Hire slow, fire fast!

You might have heard the adage, but still need help on what it means.

Hire slow means avoiding your gut instinct and identifying whether the candidate will be a good fit for the culture, the team and the job.

A toxic employee can be especially damaging to a team, so be on the lookout for signs of incivility.  Try these questions:

·      Ask what their former employees say about them (ask for the good and the bad)

·      Ask them to share a time they had to deal with stress or conflict and follow up by asking how they dealt with it.

·      Ask them what they’d like to improve about themselves (in fact, ask them this question a couple of times to get them to dig deep and share 3 things)

And…ask the Receptionist how the candidate treated them or take the candidate out for lunch and see how they treat those who serve you.  You might even want to have the restaurant mess up their order (like Charles Schwab CEO, Walt Bettinger) to check their response.

We don’t get no respect…

It’s easy to work in silos and get so focused on what your team or department is doing that you forget about the bigger picture. 

And often, there is awesome work happening in another team that impacts or improves what you are working on.

Try this: Swap 10.

Ask another team for 10 minutes on their agenda.  Show up and present a key initiative your team is struggling with, or a challenge you face or a goal you are close to meeting. 

Give them 10 minutes on your agenda to do the same.

Chances are, you will learn from each other and maybe help solve each other’s challenges.  At the very least, you will certainly increase respect for each other’s workload and process.

Bonus tip:  Ask someone on your team to do the presentation to build their skills and enhance their image. 

Wall of WOW

Q: How do you inspire greatness in your contact center or with your team?

A: Boost their competitive spirit and pride with a Wall of WOW.

It’s not an environmentally friendly idea, but it shows that customer service matters and that you value customer feedback.

How? Print out those emails you get from happy customers, enlarge those texts, highlight those survey results and post them on the wall.

Add even more value by reading those positive messages and outstanding customer feedback at your weekly or monthly meetings.  

And post a copy of it online for all to read.

We're all in this together - or are we?

In so many of the companies I work with, I see huge walls between departments.  Customer Care tells me that Service needs help, Service tells me that Customer Care needs to improve and they all agree that Sales is the real problem.  Hmmm.  Is it really true that you care more, work harder and are smarter than any another department?
 
The more you know about another person and what challenges they face, the more you will appreciate them.  Help break down barriers at your company by encouraging idea sharing.
 
Try these ideas:
• Ask to be invited to another department's meeting
• Invite someone from another department to your meeting
• Have a meeting with managers from all departments, at least once a month

Don't forget the donuts!

Change a habit - Change the trigger

New research tells us what we knew already, changing a habit is hard.  Turns out, it is easier to identify the trigger and avoid it, rather than try to override the urge.
 
Pay attention to your environment.
If you are trying to add something to your life, such as taking a multivitamin each morning, place the bottle beside your toothbrush.
If you are trying to stop doing something, avoid the trigger. For example, if you eat a drive-through breakfast every day, change your route to work so you don't see that restaurant.
 
At work:
If you want a team member to start asking people, "Is there anything else I can do for you?" put a post-it beside their phone.
If you want to stop reacting to a team member during a coaching session, have your conversation in a new location or swap chairs for the interaction.
 
I need to go throw out my Easter chocolates.  It might be easier than trying to resist...

New words, new outcome

Is there a difficult conversation in your near future?  Is it with a team member? 

Well duh, of course there is!  Work with anyone long enough and there will be differences. 

Set the tone for the interaction as collaborative with a positive statement such as:  “I want us to work on this together” or “I’m confident we can figure out a solution.”

We’d like others to assume that we have positive intentions with our words and our actions.  But you know what they say about assuming? 

Don’t let others guess.  Be clear about your expectations.  

There’s an app for that!

Chances are, your team is trying to do more with less. 

Problem is, this can lead to stress, burn-out or disengagement.  And it will likely be your top performers who burn out first.  Not cool.

What can you do?

Encourage exercise

-       I know some of you have handed out Fitbits and created team competitions – yay!

-       Have your tried walking meetings?  This makes the meeting shorter and gets the blood flowing. 

Encourage meditation 

No, you don’t need to send them to a retreat in Tibet, there are some tools that can help people disconnect for a few minutes and return recharged. 

One I like is called headspace.   https://www.headspace.com/

Try it.  If you like it – pass is on.