Few customers understand what goes on with the call centre agents at the other end of the phone. Frankly customers just don’t care - and it shows. Customers can be tough and the job is repetitive and monotonous.

But that’s just the half of it. From my hundreds of interviews with call centre agents, the single biggest issue they face is not the way customers treat them but instead - how management treats them. More precisely how they feel management treats them. Employee engagement is key to Contact Centre Operations.

FACT: Happy employees = Happy Customers

The Ultimate Customer Experience

This blog is for you, the real world customer service managers out there driving numbers and delighting customers.