Management... A Service Call that Begins Well, Ends Well Roger Daviston What are anchors and why are they important? Anchors are similar to Pavlov’s dog experiments. Pavlov rang a bell and fed the dogs. The dogs salivated when the dogs saw the food. After a few pairings of this sequence of events, the dogs salivated without seeing the food. The bell alone elicited salivation. In other words, the bell became an anchor to elicit salivation in the dogs. The bell controlled the dogs. Anchors are stimuli that call forth certain emotional states in us as humans. For instance, can you hear the sound of your mother’s voice calling out to you when you were a small child? If you notice, you are probably feeling some sort of emotional reaction to this sound. Whether negative or positive recall, the sound of your mother’s voice elicits an emotional state and is the anchor for the response of how you feel—you have no control over the emotion. Anchors have been established in your customers and you want to avoid the ones that fire off negative emotional states. Also, while with the customer, you want to establish and even activate some resourceful anchors, which is easy to do. This is important because you want the customer to be in a good emotional state when you drive away. Exit from your truck immediately and do not linger in the driveway. You will want to take care of all necessary paperwork and other things before you arrive. This will free you up to get out quickly. The customer has been waiting. Be respectful and move with urgency. Likely, in the past, another service person from another industry sat in the driveway, frustrating the customer with a negative emotion. So now, when you do the same thing, it triggers that negative emotion, even President The Daviston Group before greeting the customer. In order to avoid firing off a negative anchor, it is wise to be ready to exit your truck upon arrival. Check your appearance before you arrive. What the customer sees could trigger a negative emotion in them, as well. You want to install a positive emotion. If you look clean, professional and sharp, this implies that your work is clean, professional and sharp. If you look sloppy, dirty, sweaty and possibly even smell bad, the call will start off badly. A service call that starts well is much more likely to end well. I can still recall today the negative emotion I had when a plumber arrived at my house over seventeen years ago to fix a problem with water leaking into the floor from under the shower. He arrived a little late, but that was not the main issue. He knocked on the door, I let him in and he said, “Hey, sorry I’m late. I just ate lunch.” I already knew that because I could see it on his shirt. What a terrible state his unclean appearance put me in. I could even smell the restaurant on his clothing. Even though it was a BBQ place that I loved, I did not want to smell it in my kitchen. Now, I have two negative experiences in the first five seconds. He has elicited from me a very bad emotional state, not by his words but by his looks and smells, and was not even aware of it. I completely shut down and my brain closed. I couldn’t even listen to anything that he said. I just led him politely back to the master bath and all thoughts were about how soon I was going to get this guy out of my house, all because he had ketchup on his shirt and he smelled like onions. Check your appearance. Those who are smoking in the truck or taking a smoke break before you arrive, you are not helping yourselves. If you’re serious about your average ticket, you will be cognizant or even stop this behavior. I do not like to smell smoke in my home, and many others feel the same. Call the customer before you leave for the home. However, don’t diagnose the problem over the phone. You just want to reach out by phone and start the connection process. I advise you to say something like this: “Hi Mrs. Smith. This is Roger with ABC Heating and Cooling. You’re my next appointment and I am on my 24 ICM/March/April 2017
ICM March-Apri 2017
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