Jeff Toister
Jeff Toister
Jeff Toister is the bestselling author of The Service Culture Handbook: A Step-by-Step Guide to Getting Your Employees Obsessed with Customer Service: www.serviceculturebook.com.
How quickly should you respond to an email?
Nearly 75 percent of us expect co-workers to respond to emails within four hours or less, according to a recent email response time survey....
Using the Employee Engagement Cycle
This post originally appeared on the International Customer Management Institute (ICMI) website as part of their Expert's Angle series. Call centers with customer-focused cultures achieve...
Never reward employees for outstanding survey scores
The Westin Portland is one of my favorite hotels. Their warm and attentive associates always make me feel welcome and you can't beat their...
Contact Center Conference Spring 2013 Re-cap
Last week was a real treat. It was the first week this year that I didn't travel, but I still got to attend an...
Good people giving poor service at American Airlines
John Goodman noted in his book, Strategic Customer Service, that 60% of service failures are caused by poor products, processes, and marketing messages. My...
Why your customers often see what you don’t
The classic nine dot puzzle is one of my favorite customer service training exercises. Give the puzzle a try if you haven't seen it...
Two different approaches to the same problem
Customer service problems can and will happen. I wish they didn't, but they do. And when they do occur, how the company resolves the...
Learn from the pros by visualizing outstanding service
Last week, I wrote a post comparing customer service to professional baseball. I'd like to continue the sports metaphor by sharing an activity that...
How customer service is like professional baseball
Baseball's spring training is now underway so I thought I'd offer a simple analogy to describe how customer service is like professional baseball: Many of...
Applebee’s customer proves the customer is always right
Applebee's is the latest company to be caught up in controversy over a receipt. This time it was a server who took a picture...
Book Review: Uncommon Service
Uncommon Service: How to Win by Putting Customers at the Core of your Business.by Frances Frei and Anne Morriss I've read a lot of books...
Spreadsheet Jockeys are clueless about retail service
All super heroes have at least one nemesis. Batman has the Joker. Superman has Lex Luther. Outstanding Service has the Spreadsheet Jockey. What's a Spreadsheet...
Hire better by redefining your purple squirrel
A client of mine recently struggled to find the perfect candidate for an open managerial position. They wanted someone who had outstanding technical and...
The trouble with magic metrics
Executives like the idea of using a single magic metric to evaluate customer service because it's so simple. "Do well at this," the thinking...
Debunking the myth that attitude is a choice
You may have heard the story about a Subway employee who lost his job after getting into a confrontation with a customer over ketchup....
A service failure reveals surprising customer service trends
On the Friday before Christmas my wife, Sally, headed to Newark Liberty airport for what she thought would be an uneventful flight home to...
Your company’s viral service failure is your fault
You may have heard about a recent viral service failure where a waiter identified a trio of diners as "Fat Girls" and allowed this...