Customer Service Professionals interact with more people on a daily basis than most people in any industry in any company do in a week. And, the term Customer Service has broadened so much over the past decade or so that the term is somewhat out of date.

Perhaps the correct title would be "Professional Customer Service Interaction Manager" or "Personal Action Compliance Manager." (PCSIM or PACMAN?)

No matter the title, the customer service person still needs Effective Listening Skills.

The skills can be broken down into 4 steps. This article is the first in a series on Effective Listening for Customer service Professionals.

Customer service step number one. Stop what you are doing and pay attention to the Customer.

The Customer, remember them? The person bringing you the money! The reason you are in business in the first place.

Yes, it seems so simple. And every day we are talking with people who have been "scripttrained" to respond with canned responses in order to get a desired result, one in which the Customer follows along like some trained seal awaiting a fish treat.

Wrong!

Real Customer Service Professionals STOP what they are doing and pay close attention to what the Customer is saying. They let the Customer know how important they are because, they maintain eye contact, make appropriate non-verbals at appropriate times, use an open body posture to signal that they are listening and they realize that they WANT to listen because they know that they are there to provide a CUSTOMER SERVICE  to the Customer.

And, because these Customer Service Professionals practice step one in Effective Listening, they are sought after and asked for, by other companies, headhunters and the like.

This step is the same for anyone who is working with people on the phone. Stop what you are doing and pay attention to what the Customer is saying.

There is one area that needs to be addressed and it is the annoying habit of talking to and addressing a computer screen. Hey folks, the computer screen will not pay the bills. It's the person, you know, the one with a wallet.

Stop staring and talking to the screen! Look at the other person and engage them with eye contact, head nods and non-verbals.

If you have to take notes (like I do) say something like "Mr/Mrs. Customer, would you mind if I write a few notes down while we are talking?" How hard is that? I guarantee your Customer will appreciate what you are attempting to do for them.