Pride and the CSR

Pride – it’s that pesky little trait that can work for or against you, depending on the scenario and use of it. “Pride comes before a fall!” “Take pride in your job!” It is used in both positive and negative ways, so what are we to make of it? When it comes to being a CSR, the use of pride can be tricky and can quickly become an issue if unchecked. You must be able to identify when your attitude is simply your pride getting in the way.

When you are faced with an angry customer, for instance, do you take a meek approach and take their abuse, even to the point of accepting the blame? Or do you fight to be right, and seek to prove them to be wrong in the situation? Is the customer allowed to be right, or do you seek to get the upper hand and claim the victory in the discussion? “For too many, the object is to win the argument, to prove that they were right above all else. Pride is allowed to overtake service; defensiveness rides roughshod over accommodation,” says Adam Toporek in his recent article “Win the Argument, Lose the Customer.”

As a CSR, or someone seeking to enter into a CSR related field, it is important that you do a self-evaluation of your approach to such a scenario. Take a quick moment to read over these few thoughts and honestly look at yourself and decide if the CSR field is right for you. Do you:

A) Have a fight-back or push-back attitude when confronted/challenged?
 

B) Have a hard time accepting responsibility for or being accused of something you had no involvement in at all?
 

C) Have a must-always-be-right mentality drive when it comes to confrontations?
 

D) Seek to cover up errors and/or make excuses for actions, rather than apologize and correct them?
 

E) Seek to pass the buck to someone else and let it be their problem, instead of handling it yourself?

If you have any of these attitudes, and are unable to identify them and control them as they arise, then it will be extremely difficult, if not all-out impossible, to be one who can provide exceptional customer service. If you must win, then the customer must lose, and if the customer loses, you will more than likely lose the customer’s business – and potentially all of their friends' business too.

There is a concept you must grasp that I have mentioned in past articles, and that point is, you are the face of the company who employs you. Therefore, any wrong that the customer perceives is a company issue is therefore a wrong that you, as that company face, must accept as being their official representative. Sure, it may not have been an issue you were directly a part of, but you are the company and must accept not only the responsibility for the fault, but also for the solution. Toporek comments accurately when he says “’But what if I am right,’ people say. My answer: So what. In how many cases does that really matter? …(Y)ou are most likely not “teaching” anyone a lesson; you are only diverting precious energy to satisfy some internal desire to ‘win.’”

Oftentimes, due to the customer’s aggravation over whatever the issue may have been, their perception of details and motives from the company may be skewed. Because of that, there may be times when the customer is totally getting everything wrong. There may then be a need to establish the competence of the company in the matter in order to correct the facts surrounding the issue, and to better establish a long term relationship with the customer. And as Toporek says, “I do so in a way that is nonconfrontational and by sandwiching it between other discussion points. (Warning: This move does take some practice.)” Doing this successfully may take some experience, and of course still requires a squashing of pride.

Just remember, the customer is the reason you are there. They are the reason you still have a job. They are not your enemy, therefore, there is no need to seek to defeat them or win against them for any reason. If you are seeking a CSR related job you must have a controllable personality traits that will allow you to swallow your pride, accept blame, and  become a servant to others, looking out for their good over your own at times.

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