What I’ve Learned about Customer Service

As a teenager, I worked in an old fashion hardware store.  Not a Home Depot super store, but a small neighborhood hardware store. If you have one in your neighborhood, go there. They are a wealth of advice and information.  To this day, it was probably the best job I ever had.  I was always helping people to figure out their Do It Yourself (DIY) projects.  I learned some valuable lessons in that summer job that I carry with me to this day:

 

1. LISTEN to the Customer
   Like any 17 year old, I was a know it all.  After their first sentence, "I knew" what they needed.  I quickly became humbled by this experience. What I was doing was "hearing" the customer, but not actually listening. I learned to be an active listener and listen to the whole problem, not just the symptoms. I learned to ask questions, before I offered advice.
   
2. Know your own limits
   Again, a 17 year old "knows" everything. A Mark Twain quote comes to mind here:
   "When I was a boy of fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished by how much he'd learned in seven years."
   I quickly learned the limits of my knowledge after a few complaints of giving the wrong advice. I learned when to seek the counsel of others with greater wisdom than my own. I learned the courage and the confidence that it was ok not to have all the answers. I learned to know where to find the answers. This is still one of the greatest skills I have grown. It is ok not know the answer, as long as you know where to find it. Thank you Google. It also taught me to identify my own limitations. I learned when a project was something I could handle, and when I needed to bring in outside help. Jack Quarles calls this "Expensive Sentences". Read this article to see what I mean.
   
3. Don't assume on appearances
   I learned to treat every customer and prospect with respect, courtesy and dignity.  You never know when it will pay off. Late one Saturday a man and woman came in looking for help to paint their house. They looked dirty, tired and poor. I "assumed" there would be not much of a sale here, but I was willing to help them make the most of their budget. After working with them for about an hour, they ended up being my biggest sale of the month, and paid in cash! They helped me become the highest grossing salesman that day over all the old hands. From then on, I knew never assume I knew what the prospect had to spend just by looking at them.
   

 

Thanks to that great job, I learned a lot about customer service. Unfortunately, that hardware store isn't there anymore. A CVS or Rite-Aid took its place. These lessons I learned there are still with me, and I will always be thankful for what those old guys taught me.