How to Get Better Service by Phone

This is the piece I'd love to post on some worldwide blog read by customers and callers everywhere. Doing what I've listed here won't guarantee perfect service but it will greatly increase the chances of a satisfactory outcome in a shorter amount of time.

• If you're calling to solve a complex problem that involves a number of transactions or previous conversations, organize your thoughts first. See if you can summarize the problem and your request in 2-3 short sentences. Jot down notes if it helps you.
• If the situation has been going on for a long time (insurance claims following an accident come to mind) write down the steps you've taken to solve it in chronological order. Better yet, start keeping a log of contacts and correspondence right off the bat if the situation looks like it might involve a lot of time and money. Save any email messages, letters and (do I really need to say it?) bills.
  
• Always get the name of the person to whom you're speaking - always always always! If something needs to be verified, the person who answers your next call will need to know who to ask. If the service rep has to track down an anonymous coworker out of several hundred employees, you'll lose a lot of time.
• Have your account number, card, invoices, letters or whatever you need at hand before you make the call. It will save everyone time. For identity security and privacy reasons, many organizations these days won't look up accounts or give out information without an account number.
  
• If you'll be asking for information, have a pen and paper handy as well.
• When you're on the phone, speak at a moderate pace and give the phone rep the verbal space to respond to you. Many of us tend to talk too quickly (and sometimes too much) when we're upset. However, a barrage of words delivered in a breathless rush won't make sense to the person on the other end of the line.
• Before hanging up, ask the service rep what further steps will be taken. She may not be able to guarantee a specific outcome (big decisions are made by managers, not front-line workers) but should be able to tell you roughly how your request will be processed.
• Keep in mind that the person answering the phone probably doesn't have the authority to waive charges, grant refunds or approve exchanges. If she offers to transfer you to a supervisor, she's not blowing you off; she really can't do anything more.
  
• Finally, ending the conversation with a thank you generates good will. The positive feeling will be passed on to later callers, plus you'll leave a good impression behind you.

May all of us have a stress-free holiday season!

Working Graveyard? We'll Miss You at the Table

A post on Target's Facebook's page posed a question: why the big deal over stores opening at midnight on Thanksgiving when police, EMTs and other emergency workers are on the job 365/24/7? What's the difference? I've been thinking about this a lot because a fair number of friends who are fellow writers and musicians work in retail. I used to live there myself.

One answer to the poster's question is apparent in the name of the general vocational field, emergency services. Recreational shopping is not an emergency need.

But there's something else. To me it feels like the midnight opening crosses a line. Four a.m. is tough enough for employees who have to work that shift but at least it's possible for them to spend an afternoon with family or friends. Having to be at work at 11:00 pm makes celebrating the holiday virtually impossible...and it's to accommodate shoppers, not to save lives. What will be next - opening on Christmas afternoon so that the people who tore open their packages that morning can rush in to make exchanges?

One of the ways that families, communities and cultures create bonds is by celebrating together. That's why holidays are important. I sometimes wonder if the disengagement I've seen in some of the young people I've worked with comes from not feeling like they belong to any kind of community. Gathering with others for the sole purpose of enjoying each other's company and experiencing gratitude together, while only a start, would be a step towards building that community.

But this kind of bonding is difficult if a large number of members can't be present. In nonessential services, the customers' wishes drive decisions. However, it's not reasonable to let customer whims or "the market" dictate all decisions, especially when the decision has the potential to be detrimental to employees.

And in the end, it might prove detrimental to all of us, even those who never have to work on major holidays, by making it harder to bring people together as well as making our culture even more stuff-driven than it already is. When a large number of us lose something, we all eventually lose.

Some day, maybe holidays will actually be days of rest for everyone who doesn't provide emergency services. Meanwhile, my thoughts are with the people who will be clocking in at 11.

Creative First Aid During the Holidays

Some people thrive on the hectic pace and high sensory stimulation the holiday season brings. The buzz brought on by party-shopping-concert-glitz overload jumpstarts their creative circuits and they find themselves sprouting ideas like a lawn produces dandelions. I have a friend who writes more stories during December than her total during the other 11 months of the year.

I'm not one of these people. Most years I'm tempted to shelve all pending projects (even the ones with deadlines) until January 2. But because of said deadlines, I can't. Over the years I've found a few tactics that work for me. Maybe they'll work for you too.

• Set aside daily time to get away from the audio, visual and social noise. I find that going for a solo walks in the rainy twilight helps me clear my mind. Even if you don't love rain you can eventually get used to walking in it if it's not too heavy.
• Take an evening to just read in bed. If you have young kids, they might enjoy reading in bed with you. Choose a book that doesn't tax your brain too much.
• Begin each day (or as many as possible) with 15-20 minutes of silence. Just sipping your first cup of coffee in peace can clear a small space in your mind that will allow you to process information later. Thirteen years ago when I had a full house, a day care business at home and numerous school-parent commitments, getting up at 5 so I could have an entire hour to myself saved my sanity.
  
• Depending on what your creative outlet is, try playing around without any goals in mind. If you're an artist, doodle. If you write, spend a day writing just for fun. See if any usable ideas eventually surface.

Keep in mind that different people need different approaches. Super-social extroverts energize themselves and consequently renew their creative juices by playing with others. Quieter types often prefer to play alone, at least for while. Experiment to find out what works for you.

A Student Again: It's All in the Process

Sometimes it's good to learn or relearn something not in order to get a specific benefit, but only for the process itself. Even if you have definite goals and a burning desire to meet them, if you don't occasionally put the outcome aside and fully experience the process of learning and practicing, the outcome won't be as good as it might have been. There's something about the act of careful focusing that makes any subject come alive.

I started lessons again because I want to explore musical styles that are significantly different from what I've done during the past 25 years, with an eye to forming a group later. However, I realized I didn't have the necessary skills to do this. In less than a month I've rediscovered how important it is to be in the moment when practicing, to focus on doing just one thing.

Someone once said something to the effect of "How you do one thing is how you do everything." Whether you play, sing, paint, write or whatever, doing it mindfully helps you towards approaching every other activity with similar care.

A Student Again: Real Musicians Practice

Years ago I saw a sticker on a car in my neighborhood that said, "Real musicians practice." This would seem obvious but in fact I've gone through periods where my skills deteriorated because I fell out of the habit of practicing.

Some of us enjoy practice more (or in my case, less) than others. I find it much easier to play with the rest of a group than to go over scales, exercises and songs all by my lonesome at home. However, the fact is that with much of the music I've played over the years, I would not have been able to make any meaningful contribution to the group if I hadn't practiced my part first. From experience I know how annoying it is when group rehearsal time, which should be used for blending, gets bogged down because someone doesn't know her own part. I've been that person myself on occasion.

Exercises can be tedious but without them, most of us will never get to the fun part, playing the music listeners want to hear. This time around I've decided to approach doing scales and intervals as a sort of Zen-like focusing exercise, doing everything in a mindful way, paying close attention to details on even the most seemingly simple piece. Since I'm not generally a careful-attention-to-minute-detail person, this will be a challenge.

But maybe the point of learning something new isn't just mastering the skill. Maybe it's also about approaching learning itself in a new way and developing traits like patience. Seen from this perspective,it's possible that the benefits of practicing anything at all will spread throughout every area of daily life.

A Student Again: Beginner's Mind

Three years ago, when good fortune made me the temporary caretaker of a cello, I began taking lessons with a teacher in the neighborhood. I hadn't tackled a stringed instrument since high school guitar class and a short stint playing bass in a classmate's band. I was starting at the bottom.

This experience is serving me well as I start lessons again, this time in a whole new genre. I've had to work at chipping away certain prejudices (classical music is somehow "higher" than popular or folk music), become willing to make mistakes, and return to practicing very basic skills. At 52, I'm my teacher's newest and oldest student.

The Zen tradition has a principle called beginner's mind. Cultivating beginner's mind requires putting aside preconceived ideas and the egotism that can come from previous accomplishments. The student has to turn off her own mental chatterbox, quiet down and listen. She has to be willing to say (if only in her own head), "You're better at this than I am," "I goofed," or "I'm just not getting it; can you show me how?"
Beginner's mind is know-it-all's opposite.

No one is ever too old to learn something new; however, the learner needs to adopt a mindset similar to a 5 year-old learning to read. Beginner's Mind 101 is the prerequisite to everything else.