By the end of the course, you will understand and learn:

• Why is good customer service so important?
• What causes people to be difficult and are they actually difficult?
• How to sharpen the skills and confidence required to deal effectively with difficult customer-situations?
• How to empower yourself in dealing with aggressive customers?

1. Appreciating Customer Responses and Behavioural Patterns
   1. Repercussions of dissatisfied customers
   2. Benefits of excellent service to you, your customers and your organization
2. Recognizing how your own attitude and action impact others
3. Knowing what makes customers difficult and their reaction?
4. Understanding the nature of customer complaints
   1. Why do customers complain?
   2. Why don’t customers complain?
5. Apply the 4-step process to manage effectively complaints and the irate customer
6. The powerful psychological trigger that makes angry customers feel cared and comforted
7. Essential skills that soothe difficult customers/callers to achieve understanding
8. Appreciating the impacts of negative and positive communication
9. Listening and responding skills in managing anger and customer complaints
10. Be empowered to defuse anger in complaint management
11. Understanding gestures and non-verbal communication signals
    1. voice, proper body posture and facial expression
    2. know how you look and sound in an angry customer-situation
12. Handling criticisms, fear, nervousness and the greatest enemy
13. Summary and application back at work

All staff who place service paramount to their continued success, especially front-line service and sales personnel who have to deal with customers regularly in the course of work.

A highly interactive adult-focused programme with plenty of real-life scenario discussion, sharing, case studies, role-plays on different difficult customer behaviours, games, quizzes and question/constructive feedback sessions.

“We are delighted to have attended your training. Your good understanding of our work context and the interesting ways which you delivered the important messages attracted our attention and learning. The value-added service pointers gave us a firm foundation to model and learn from.”
– Manager, Nanyang Polytechnic

“The case studies, examples and service role playing are very applicable to our line of work. Catherine understands our job nature well and is able to provide practical skills for us to apply in our daily work.”
– Customer Service Manager, Mobile One

“It has been fun and insightful to learn skills which are applicable to my line of work.”
– Customer Service Executive, International Hotel Chain

“Catherine was very positive and engaging and has had great experience in all aspects of this course. Perfect!”
– Manager, Coca-Cola International (Thailand)

“I would like to express my heartfelt appreciation for the excellent training you had conducted for us. The workshop was engaging. fulfilling and interactive. I found it beneficial and would apply the skills learnt in the workplace.”
– Sales Manager, Sony Asia Pacific

Catherine Syn has conducted both public and in-company seminars and workshops in Secretarial & Office Administrative Practices, Business Correspondence, Report, Proposal and Minutes Writing, Customer Service, Handling Complaints & The Difficult Customer, Teambuilding, Time & Stress Management, Communication & Relationship Management. She has been working closely with individual client companies on the development and design of training programmes to their specific organisation’s training and developmental needs. An approved lecturer with the Singapore Ministry of Education, Catherine studied Business in Australia, was a Corporate Member of the Institute Of Administrative Management (U.K.) and a WDA ACTA certified trainer for WSQ courses including Certified Service Professional. She has held the positions of Executive, Manager, Corporate Trainer and Consultant for the past three decades.

Since 1990, she has been training management professionals, managers, executives, secretarial, administrative, front-line sales, engineering, operations and service staff of both public and private sectors in Singapore, ASEAN and China. As an experienced trainer, she has successfully applied service qualities principles and competency assessments in all her communication courses in the areas of business writing, face-to-face communication, customer service, managing difficult customer-situations using effective interpersonal, communication and problem-solving skills. A versatile and bi-lingual trainer, she relates well to all participants and has excellent delivery and presentation skills that meet the motivational needs of each and every participant.

Among the many companies she has provided training for, some of them are: Ritz Carlton, Swiss Hotel Merchant Court, Marina Mandarin, Becton Dickenson, Sony Asia Pacific, NTU, Singapore, Ngee Ann and Nanyang Polytechnics, ZhengHua Primary School, Carrier Transicold, Marsh Brokers, China Taiping Insurance, AIA, Etiqa, Liberty Insurance, SIA, Komatsu, DSO, DFS, NYK, AET Tankers, Du Pont, Senoko Power, John Crane, Hewitt, SembCorp Marine, Nippon Express, Nippon Koa, German Centre, Tanaka Electronics, SOXAL, Speedy Tech, NatSteel, Philips Singapore, Teck Wah, PSA, LTA, HDB, CPF, DSTA, RSAF, MCMD, Ministry Of Education, Traffic Police, Ministry of Home Affairs, GSMB, CSIT, CAAS, CIAS, SATS, LTA, A-Star, Toshiba, AWWA, SingStat, Department of Statistics, Crown Worldwide, Schenker, Keppel Shipyard, Alpine Engineering Services, Sanmina-SCI, Geotronics, ABB Industry, ICPAS, Loreal, Shisedo, Sa Sa Cosmetics, Cummins Diesel, EM Services, Esmaco, M1, Sankyu, Snap-On Tools, Makino, Bureau Serve, PerkinElmer Singapore, ST Aerospace Engineering, Chartered Semiconductors, AGC Flatglass, Hunting Energy, Orange Business, Cristofori, LF Contennial, Wah Yang Production, Malayan Natural Liquidfied Petroleum & Gas in Sarawak, Coca-Cola In Thailand, Maldives International Airport and MNCs in China.