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Home of the Original
LAMA Training

(818) 945-5141
Call us–We’re in the
phone business!

Christmas, Didn’t you get the memo


Aaron Sorkin wrote that line for WESTWING and I will never forget it.

I love this time of year.  It causes everyone to take at least a minute to STOP and THINK. 

Questions like:

  • Am I getting too old?
  • Am I going too fast?
  • Am I working too hard?
  • Am I trying to scheme to get the next gig?
  • Am I really living in the now moment?

“I have come to believe in so many strange things over the years.  I have had many ‘wow’ experiences, and because of that, I have very little reason to doubt that there is truth about things that are beyond what I can see or predict.” 

Intention and a vision in a future, you cannot see, is where the fun is.  The past has its moments, and sometimes they are really great. But that is not a reason to look back all the time. Looking through the rearview mirror causes you to bump into things.  The only thing the past can do, is to help you make a prediction based on old facts.  But what about the things you didn’t predict?

Imagination is funny.  It allows you to dream of things that have not yet happened.  I like that.  I can put a lot of faith in that.  Experience is all that teaches…words never teach. Let’s have a New Year of Intention, Consciousness, and Vision.  That is what I […]

Christmas, Didn’t you get the memo2018-12-23T19:58:15+00:00

Customer Experience is Not just a department, but a Philosophy!

My thoughts today:  Customer Experience, Customer Care, and Customer Service is NOT just a department, but a PHILOSOPHY!

 

          “It is a STAND YOU TAKE and you Take a STAND about the Stand you Take. YOU believe in the STAND You TAKE!” Werner Erhard said that in 1982.  I still operate from this thought system.  Taking a stand for the Stand You Take is so important.  My stand is this: The Customers must never be made to feel wrong or stupid even if they are wrong and stupid.  We do not get to make the judgement call.  My STAND is THIS: We must use feelings, and no computer can do that yet.  I hope they never will.

 

The Philosophy needs to lead the technology…not the other way around

  • How can we make it EASIER on the CUSTOMER to SAY YES without coercion or manipulation, but use Education and Good Offers?
  • What can we do to make the Customer Experience friendlier and kind and use our Technology to help?
  • What do the Customers WANT?
    • They want to find answers themselves, even before they call the company (FORBES said this)
    • If the company doesn’t respond personally and fast…
    • They GOOGLE the information

 

So, Ask yourself these questions:

  1. What am I NOT seeing about my customer that would make us more profitable and the customer happier with us?
  2. What is ALSO true about our relationship with the customer that I have NOT thought of?
  3. What does the customer want from […]
Customer Experience is Not just a department, but a Philosophy!2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00

“Motivate Me!”

What can you do to motivate and inspire yourself?

When I need motivation, where do I turn?  Who motivates the motivator?  Do I send myself balloons?

No balloons please…

Instead, I call a friend.  I have about five people in my life who never forget who I am, and what I am about.  They will always let me be petty, feel sorry for myself, and even listen to me grumble about life and whatever is bothering me.  They let me do this for about five minutes, then they say…”Hold the phone while I get a crying towel.”  Then, they have my attention.  I begin to see that I must sound like a real complainer.  They remind me of the people I have trained, the difference I have made to them and others.  They always let me know that my work is where my joy is.  This is my lesson to you: Find the joy and give up the pettiness!  At least, only let the pettiness linger for a short time.  It’s ok to get it out, vent for a little, but then breathe it all away, and focus on the good, the joy, the greatness!  These people love me and will always be there for me and not let me give in too long to the dark side.  The rule is always the same, let me vent just enough to be able to get over it.  Never let me vent […]

“Motivate Me!”2018-04-04T17:19:29+00:00

ALL ABOUT MONEY!

A million dollars doesn’t go as far as it used to

Money talk drives agents crazy?
Would you rather talk about ANYTHING other than MONEY?

When I started my business about 35 years ago, there were no ways to “think” about money as a good thing.  Real Estate was inflating at the speed of light, interest rates were sky high, and people were very fearful about money.  Now, all this was happening in a world filled with people who had gone through the 60’s, were hippies or even moving back into society from the communes, and seriously brought up to think that MONEY WAS THE ROOT of ALL EVIL!  That kind of thinking was getting me nowhere.  And I had three kids to put through college!

So, I started looking around for ideas on how to THINK BIG, “Think and Grow Rich!” and Catherine Ponder’s “Dynamic Laws of Prosperity.”  Before you knew it, I got my mind straight about How to THINK about money.  I set myself up with a couple of rules. Laugh if you wish but heed this warning.  If you are afraid of money, or you don’t like it for some reason, or you judge all those who have it as bad in some way…This Doesn’t Work! Set yourself up to start by thinking a little differently about money.  Here are a couple of my rules which helped me a lot to get positive about money. 

Rule # 1 – Money is NOT the Root of all evil.  It is […]

ALL ABOUT MONEY!2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00

Looking for Love in all the Wrong Places

Call Center Love needed – but don’t look for it where you don’t want to find it – Find it and give it to the agents

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner.  We are all looking for love.  My thought for this month is, let’s look for love where we WANT to find it.  Call Center Agents need love too!  It seems the world is bent on finding love in all the wrong places, because they think that if they can only find the problem, they could fix it.  This is NOT TRUE.  You can always find challenges, but “Where is the love?”  Find THAT!

Call Centers have their problems, issues, and challenges.  But supervisors don’t need to find them.  They aren’t lost.  They are still there.  Issues constantly come up, and I always feel that the Agent is the one taking the heat!  They bear the brunt of every irritated customer, and are taught not to take it personally.  RIGHT?

Yesterday, I spoke to an Agent with my cable company; she was delightful!  She was helpful, quick, and she cared about what I wanted…my way.  The Agent thanked me for my complimentary attitude and said that, she sometimes gets frustrated because the hold times are so long, and when she can finally answer, the customer “yells at me.”  She corrected that to say “The customer gives the me a piece of his mind!  If you know what I mean.”  (This is in case she is heard on the recorded call.)

I […]

Looking for Love in all the Wrong Places2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00

Who Has a Conscience Anyway?

Jiminy Cricket, THAT’S WHO! Just let your conscience be your guide!

Is there such a thing as INTENTIONAL CONSCIOUSNESS? INTUITION?

Those who use their INTUITION and LIVE by INTENTION can see they have power!

With the tech world growing and the privacy leaving us, (or maybe it already left) we may have not considered that our MIND is bigger than all the technical “programs” in the world so far. What the bots are trying to do is to duplicate the way we think. The bots are trying to give us “Artificial Intelligence,” and it’s working, so far. Just remember, the machine will NEVER replace feelings. Your feelings are never artificial, and they are uniquely your own.

You know when your gut seems to say NO? Whenever you feel like you are out of sorts…or something just doesn’t feel right. You are right! When will you trust that gut? When will you give in to the small voice in the back of your head that is saying…

“Don’t do this…it’s not the civil thing,” “It’s not the kind thing.” All it is – is a scheme you have worked out. 

I always use justification to check myself. I noticed once that almost everything I […]

Who Has a Conscience Anyway?2018-01-10T00:59:31+00:00

2018? It’s here now? How did that happen so fast?

YEAR END Goal Setting – LAMA LESSONS in Money, Time, and Energy

All our training classes begin with “INTENTION” and a short definition is “Being Determined in Advance.” A question I get at all training classes is: “Judy, what is the difference between Goals and Intention?”

Thanks for asking because the response is very important, and it can change the way you think about goals. Since, the Universe always says YES…you better get those goals right! There is a Universal Law at work, and it’s just like gravity.  So, at the end of every year, we talk about year-end goals, New Year’s Resolutions, and Next Year’s Goals.  This will be quick to learn.  The most important thing about goals is that they are specific and measurable.  Intention is general and imaginative, creative and the vision from 40,000 feet.

Here is the “kicker.”  All goals need to be based on INTENTION.  There are no hidden meanings, no hidden agendas, and no fooling the FORCE.  Therefore, you need three things:

  1. Purpose for your INTENTION- WHY do you want what you want?  Don’t set a money goal unless you have an Intention in mind.  Example:  I want to make a $50,000 goal. (BOLDLY stated.)  What for?  AH YES…for College tuition.  It is my Intention to put my kids through college.
  2. Goal- Sell $50,000 worth of training programs to pay for college fund.  (Now we’re talking.)
  3. Discipline- Discipline yourself to follow the plan in two ways. Daily and Monthly, I will be determined in advance […]
2018? It’s here now? How did that happen so fast?2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00

How do you say, “Thank You” in LAMA?

Maybe you would like some ideas this year on words and ways to say them, that really acknowledge another person.  When I want to say something wonderful, I usually start blubbering like a baby because, I start to seriously think about what someone means to me instead of taking them for granted.  When I am coaching in a call center and the agent says, “Thank you for calling,” or “Thank you for being our customer,” I always want to thank the Agent for the good job and embellish it.  Most agents find me a little on the corny side, but the wonderful thing is, they GET IT!  If you are teaching Customer Manners, or Company Goals with Customer Affairs or Quality Care, it may be part of your responsibility to listen for how we express our thanks.  I will LAMATIZE a couple of Thanksgiving expressions for you when you are the Coach, the Manager, or the Trainer.  This will start you thinking about how to say “Thanks.”

  1. The Customer asked for something. The agent completed the job. Here is what you can say:
  2. L – This is what you heard…Agent did a nice job and thanked the customer for calling.
  3. A – Corey, you really helped that customer and you did it fast.
  4. M – When we teach etiquette we say the usual things, but you didn’t just say the usual things. You were kinder, you offered even more education if the customer […]
How do you say, “Thank You” in LAMA?2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00

Quotas Never Work – Intention Does

Training in Contact Centers is all devoted to RESULTS based on Goals! HA! That’s funny…

To learn that words don’t teach is the hardest lesson that I know. The world’s management seems to think that the numbers they generate, and the words they use to express those numbers, work. Well, here is the bad news for them, but the good news for you. Words DO NOT TEACH…Only Experience, and Emotional Experience at that actually teaches.

Now, you understood that. So, how would the training department, the marketing department, the Supervisors, the Managers, the Coaches, and the Agents relate to that? I spent my life teaching agents to come from their experience and intention. It never fails to be successful because these words never rely on the STATS. I never have the Agents Set Goals. “First Intention Then Enlightenment.” I teach through experience of personal stories, relationships, and train the Agents to find the emotional need of the customer, the buyer, and even their own. This works because it’s the experience that teaches. When the Agent relates, they own it…they own it because it is theirs.

There is no substitute for Aliveness or the Experience of Agent Satisfaction. There is no substitute for Intention. What you call goals isn’t it! There is no substitute for The Experience of the Customer.

The Customer Experience is so big in all discussions today yet it appears that all the work is being done on the level of technology and not on the level of the HUMAN BEING EXPERIENCE. Doesn’t that […]

Quotas Never Work – Intention Does2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00

Words Don’t Teach – And All That Jazz!

Words are only symbols of something else.

OMG…I am not a team player…now what do I do?  Don’t I fit in? (NO…) Don’t I play well with others? (YES, I do!)  Should I just say… “I am a team player!” Will I be more accepted then?  Being a TEAM player is acknowledged by the best companies as The Way To Be.  Often you hear, or see, great presentations about the word TEAM and what those letters stand for.  Another one I’ve heard is “There is no I in T-E-A-M.”   This is a very old paradigm.  The word team teaches nothing…the Experience of Being on a team can teach you everything…I like to use the very ancient words from the HAGAKURI. “Learn one thing, learn a thousand.”

My favorite way to put a TEAM together would be to use the analogy of JAZZ.  Each single person is an I AM or I WILL kind of person.  A person who can hold his own, alone if necessary, yet allows others to play as well to the best of their ability.  If you watched and heard a Jazz quintet play together, you would hear each musician do his or her own “thing.” It becomes a thing of beauty, and it’s called JAZZ.  Each player can SOLO as well as join in the tune with accompaniment.  It’s a joy to  be in the presence of this type of TEAM.   The Piano man, the percussionist, the base, the horn, and the guitar – WOW!  Put […]

Words Don’t Teach – And All That Jazz!2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00
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