Customer Centric Management in the Public Sector

Course Overview:

This course focuses on what it takes to build the culture, the processes, and the relationships that will lead to long-term growth and financial sustainability.

The need to be ‘citizen centric’ has become widely accepted in recent years, although some public organisations take refuge in long debates about who their customers are and whether they have the right channels to access them, directly or indirectly. The reputation of public bodies may be compromised if they offer services that customers do not recognize as being relevant to them or ones they encounter difficulty in accessing. If managers of public services engage systematically in understanding the needs and behaviour of customers, the rewards will be felt by everyone — socially, democratically and economically.

This challenging and highly participative program will focus on creating and managing effective teams, dealing with difficult customers, understanding behavioural styles, and proven leadership strategies.

Course Objectives:

At the end of this course, the participants will be able to:

• Describe the importance of the leader as a role model for customer service excellence
• Establish the importance of setting and reviewing customer service standards
• Describe techniques to motivate teams and individuals for peak performance
• Develop effective communication strategies to promote team building
• Evaluate surveys to accurately monitor customer satisfaction
• Design a realistic and challenging customer service employee training program
• Analyze and implement the best practices of top-performing customer service providers
• Utilize best practices for measuring and monitoring customer satisfaction
• Utilize interpersonal skills to supervise and motivate employees
• Empower, motivate and retain frontline personnel

Course Coverage:

Topic 1: Creating a Customer-Focused Organisation: 

• Vision and mission of a customer-focused organization
• Benchmarking world-class customer service companies
• The roles and responsibilities of a customer-focused manager
• The importance of presenting a professional business image
• Breakout session: Customer service from the heart
• Best practices - Xerox’s Five Pillars of Customer-focused Strategy
• Mastering nonverbal communication

Topic 2: Enhancing Leadership and Interpersonal Communication Skills:

• Supervising the four personality styles
• Determining your management style
• Overcoming communication barriers in the Workplace
• Listening Awareness Inventory
• The most admired character traits of leaders
• The supervisor’s role in conflict resolution and service recovery
• Managing group dynamics
• How to Give and receive constructive feedback

Topic 3: Setting Customer Service Policies and Performance Standards:

• Dr Deming’s Fourteen Points of Total Quality Management
• Traditional manager versus TQM manager
• Setting SMART objectives to improve customer satisfaction
• Developing a call centre checklist
• Methods of Measuring and monitoring customer satisfaction
• Empowering frontline employees to better serve their customers
• Developing a customer service complaint checklist
• Working with difficult or demanding customers

Topic 4: Building High-Performance Teams and Motivating Individuals: 

• The building blocks of a high-performance team
• Your customer service is only as good as your worst employee
• Team building: The paper towel
• The power of mutual support and cooperation
• Building teamwork with support and recognition
• Coaching and mentoring techniques
• The Impact of stress on Individual and team performance
• The benefits of teamwork and cooperation

Topic 5: Leading the Way to Superior Customer Service:

• Recruiting, interviewing and hiring quality personnel
• Developing and implementing effective training
• The importance of attitude and teamwork
• Professional development and continuous improvement
• Setting performance goals and expectations
• Employee Recognition and performance review
• Empowering, motivating and retaining frontline personnel

Targeted Participants:

• Sales Managers
• Department Managers
• Customer Service Managers
• Customer Service Professionals
• Team Supervisors
• Frontline Customer Service Representatives (CSR)
• Account Managers
• Field Service Representatives
• Persons who want to gain essential skills to improve their career