• Unit 2: Customer Service Duties

    Customer service workers might be assigned to workstations equipped with a telephone, headset, and computer. Alternately, other customer service workers might be in a retail store interacting with customers in person. Wherever and however the service worker connects with them, customers might be angry or pose difficult-to-resolve problems. A skilled customer service provider must develop abilities to effectively assess a situation, establish rapport, defuse anger, and work with wide diversity of customer cultural backgrounds.

    Completing this unit should take you approximately 8 hours.

    • Upon successful completion of this unit, you will be able to:

      • demonstrate professionalism in difficult situations;
      • describe methods for dealing with challenging customers; and
      • identify tactics for dealing with culturally diverse customers.

    • 2.1: Professionalism in Difficult Situations

      • Dr. Steven R. Van Hook's "Extraordinary Customer-Service Situations" URL

        Read this article on dealing with extraordinary customer-service situations. Be sure to take careful notes to help study for the unit quiz and final exam. Spend 30 minutes visiting the featured customer workplace for examples of effective customer service tactics. If you can find employment listings of interest to you on that website, you may want to investigate those.

    • 2.2: Dealing with Challenging Customers

    • 2.3: Dealing with Diverse Customers

      • Dr. Steven R. Van Hook's "Working with Customer Diversity" URL

        Read this article on methods to work with customer diversity. Be sure to take careful notes to help study for the unit quiz and final exam. Spend 30 minutes visiting the featured customer workplace for examples of effective customer service tactics. If you can find employment listings of interest to you on that website, you may want to take time to investigate.

      • Dr. Steven R. Van Hook's "Cross-Cultural Communications" Page

        Watch this video on international communication tactics, using themes and images that transcend cultural differences. English may connect us in the business place with a common language, but we still need to be sensitive to cultural differences. You may read along with the transcript linked here.

    • Unit 2 Activities

      • Unit 2 Discussion URL

        After you have reviewed this unit, please post and respond to the following topics on the discussion forum. Feel free to start your own posts and respond to those of other students.

        1. What are some examples of problems you or someone you know may have had with a company based on a faulty product or service? How did it get resolved?
        2. Consider a situation where you had to deal with an angry person. How did you handle it? What might you have done differently using some of the methods described in this unit?
        3. What sorts of diversity do you find in your immediate environment of family, friends, work, school, groups, and so on? How do you best interact with the differences in cultural backgrounds and behaviors?

      • Short Writing Exercise: The Customer Service Workplace URL

        Prepare a 300-500 word document as if you were the manager of a customer service department orienting newly hired employees on aspects of dealing with challenging problems and difficult customers. Based on this unit's readings, what are some possible situations and tactics you would want the new employees to be prepared for as they start their job? Once you are done with the document, please post it to the linked discussion thread to share with and receive feedback from your classmates.

      • Unit 2 Assessment Quiz

        Take this assessment to see how well you understood this unit.

        • This assessment does not count towards your grade. It is just for practice!
        • You will see the correct answers when you submit your answers. Use this to help you study for the final exam!
        • You can take this assessment as many times as you want, whenever you want.