HBS_ Want to Perfect Your Company's Service? Use Behavioral Science,”

Speaker notes

Client service techniques — lessons from behavioral science

Dr. Ashish Nanda, Harvard Business School Professor

Follow these very simple tactics (insights) from behavioral science to build strong client relationships:

I. Sequence Effect

The sequence of events/experiences has a great impact on how a human being experiences those events.

A.                  Trend really matters in how people experience events. When meeting with a client, get the pain out of the way early (e.g., I have good news, and I have bad news. First, let me tell you the bad news).

B.      People do not recall the entire experience of what they have been through; rather, they remember the highs and the lows of the experience (e.g., movie experience).

C.      Endings are very important (e.g., place hand in very cold water, then in cold water—cold is nicer than very cold). Endings stay in one's mind.

1.       Pay attention to how you are going to finish.

a.       End strong

b.       Something considered positive and important to the client

c.       Significant observations (do not summarize what was discussed; avoid minutiae and great detail)

II. Duration Effect

A.                  People have fuzzy biological clocks and don’t have a good sense of how time is passing. Time flies by unnoticed until one pays specific attention to the passage of time (e.g., no clocks in casino—no clear sense of time passing. If one has only five minutes—time that has been spent seems longer. Both indicate how sensitive one is to time itself)

B.      Segments lend one the experience of duration (e.g., sports: four segments seem longer than two segments even thought the total time spent is the same.)

1.       Combine the pain and segment the pleasure (share the four bad things, then share the three good things: (1) good news, (2) good news and (3) good news.

III. Rationalization Effect

1.       People tend to rationalize by personalizing whatever happened, giving credit or blame to people rather than to systems (e.g., a person has caused the flight delay…not the system).

2.       People feel comforted by a sense of ritual (e.g., gestures in baseball).

a.       Build rituals and stick to them. Rituals offer comfort. Do not be driven by content or by an agenda. Have meetings at certain times each week.

3.       Empowerment – If people are given some control over the process, it makes them open to the content as well (e.g., choice of which arm one receives an injection in).

a.       Empower client with choices in the process (not content)

                                                               i.      Where would you like to meet?

                                                             ii.      What time would you like to meet

IV. Emotions

People’s emotions have an impact on how trusting they are. How positive a person is feeling has an impact on how trusting he/she will be. When meeting with a client, begin the conversation with positive emotion-building communication. Even if this brief conversation has nothing to do with what you are going to talk about, the client will become more trusting.

Richard B. Chase and Sriram Dasu, “Want to Perfect Your Company's Service? Use Behavioral Science,” Harvard Business Review, June 2001. pp. 78-85.