Employee Service Training: Covering Essential Issues Proposal

Introduction

Although persuading the staff members to switch to the mode of behavior and information processing that triggers a rapid increase in customer satisfaction rates is rather complicated, the courses including detailed pieces of advice and simulation training will serve as a platform for improving the current customer–employee relationships considerably. Combined techniques will allow for an active acquisition of the necessary skills and the development of the necessary habits and behaviors within a comparatively short amount of time.

Needs Assessment Justification

Assessing the needs of the participants and the limitations that the course will have is a crucial part of making the learning process successful (Muma, Iravo, & Omondi, 2014; Lepicki & Boggs, 2014). By applying the needs assessment to the training course, one is likely to locate the issues that may have been overlooked otherwise. Detailing the effects that the evaluation of needs is likely to have on the program, one must mention the following reasons for the assessment to be held:

• The gravity of the needs assessment for the training in question can be justified by the importance of stating the key objectives of the training.
• In addition, the needs assessment will serve as the ground for determining the design of the course and the information that the organization will have to get across to the target audience.
• Moreover, the use of the needs assessment will help get the firm’s priorities straight in terms of the data that the employees will have to be presented with and the skills that they will have to acquire.
• Another way, in which the needs assessment may be useful for the on-coming employee service training classes, the tools that will have to be used to convey the required information and the time that the process will take can be identified with rather high precision.
• Finally, the needs assessment will serve as the tool for identifying the possible dents in the current plan and locating the issues that may have flown under the radar of the company managers.

The assessment will expose deficiencies by locating the problems that the participants have and prove that help is required. In other words, the assessment will provide a way of defining dents in the current method of catering to the needs of the staff. As a result, a tan adequate tool for meeting the requirements of the employees will be introduced.

Plan and Method

Plan

Expected effect

It is assumed that the staff members provide timely support to the clients, therefore, improving customer satisfaction rates.

Objectives

1. The gravity of customer satisfaction is explained to the meeting participants in the first 5 minutes.
2. The employees are taught in the next 15 minutes to use the tools that help improve customer feedback processing.
3. The staff members are trained to use the corresponding tools correctly based on their assessment of the situation within 20 minutes.
4. The customer satisfaction rates are raised by 20% within a month after the meeting.

Description

The meeting will open with a short introduction regarding the importance of analyzing customer feedback, providing responses to the clients’ queries within a relatively short amount of time, and the effects that the employee service training will have on the staff’s skills as professionals.

Afterward, a presentation displaying five essential tools for processing customer feedback along with five crucial time-management strategies for conversing with the clients efficiently is shown to the participants. The staff members are also given handouts with essential points listed.

A simulation involving responses to online queries and phone calls is carried out within the next 20 minutes. The employees are supposed to train their skills in communicating with customers and gathering feedback efficiently with the help- of the information and tools that have been explained to them in the previous part of the training.

The analysis of the simulation results and the following identification of the areas that each employee has to work on is identified afterward. The given stage is followed by a discussion of the outcomes with the staff. Time frames for receiving the expected results and improving customer satisfaction rates are set.

Time

It is assumed that the essential goals are attained within the next two months. However, due to a high probability of hiccups in the process, until the framework is remembered by all participants and is accepted as habitual, the time frames may have to be stretched to three months.

Method of Training

The choice of the method depends heavily on the area that it is applied to. Seeing that the retail industry is the target field of application, the phenomenon known as the Customer Service Model (Kabanda, 2014) needs to be mentioned. Since teaching the employees to apply the Customer Service Model to the area of their expertise to improve the current relations with the clients should be viewed as the priority of the training session, it will be required to apply a combination of two approaches, i.e., a slideshow with essential pieces of information and simulation.

By definition, simulation permits reenacting interactions with the target audience; therefore, it can be used to test the efficacy of the Customer Service Model and identify the aspects of its application that need to be improved or addressed. Moreover, the simulation process will create premises for spotting the individual issues of the staff members.

As a training method, simulation has its pros and cons, the lack of opportunities for explaining the theory of employee-customer relations being the key one. Therefore, it is also recommended that the use of slides should be considered prior to the simulation.

Training Method Justification

The significance of simulation in the given scenario can hardly be argued as the tool under analysis helps recreate the environment in which the staff members operate rather precisely. In other words, the simulation will help build the premises for training communication skills by tackling an actual conversation.

Motivation

The motivation issue might be somewhat tricky in the specified scenario as different employees are driven by different motives when excelling in their work. The approach to be used to motivate the staff must be general enough to appeal to every single member of the company and at the same time rather specific so that each staff member could be addressed on a personal level.

To appeal to each employee on a personal level, one may consider stressing the benefits of the training course, making it clear that it is an opportunity for them to evolve professionally and become more knowledgeable. Triggering the staff’s need for personal and professional development is much more efficient than merely introducing mandatory courses that the employees are going to view as a burden (Byers & Tani, 2014).

In the workplace environment where the competition rates among the staff members are not very high, the inclusion of a regular assessment to display the employees’ development in the designated area over time can be interpreted as a means of empowering them to attend the courses. Pointing to the areas that need more effort and outlining the ones in which the employees have performed well, the report will serve as the cornerstone of measuring their progress and, thus, prompt their enthusiasm for further learning. The managers, however, must clarify that the assessments are made for people’s personal use and not for identifying the ones who perform poorly and getting rid of them afterward. Thus, the employees will not be suspicious about the training, and the threat of an unhealthy competition (Raju & Reddy, 2015) will be avoided.

To convince the target audience to attend the courses the managers will have to make it clear that the learning sessions have been designed because the company values its members and wants to invest in them to gain their loyalty. As a result, the connection on a personal level can be expected with every employee.

Survey

To make sure that the training session is going to have a tangible effect on the quality of relationships between the staff members and the company’s customers, the managers will have to come up with a survey to identify the effects of the train g, including the positive and the negative ones. Seeing that the number of factors affecting the staff’s perception of the training is very large, the use of the answers based on the Likert scale (Capone & Petrillo, 2015) is preferable.

• The training impacted and changed me as a retail expert significantly.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.
• I find the strategies learned in the course of the training very useful, and I am going to apply them to real-life cases consistently.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.
• Now I am positively certain that I know what the best way to improve customer communication is.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.
• I am completely comfortable with having to make a personal and professional change in order to increase customer satisfaction rates.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.
• I have a range of ideas and special propositions concerning improving customer satisfaction rates.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.
• I am going to use my personal assets actively to improve customer satisfaction rates.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.
• I realize what tools I have to use to improve my time management strategy.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.
• I recognize the significance of customer service quality.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.
• I can define further steps in my professional development has the training inspired me to take.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.
• I am able to identify my customer service issues, and I am ready to work on them.
  • Strongly agree.
  • Agree.
  • I don’t’ know.
  • Disagree.
  • Strongly disagree.

Conclusion

By incorporating simulation and theory into the training, managers will be able to shape the employees’ behavioral patterns so that customer satisfaction rates could be increased. Assuming that the training program described above will have an immediate effect on the performance rates of the employees and the improvement of customer relationships would be beyond unrealistic. Time has to pass for the outlined behavioral patterns to become a part of the company’s image and vision. Nevertheless, the meeting and the training process outlined above is bound to plant the seeds of proper customer treatment in the participants, thus, helping them accept the changes as not only inevitable but also indispensable. As soon as every member of the organization recognizes the need to transfer to a new mode of communication with clients, positive changes will occur.

Reference List

Byers , P.,& Tani, M. (2014). Engaging or training sessional staff: Evidence from an Australian case of enhanced engagement and motivation in teaching delivery. The Australian Universities’ Review, 56(1), 13-21. Web.

Capone, V., & Petrillo, G. (2015). Organizational efficacy, job satisfaction and well-being: The Italian adaptation and validation of Bohn organizational efficacy scale. Journal of Management Development, 34(4), 374-394. Web.

Kabanda, G. (2014). The impact of ICTs on customer service excellence in Zimbabwe. International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering, 4(5), 312-324. Web.

Lepicki, T., & Boggs, A. (2014). Needs assessments to determine training requirements. New Directions for Evaluation, 144(1), 61–74. Web.

Muma, M., Iravo, A., & Omondi, M. (2014). Effect of training needs assessment on employee commitment in public universities: A case study of Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology. International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences, 4(9), 233-250. Web.

Raju, S., & Reddy, K. R. (2015). Seed industry in Andhra Pradesh – problems and prospects of seed producers: An empirical study. International Journal of Advance Research in Computer Science and Management Studies, 3(4), 244-252. Web.