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LAMA Training

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Home of the Original
LAMA Training

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

Contact Center Consciousness About MONEY – Make it EASY and Convenient for a better customer experience

 

CASH!  WOW!  I love that word, Cash.  I love everything about it.  Like MONEY in the Mail.  Cash In and get your prize today! or Would you like Check or Cash?  I’ll take CASH, Please.

Let’s have a better Consciousness about MONEY.  We have an economy, we have goals, we have sales, we have up-selling and cross-selling, but do we have the Consciousness for Success where money is concerned?

The leadership, the trainers, and the coaches need to have a deep sense of “MONEY is a GOOD thing”. The Price is Right! Trainers and teachers cannot teach what they do not experience.  Words don’t matter much.  Words don’t teach, you have heard me say that before.  Experience teaches. PERIOD.  MIC DROP!  OLD mother’s words about money doesn’t hold up.  Learn this and your agents will be trained in how to give up the old story and apply the new one but IT’S UP TO YOU.  So, what do you believe?  Check yourself first.

Here is why it’s important in the Contact Center.  People are always freaking out over money.  Most of them learned the myths about money from their parents.  Here are a couple of things they heard.

  • Money is short.
  • There is never enough money.
  • Don’t carry cash, you may lose it.
  • Money is the root of all evil. Now that’s just wrong. Maybe the LOVE of it is the root…

How about when you’re in the Contact Center, and your agents must talk about the purchase price, the value, […]

Contact Center Consciousness About MONEY – Make it EASY and Convenient for a better customer experience2018-08-14T00:51:19+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

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

What is all this talk of LAMA™

It is a Skills Training Course on Communication that works!  That’s all!
The L-A-M-A Technique™

When you know the difference between “What Works and What Doesn’t Work!” you can create a Contact Center Learning System that is FANTASTIC! REVOLUTIONARY! AND one that Cannot and Will Not fail.  It is based on the same principle of gravity, and you never doubt that do you?  Judy McKee started in 1979 generating so many appointments, to sell or list real estate, that she was made a manager, then a trainer for a large Real Estate Company.  She said. “What’s so hard about getting appointments?  I get them all the time.”  The Independent Agents would not do what she said. Lesson Number One in the LAMA Training.  PEOPLE WOULD RATHER BE RIGHT, THAN RICH.  When she got the job of training the new hires, they didn’t know any better.  They just wanted to sell real estate, so Judy asked them to put their manuals under the desk because the manual said, “How to hold an open house.”  Judy said, “Who cares if we hold houses open…we just want to sell them.”

This seemed like perfect logic to her and to the new hires. This is when the LAMA Training was born.  It was called the Statement/Question Technique until Discover Card took our training and penned the acronym LAMA. Judy McKee trademarked the name, and the rest is history, as they say.

The LAMA Technique™ is born to WIN!

Why won’t it ever fail? Because it is built […]

What is all this talk of LAMA™2021-03-11T22:17:08+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

Digitize Those Defining Moments! LAMAtize the chats, texts, and twitters!

 

It’s an idea whose time has come

Life Lessons in the Call Center are very real.  Here is a quick story about how one company used their new Salesforce Program (NO I am not a Salesforce salesman) to save a very upset customer!  (I am always looking for defining moments on a phone call, email, or chat.)  THINK L-A-M-A, then call us.

Here is the story about how one call center discovered that a customer had contacted their company four different ways, in just one hour.  And Salesforce did all the work.  The CX manager was pinged with a customer issue, and when he put in the information, Salesforce created a list of all four contacts, and the text of those issues. (Could this happen to you?)  Here is what happened.

  1. The customer contacted the company by chat…and hung up after waiting.  Unsure of where the agent had gone.
  2. The customer tried chatting again – was still left on hold…hung up again!
  3. The customer sent an e-mail, and received a terse, yet accurate return response.
  4. The customer received a CX survey.  They proceeded to send it back, blasting the company for terrible service but a great product.

The Coach/CX Manager gave the original Chat Agent a pass…she was handling so many chats at once, and he thought the customer could have been a little more patient.  The Coach also gave the e-mail agent 100% for accurate information and a speedy response. Although the agent got good grades, the customer wasn’t happy.  Are […]

Digitize Those Defining Moments! LAMAtize the chats, texts, and twitters!2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00

Mystical? Magical? Vicious? 

Are you caught in a Vicious Cycle that damages your self-esteem or the self-esteem of your Agents? The cycle can look like this.

This is a Vicious Cycle of Negativity

I hear something wrong on a call, I get Quality to Agree it is bad.  I send out a graded form that tells the Agent what is wrong with the way she handled an issue or a person.  I set up a feedback session disguised as a “coaching” session.  In the meeting, I make sure the Agent sees the error of her ways.  I tell her how to do it right, or how we did it in my day.  I tell the Agent to fix this for their next evaluation. I hope they are repentant and willing to take the constructive criticism well and mend their ways. I watch and listen for improvement and wonder why I don’t hear or see much improvement. I am frustrated. (BTW so is the Agent and now lacking self-esteem)

This is a Vicious Cycle of Positivity

I hear the Agent make an error on a call. He said something that doesn’t please the Customer.  I ‘think’ that Agent needs more confidence and maybe a lesson on Handling the Upset Customers. I am the COACH and I am responsible to help the Agent improve. AND, to give him acknowledgment and show my “confidence in him.”  I set up a time to meet with the Agent for a coaching session. We listen to the recorded call.  I mention that […]

Mystical? Magical? Vicious? 2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00

FEEDBACK SUCKS!

The biggest cause of turnover in the contact center industry is Negative FEEDBACK and everybody still does it!  Why ? ? ?

Usually I do not use words like “sucks” but I want your attention on my intention. Thank you for opening this blog. I want to help you be able to help the agents enjoy their jobs more.  I want companies to retain their agents and have much less turnover, and of course, I want everyone to use The Positive Coach Approach.

Feedback simply doesn’t work when it is negative.  Agents don’t ever quit their job. They quit their supervisor, their manager, their coach, or their quality call checker.

It seems people would rather be RIGHT, than happy.

Supervisors are racking their brains for a new formula, a new way to correct, a different way to “hold people accountable.”  What they really want are results that work for everyone; the Customer, the Company, and the Agent.  When applying feedback or monitoring using computer based bots, or when supervisors threaten with bad grades or poor quality assessments, they have forgotten that the agent is one of the three components to the equation.  I do know that they mean well…

This type of simplicity is very difficult for complicated minds. The technical methods are holding us hostage.

What do we want?

  • A happy atmosphere where people thrive and create a safe environment for the customers, and are wide open for the opportunity to sell something of value to the customer. This way everyone thrives; […]
2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00

Would you rather read a romance novel or make love?

Do you not separate the menu from the meal? Do you know the difference between: What is right? and What Works? Understanding the difference between a gain and a loss can be vital to your training program.

Would you rather read a romance novel or make love?2021-03-11T22:17:08+00:00
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