Last week I facilitated a group coaching session to a team of call handlers who regularly have to work with customers having to cope with challenging personal and financial circumstances. Between them the group had over 100 years experience in dealing with these challenging conversations but even so they found that they often struggled keeping the conversations focused whilst maintaining the level of compassion and understanding needed.
So faced with these sticky conversations I offered them some GREASE to help structure their approach.
G – Greet the customer with warmth and without judgement
R – Rapport built through verbal and non-verbal communication
E – Empathic listening
A – Ask open questions
S – Supply the relevant information
E – End the conversation
Personally I love a good acronym as I feel it helps the message stick so I hope my group found this useful and if you, or your clients, also have a sticky conversation coming up please feel free to add some GREASE too!
