Cremation Options Satisfies Clients

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Sunday April 14, 1912 @ 9:30 pm: As the Titanic comes within range of the coast of Newfoundland, wireless operator Jack Phillips begins transmitting passenger messages to a lighthouse at Cape Race. The wireless system, fairly new at the time, had become a sensation to passengers. As a way of impressing friends, relatives and business associates, passengers would spend time sending messages from the Titanic. Phillips had had a difficult day. Twenty four hours earlier the wireless system had broken down and Phillips had worked until 5 a.m. Sunday to fix it.
Those long hours plus the large number of messages to transmit had caused Phillips to feel tremendous pressure. 11:00 p.m.: while continuing to send passenger message to Cape Race, Phillips receives a message from the Leyland liner Californian. Because of the Californian's close proximity to Titanic, the message blasts through Phillip's headset at full volume: "Say old man, we are stopped and surrounded by ice." Rather than acknowledging or acting on the message, Phillips in a pique replies, "Shut up! Shut up! I am busy. I am working Cape Race!" No further message comes from the Californian. Forty minutes later Titanic strikes an iceberg. This incident from the Titanic disaster, during which Phillips and more than 1,500 other people died, illustrates the consequences of failing to listen. While no one would say that this incident was the sole reason for the disaster, it certainly didn't help matters. Without satisfied clients, your business will die. Without knowledge of your clients' needs, your business similarly will die. In order to maintain client satisfaction and to remain aware of client needs, you must listen to your clients. Simply hearing what the other person is saying is insufficient.
Have you ever said something to someone, only to have that person act as though he or she didn't hear at all? Annoying, wasn't it? For that reason, avoid doing the same thing with your own clients. It's not enough, in other words that you heard the other person. It's not enough even that you understood the other person. In order to minimize dissatisfaction, you must ensure that the other person knows that you heard and understood. With apologies to the author of the "If a tree falls…." Riddle: if you heard and understood the client, but the client is unaware of it, did you really, in the client's eyes, really hear and understand? Probably not.
Main Aspects Of Active Listening
The key to listening effectively is to practice "active listening." This process involves several steps: hearing the other person, processing what you have heard, giving response, confirming that the other person head and understood.
Hearing The Other Person
While you hear what the other person is saying, give them your undivided attention. More importantly, ensure that the other person knows that you are giving your undivided attention. Interruptions will occur during the workday. However, being distracted by them will cause the other person to react negatively. In particular, if you're talking face to face, look at the other person. Wandering eyes will signal to the other person that you have a wondering mind as well. If you're going to be distracted by other sights, consider moving to a more private area. In addition to cutting down on distractions, it will foster a greater flow of information. Avoid taking calls if you're talking in your office. Let the call go into voicemail or ask you assistant to take the call. Turn your cell phone off or set it to silent mode.
If you really are expecting an important call, for example if your spouse is about to give birth, at least let the other person know in advance, and apologize. I remember meeting with someone who, shortly after we began talking in this office, actually unplugged his desk phone. The same goes for anything else that either person thinks might distract you. If you're listening to music through earphones like on an iPod or through your computer, remove them before the other person starts talking. If you were working on the computer, stop doing so.
You might be able to hear and comprehend perfectly even while listening on your iPod or typing on the computer, but the other person could interpret those actions as rudeness. Try to hear everything the other person has to say. Sometimes when we're hearing someone else, we make one of two mistakes. Either we interrupt the other person (as Titanic wireless operator Jack Phillips did with the Californian), because we think we know what they're going to say. Or, we fail to listen, because we're already thinking of the response we're going to make. Try to avoid either of these errors, because they will hinder your listening.
Processing What You Have Heard
Once you've heard what the other person has said, you might need time to process and analyze what you have heard. If you're going to take more than a few seconds, consider letting the other person know that you're thinking about the answer. Otherwise, the person might believe that you're ignoring the statement or question. To prevent such confusion, you could say something like, "I see, let me think about this," or "That's interesting thanks for bringing it up." While analyzing what the other person has said, try to understand why the other person is asking or saying it. Often, the question or statement indicates an underlying issue. If you can answer in a way that addresses that issue, you will be far more effective in communicating. For example, suppose you're talking with a client about arrangement for the interment, which will occur on Friday. During the conversation, the client asks you, "Do you know what the weather will be like on Friday?" Suppose, on Friday, there's a chance of rain. You could simply answer that way, saying, "I heard that there's a chance of rain on Friday." A better response, though, might involve asking yourself why the client is asking this question. It's probable that the client is concerned if the weather might affect the interment. Another critical distinction to make is the question for pure information. "How many copies of the death certificate will we receive?" versus the question because asker is upset. "Why haven't our death certificates arrived yet?" In the latter case, it's even more important to understand the underlying issue that drove the question and to address the issue in your answers.
Giving Your Response
When you do respond, try to incorporate that issue into your answer. Try to answer in a way that addresses that issue. Doing so tells the other person that you actually did hear what was said, thus increasing (or at least preventing further loss of) satisfaction. In response to the weather question you could say, "I heard there's a chance of rain on Friday. However as you know we will have a tent set up at the grave site," or, "We'll make sure there are umbrellas available as we walk to the grave site." In response to the death certificate question, you could say something like, "I'm sorry, I know it's an inconvenience. I'll check and find out what's going on." In general, the more complex the statement you hear, the more complex should be your response. If someone casually remarks about heavy traffic, you could simply respond that yes, you ran into that same traffic. On the other hand, if a client talks about the need for a proper service, and you sense the underlying sorrow, you should aim for more empathy in your response. You should try to let the client know that you understand him or her emotions.
Confirming That The Other Person Heard And Understood
Once you respond, make sure that the other person heard and understood you. Be careful, though, how you say it, or else you might cause offense. Rather than say, "Is that clear?" or even worse, "Do you hear me?" Consider a statement such as, "How clear was that?" or "I hope that was clear enough." Have you ever seen the "old woman/young woman" picture? Depending on your point of view, she could be either or both. Likewise, if you fail to confirm that the other person heard and understood, you risk the situation of having two people walk away from an interaction with two completely different interpretations of that interaction.
Communicating Via-Email
If you're communicating via email, be especially careful. You cannot as with personal interaction, observe the other person's facial expressions or body language. Nor can you, as with a telephone, hear the person's tone of voice or inflection. Therefore, think carefully before you send an email reply, particularly if the original message upset you. Remember the old proverb, "Fools answer rashly, but a prudent man overlooks an insult." After composing your reply, store it in your drafts folder for awhile, then come back to it later. To prevent sending it accidentally, cut the recipient address from the "To:" field and paste it into the body of your message. When you're ready to send the reply just re-cut the address from the body of the message and re-paste it into the "To:" field. Avoid tongue in check or joking comments in your email, unless you know the person really well. Even then, be careful, and in those cases, use abbreviations such as "LOL" (which stands for "laughing out loud") at the beginning and the end of the tongue in cheek comment. A comment that you find humorous might be taken seriously by the recipient. Often, people will use the "reply" feature of email to compose a note to the sender but on a completely different topic. If you do so, take time to change the subject line to match your actual subject. Otherwise, your sender-turned-recipient may not pay attention. Two years ago, in January, a neighbor in my housing development sent a note announcing a new version of a neighborhood telephone directory, with the subject "neighborhood directory." By accident (because I wasn't really interested in the reply), I clicked on the "reply", and say this note from the other neighbor: "Our heater is broken. Can someone lend us blankets and a space heater?" I found out later that this neighbor did get what he wanted and did get his heater repaired. However, he might have gotten help sooner if he had put an appropriate subject line in his note, regarding this need for help and the urgency of his situation. By default, most email programs include in the reply the original note to which you are replying. It's a good idea to use this feature, so that the recipient understands the context of your reply. However, if you are constantly exchanging emails on a topic so that your notes get longer and longer, you should consider meeting in person or talking on the telephone. The better you are at listening whether in person or via email, the more quickly you can respond to opportunities and challenges in your business and the more successful you will be.

Cremation Options is proud to be a family owned and operated company dedicated to providing dignified cremation services at an affordable price. Established in 2002; we are a non-denominational firm providing a variety of Cremation, merchandise, and services to families of all ages, creeds, and ethnic backgrounds.