How to find talents for customer support?

Managing people is difficult, but hiring them is no easier. How to attract the attention of these professionals? What are the criteria to find out those who do not fit into the team? How to weed out the middle peasants, for whom the work in the support service consists only in trying to detach from the client? Today we will talk about how to create an effective vacancy announcement and conduct a productive interview.

1) Who is the perfect customer support officer?

The answer to this question you must give yourself. Strange: companies spend huge budgets in order to create a portrait of their customers, but few people think about creating similar portraits of their own employees .
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It is impossible to hire an excellent specialist, relying only on his resume. You need to know how well he will fit into the team and whether it is suitable for the role intended for him.

Understanding what you are looking for will make your search more effective. To help offer the three most important aspects.

Personal qualities . What qualities do you think an excellent support specialist should have? For example, curiosity, sociability, or inner need to help people. Make a list and bring it in the ad, so that the applicant can immediately "know yourself."

Corporate culture . The tacit values ​​of the company and team relationships are manifested in everything from product and marketing to customer support. Try to reflect in the text of the vacancy your basic principles, so that the person can understand how you are suited to each other. Do you think that the client is always right, encourage employees to read as much as possible, conduct mandatory table tennis tournaments or can you not live without daily meetings? Write about it. Far from the fact that the applicant shares your delight.

Professional skills . You can make a long and trivial list - like everyone else. However, it is more effective to identify the basic skills that will be needed to solve 80% of the tasks . No candidate meets all the requirements from the endless list. For support services, it is better to concentrate on skills that allow you to cope with the most difficult tasks.

2) We write the announcement

Regular ad attracts mediocre employees. Our goal is talent, so you need to work on the job description. Here are some tips.

Show ingenuity in the choice of words and expressions . They do not simply describe the required skills. When used properly, they can be used to find someone who can pleasantly surprise and improve your team. Think over each word: what message does it carry?

A couple of examples from the vacancies of companies that are trying to stand out: "We are looking for an expert on the happiness of customers", "We need an engineer of human souls."

Agree, someone at the sight of such a title just twist a finger to his temple. The other one will think: “Well done, guys, they thought up something cool, right about me!”. Most likely, this will be the talent you are looking for.

Intimidate a little . This strategy is also bearing fruit. This is not about "lamp in the eyes, hands on the table." Just thicken a little paint, highlight the most difficult tasks - it will scare away those who are looking for a warm place behind other people's backs.

For example: “You are a specialist who will provide customers with comfortable use of our service. That you will solve all the technical problems that arise and keep the defense at the forefront of customer support. You should be able to skillfully navigate through the process of setting up even an old woman who does not know how a computer program differs from a television program. ” To respond to such an announcement, you need some confidence in their own abilities.

A few words about culture . You already have a sample list of requirements, now you need to correctly reflect it in the job description. If we are talking about the values ​​of the company, the idea can be formulated quite strictly: “You should read every post in our blog. Only in this way will you learn everything about the company and how we think. ”

If you want to focus on the culture of relationships in a team, the wording may be easier: “Charm and humor are your siblings.”

The attractiveness of the vacancy . “Cookies in the office” is great. However, the abundance of "buns" can have a negative effect. You hardly need an employee who wants only free lunches, a gym membership, a long vacation, and is ready to “endure” any work for them. Therefore, despite the fashion, you should not get involved in the transfer of bonuses and benefits - you will have time to talk about them at the interview.

3) Initial dropout

Get applicants to do a bit of work . No abuse, just make sure the potential intentions of a potential employee.

You can in response to the summary to send a letter with additional questions. This will kill two birds with one stone. First, the need to spend time and ponder those who send out their resumes to all vacancies. Secondly, the questions themselves will work. Make them open - so that you can not just answer "yes" or "no." For example: “Imagine that you came after lunch break and saw 100 calls from angry customers. Apparently, something serious happened. Your actions?".

Answers to such questions will show how the applicant is coping with non-standard situations, how well he solves difficult problems and whether his thoughts are clear.

Primary skills audit . This method is successfully used by many companies, including Omnidesk . For example, we suggest the applicant to write down a small screencast in which he will explain in detail one of the functionalities of the service. The ability to create high-quality screencasts is important for a supporter, since it is often easier with their help to convey all the key points to the client.

Such tasks can be made optional, but not because they are secondary. On the contrary, those who decide not to carry them out should be written off without hesitation :)

4) Interview

The last stage in the epic search for a talented specialist helps to create a personal impression of the applicant. Here can be used both banal and non-ordinary questions. The main thing is to correctly interpret the answers. Let's look at examples.

"What is your latest achievement?"

It would seem a standard question, but the answer to it explains a lot about the potential employee and his personal characteristics. For example, the applicant talks about what efforts had to be made to overcome obstacles and get out of the crisis. Excellent: patience and the ability to not give up - very useful qualities for support staff.

“Explain to me how it works.”

An effective technique that allows you to unlock the potential of the candidate. Will he convey his thoughts clearly and clearly? Will you put yourself in your place? If a person explains an object unknown to you "from scratch" in such a way that no initial knowledge is required, this is a victory.

You can slightly complicate the situation. Pretend to be distracted and ask again. Will the applicant speak with the same enthusiasm as the first time? Can you hide the indignation caused by your carelessness? These are important qualities, and you can identify them with the help of such a simple test.

"Tell me a little about yourself"

The most common question that almost all applicants have prepared a standard answer. However, having listened to the beginning of the story, you can interrupt the person with a counter question and start a spontaneous conversation on an abstract topic. The goal - to see how he is a pleasant companion. Clients highly value friendly support, often help for them is already in a friendly conversation.

As a conclusion, I would like to cite a few numbers. They give a complete understanding of the need for a creative and careful approach to finding support specialists:

• 70% of purchasing decisions are made by customers, depending on the quality of service;
• 81% of customers reapply to the company whose service they liked;
• 95% of customers react negatively to poor service: they stop using the services of the company, send complaints, tell their negative impressions to friends;
• 9 people - on average, a satisfied customer tells about your company to exactly that number of friends.

A talented support specialist is not a luxury . These are long-term investments that will inevitably affect the growth and development of your business.