Internal Customer Service: Be Nice to Summer!

Excellent internal customer service drives excellent external customer service.

While attending Florida State University (sorry, Gator fans), I worked as a dispatcher for a cable company. As a dispatcher, I routinely communicated with customer service representatives, installers, technicians, and customers. Indeed, it often seemed like all of them wanted to talk to me at once! For example, while communicating with a customer, a customer service representative would call me on an internal line to check on the status of an installation at the same time as a technician would call me over the radio to “close out” a service call. I quickly learned that working as a dispatcher proved to be — as my trainer, a veteran dispatcher, described it –“controlled chaos.”

Within a few weeks on the job, I realized that, despite my “newbie” status, I possessed a great deal of power and discretion: for example, I could request a technician to service a particular customer “as soon as possible”; or, I could designate a particular service call as a “first morning” or a “first afternoon” appointment. Over time, my “Jedi powers” increased even more: I could even request an on-call technician to service a customer after-hours.

Although I didn’t realize it as a 20 year-old, over time I became more appreciative of internal customer service. While external customer service describes how your employees interact with customers, internal customer service refers to how your employees interact with each other. Specifically, internal customer service focuses on how well your employees, departments, and divisions work with other employees, departments, and divisions. It was only later that I realized why my trainer, while introducing me to my new colleagues at the cable company, told everyone: “This is Mark. He is our new dispatcher. Be as nice to him as you are as nice to me!”

Yes, internal customer service matters. If, as business leader Tom Peters suggests, politics is defined as the “art of getting things done,” internal customer service is defined as the “art of getting things done in the workplace.”

Think of it this way: Your organization, like an aircraft jet engine, is comprised of a multitude of internal parts and components that, working together, thrust your business or organization forward. In a jet engine, these major parts and components consist of compressors, combustion chambers, and exhaust nozzles; in a business or an organization, these major parts and components consist of employees, departments, and divisions.

The bottom line is this: Your organization’s employees, departments, and divisions need to work together in order to thrust your organization — and, in particular, your organization’s customer service — forward. Just as a jet engine’s compressor, combustion chamber, and exhaust nozzles need to “get along” to produce thrust, your organization’s employees, departments, and divisions need to “get along” to produce exceptional customer service.

Regardless of the nature of your business or organization, internal customer service impacts your external customer service. That is, your organization’s external customer service is intrinsically linked to your organization’s internal customer service: the better your employees, departments, and divisions treat each other, the better your external customer service.

Simply put, who do you think a dispatcher will treat more favorably? A courteous coworker or a crass coworker? And whose customers will be better served? A courteous coworker’s customers or a crass coworker’s customers? I think we all know the answer.

At this point, you’re probably thinking, “Yes, I agree, but who is Summer, the subject of this post?”

Summer is a dispatcher for Airtron, an HVAC (Heating/Ventilation/Air Conditioning) business in Indianapolis. I had the privilege of working with Summer and her colleagues during a recent customer service training session, and we immediately bonded given our similar roles as working as dispatchers, although for different industries.

Here’s the point: Every business and organization, including yours, has a “Summer” — that is, an employee who possesses extraordinary “Jedi powers” to get things done for customers. And the key to getting things done for customers is being nice to “Summer.”

So, here’s my question: Are your organization’s employees, departments, and divisions nice to “Summer”? If your business or organization is genuinely committed to providing exceptional customer service, the answer should be a resounding “Yes!”

Have a “customerific” week!

Mark