Client Profile:
A local branch office of a large mid-west company facing the
challenge of developing its Customer Services staff to provide
better service to its customers. The branch office was
made up of several small acquisitions, companies that were
competitors, and each customer service
representative came from a different company and continued to
service the clients it serviced under their previous employer.
Challenge:
The new branch manager faced the challenge of bringing unity to
the customer service team which was extremely territorial.
Each employee was committed to providing exceptional customer
service to their respective clients, however, there was no
cooperation or unity within the group of fifteen reps.
This was extremely problematic since when someone was out, their clients were not receiving any
service. Bringing the reps to work together for the new
company was the biggest challenge since they all worked for
competitor companies before the acquisition and loyalties still
were strong to the previous companies.
Solution:
The branch manager was open to implementing progressive programs
to help ensure clients were receiving seamless service while
still maintaining their existing reps. We first took a
look at how logistically we may have to change the routing of
calls through the Automatic Call Distribution system and
realized the system needed to be upgraded. Since it was a
simple upgrade this was done with very little capital outlay.
The new system needed to be able to handle multiple 800 numbers
specific to client being routed into the rep handling that
client. In the event that reps line was busy the client
had the option of leaving a message or being routed to another
rep who was also versed on the client account.
The second step was to help the team build
better interpersonal relations so that they felt more part of the
same team. PRS first helped the customer
service team script a brand identity for the new organization that
each could identify with. We also conducted teambuilding
exercises using assessments and then working towards bringing the
group to recognize the common goal they shared and how as
individuals they had similarities and differences in their
personalities and communication style. The off-site retreats
helped tremendously in building rapport with team members and they
were able to come back energized to their new work environment.
The branch manager continued with the teambuilding exercises on
his own to keep the cohesiveness of the new team in tact.
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