1. Diagnosis

Agent is not asking the right questions to get to the customer's underlying concern and is consequently making superficial or inappropriate offers.

2. Behaviour Observations

What you might see or hear that points to this pattern.

• Agent is asking very few or no clarifying questions when the customer is explaining their issue.
• The promise the agent gives at the end of the call does not include reference to the customer's specific needs or language.
• The agent moves directly from the customer's request to execution without repeating back to the customer what their request is (doesn't reflect).

3. Session Objective

Often agents have a belief that customers judge success by the amount of effort the agent is conducting on their behalf regardless of the value of the effort. A coaching session where the agent is given cause to reflect on what the customer really wants and establishing that doing the right thing is better than doing lots of the wrong things is more effective. Helping the agent overcome their fear of not understanding the customer request right away is critical.

4. Session Tactics

How to prepare for and structure the 45-minute call review.

Choose a call where the customer is making a long and complex, ideally not well structured request. Have a discussion about what the customer might be looking for. It is likely that there are 2 or 3 interpretations of the core requirement. The agent will likely pick the most easily satisfied interpretation. Your job is to help them see that by choosing the simple interpretation they are prolonging the call as the offered solution will pull the customer back to making their request again. If you get to this realisation, help the agent have the bravery to ask for clarification — see this as an attitude (bravery) rather than a skills issue.

5. GROW Experiments

Experiments the coachee might choose to try. These are offers, not prescriptions — the coachee selects what feels right for them.

Behaviour Tags