Conflict Between Customer & Employee

Dear All,
We come across many situations where customer and employee conflict occurs and due to which either customer left or employee.
I recently came across the case where one employee absconds due to ill-treatment of customer. One day that employee calls HR and say "I am not coming now due to ill-treatment of customer".
This mostly happens in service sector. To whom we should give the priority? Offcourse customer. But what about employee where now a days is the "only means of production and/or services?"
Regards
Manish

Hi Manish,
I think u shud call the employee and counsel him. These things are common in today's world where the customer/client is the "king". So the employee, esp if he is in Sales, should be able to handle these situations. even if he absconds, he may face the same thing in his future job.
As HR, you need to counsel the employee and make him aware of these things and also assure him that your company will extend full support to him and take care of him. If possible you can assign this case to his senior who may be able to handle it better.
Rgds
Deepa

hi manish

i agree with deepa, you should counsel the employee, make him feel that you are caring for the employees, customers are given the utmost importance right but employee is the priority for the management.

And the employees are easily convinced when the immediate superior takes up the counseling session, after all ill- treatment shouldnot matter him at all, he should be bothered when his superior/ management or somebody ill treats him who matters to him.

i have gone thru such an experience in my company, initially when i joined, one of our old customers called up my superior to complain about me, he was an arrogant person, but as the matter of fact there was nothing wrong with me.

My superior asked me regarding the issue, i have well answered him and the matter was solved then and there. my boss knew that it was not my mistake so he did not say a single word to me nor the customer, things are going on, i still call up the same customer, speak to him, know the customer could understand that iam a key person here who is in an indispensable position in the organization & he hastily forwarded a complaint.

better you speak to him personally, help him understand.

there is no gurantee that he will not come across this kind of a situation in his next job.

he shouldn't run away from diffculties, be brave & try to face them.

Make people understand what he is capable of .

regards

arc

Hi Manish ,
These are the common issues faced by a Sales Person and a through sales proffesional is always used to it as it is a part of his job.. Maybe the person hired was not suitable for the job and he should not continue in sales as these situations are faced every where and the employee should be in a position to handle such situations ... Before hiring a Sales Person we should be very choosy and see if he\she is willing to take the stress and how well can he handle customers .... You just cant afford to lose customers. Coz of that customer we get our salaries ... HAHAHA .. Neways part of HR job man ..
Rgds
Abhijeet

Hi,

Here's how I would handle this...

I will first try and get to the root cause of the "ill treatment" - Did the customer abuse the employee or just shout since the employee did not do what was expected...

In case of an abuse, you can go back to the customer and tell him/her that every individual in the organization needs to be respected irrespective of caste, creed, colour or whatever.... and go that route.. If necessary speak to your manager and ask them to speak to the customer's manager.

If the situation is the employee missed a very important deadline... then I would speak to the employee if he had reasonable time and resources to do what was expected from him -

if yes, then I would counsel the employee to be sensitive to the customer's priorities and let his manager knows if there is something he cannot deliver.

If no, then I would speak to the employee and ask him to speak to his manager a couple of days before the "due date", and also ask the employee's manager to ensure employees have the right resources to do the job...

In both cases, I would advise the customer to speak to manager in case he is not comfortable with the way things are... and preferably a couple of days before the end date.

However solution needs to be done on a case to case basis.

Anurag

Dear Manish,
with so many replies given, I have only few things to say.
a) find out the root cause of the customer dissatisfaction - was it imaginary or real?
b) Change the process of your work - if required.
c) If the process is correct, make this case study as part of the staff training.
Thanks,
Dinesh V Divekar
soft skill trainer