“Building Customer Relationships” is not only the name of the training course New York Community Bancorp, Inc. (NYCB) developed, but this concept is at the heart of what the organization strives for as a key business objective. Cultivating trusted customer relationships that are strong enough to last is critically important for the bank’s reputation, longevity, and profitability. NYCB’s mission is to equip its employees with the confidence, skill set, and ability to hold productive conversations with customers in order to provide a best-in-class service experience.
Program Details
Building Customer Relationships is not your ordinary training class. Employee Development & Training partnered with NYCB’s business client to develop an interactive and memorable classroom experience for front-line employees. The engaging and empowering session aims to inspire and achieve a sustained change in behavior around the process of Building Customer Relationships. To maximize classroom learning, participants are required to complete three prerequisite online courses.
The opening classroom activity sets the stage for success. Participants are greeted as they enter a lively room with “Big Fish” décor and dancing music. Laughter fills the room when the facilitator reappears in fishing attire and a big fish hooked to a fishing rod. A special message from NYCB’s Sales & Service director is delivered in a colorful letter format with photos of fish and creatively written to capture learners’ attention on how to “catch their Big Fish.” The passion around service is felt when learners read, “By expertly casting your questions out to your customers, you will uncover their needs, and when you present viable solutions, your customers will be ‘hooked’ on our organization!” Participants are encouraged to share their “Big Fish” stories around building customer relationships and best practices.
Through a series of skill practice activities, participants are challenged to spend time outside of their comfort zone practicing effective questioning techniques, the six steps of the relationship selling process, and effectively planning follow-up calls. They receive balanced feedback, using praise and polish techniques, from team members in their small groups after each skill practice. Throughout the workshop, customized video demonstrations are utilized to show “order-taker” and “best-in-class” customer interactions to reinforce the expected sales and service behaviors. Participants evaluate the effectiveness of the customer interaction by completing a sales and service checklist that incorporates all of the steps of the relationship selling process. This checklist is a tool used by management to observe and evaluate employees’ sales and service performance.
The session concludes with a memorable and classical story from the “Wizard of Oz.” Theatrics and props are used to captivate the audience, and participants are encouraged to use their “brain, heart, and courage to catch their big fish.”
Results
As of August 2013, NYCB’s year-to-date Attribute ratings—which measure the consistency of the expected sales and service behaviors—increased from 85.8 percent to 91.8 percent, and Customer Satisfaction year-to-date ratings jumped from 83.1 percent to 87.4 percent.
