Effective service conversations – the basics of writing to customers with Leslie O’Flahavan

I loved being interviewed by GrowthDot’s Natalia Zhontsa, who asked me 11 provocative questions and somehow got me talking about a dead airline passenger, customer service, social media, live chat, customer experience, email, writing, plain language, and my secret dream of being a blues singer?

1. First of all, can you tell us a bit about yourself and your career? How did you start, and where are you now?
2. What are the most favorite and the most complicated parts of your job and why?
3. In terms of writing for customer service, what do you see as challenges and opportunities?
4. In your opinion, what are the biggest failures of businesses in responding to their customers in writing? And what are the biggest successes in responding to customers in writing?
5. What is the most unusual case you’ve experienced if there were any, and how did you handle it?
6. What qualities do you think customer support or customer service agent should have to be able to resolve such cases?
7. How would you serve an angry customer yourself? What would be your advice in that situation?
8. Do you have an everyday ritual that helped you to achieve success? And what is it?
9. How do you keep up with the latest trends, for example, in customer service?
10. How did this pandemic influence your work?
11. If you could immediately acquire one new skill, what would it be and why?

P.S. I’m not on Clubhouse anymore, but you can always join me for a great Fix This Writing! conversation on LinkedIn Live.