ROMMEL ANACAN
SHOULD YOU JUST CALL
INSTEAD?
Rommel Anacan will be speaking
about communiating by email, and
dealing with upset residents at
this year’s Education Conference
& Trade Show on Wednesday, May
13, 2015, at The Denver Mart Expo
Center.
S
ome of my favorite things to read online
are the things people say when they’re
commenting on stories! I am always
amazed at how ugly, mean-spirited and
down-right awful some people can be when they
communicate behind a wall of anonymity provided by the computer.
Here are some comments I have found on a
few sites over the years:
“ You are a FOOL--with a LOT of company.”
“3 crap articles in a row. Youre on a roll Doyel.”
“Obviously Ravens fans can’t speel, no surprise.”
“Trent is a weak minded fool.”
Do you think any of these people would actually make those comments if they were standing
in front of the people they directed them to? I
don’t! (At least, I hope not!)
When I was the customer care manager of a
property management company in Southern
California, I discovered very quickly how making
a phone call could be the best thing you do in
resolving a complaint! I usually had a practice of
communicating with people in the same way they
first contacted me, unless they told me otherwise.
So of course I loved it when people emailed me
or wrote me a letter because I could respond back
without having to actually talk to them! (Admit it, you feel the same way!)
But sometimes I’d notice that an issue
that should have been resolved would keep
going; or sometimes I’d see that my email
back would trigger another email that seemed
more angry and frustrated and the first, which
of course, was not my goal!
Here is the funny thing...when I’d
see these escalated emails or letters,
I would then pick up the phone and
reach out to the customer personally. In a majority of the cases the
residents would typically be very nice and sometimes apologize for how they communicated to
me in their writings. It seems that the one-on-one
connection was often enough to defuse a customer’s anger.
Sure, I often had challenges that still needed
to be resolved, but I found that resi-dents were
often more willing to work with me and see my
point of view when I spoke with them personally,
18 | TRENDS • APRIL 2015
instead of relying on email or letters. And, there
were many times when the complaining resident
called to thank me for working with them, even
when I wasn’t able to give them what they wanted!
So here’s why you might consider calling instead of writing an email:
IT’S EASIER TO BE A JERK
OVER EMAIL
This one works both ways. I’ve seen many emails
from associates to residents that made me cringe
and fear for the job security of the associate who
wrote them! As I talked about earlier, when you
are safe and secure behind your desk, it’s easier for
you to say something you shouldn’t say, or to say it
in a way that you shouldn’t. It’s also easier for your
upset resident to do the same thing.
When you are talking in person (or on the
phone) there is a tendency for people to want to
find some type of common ground, because not
everyone is comfortable be-ing combative or aggressive in person.
IT’S EASIER TO BE
MISUNDERSTOOD OVER EMAIL
There is no way around this one, letters and
emails often read harsher than they are intended.
This is why you’ve probably heard that you should
never use email to cor-rect or discipline someone.
The other issue with written communication is
that it can be looked at and stewed over again and
again, further inflaming an already upset res-ident.
If you must send an email read and re-read it from
the customer’s point of view~and have someone
else (who is generally level-headed) read it for you
if you have any doubts!
PERSONALLY CONNECTING IS
POWERFUL
While technology allows us to communicate
in every way possible, it also seems to isolate us
from people as well. In today’s world where we
text more than we call, where we Facebook more
than we meet for coffee, there is something emotionally powerful when you pick up the phone
and say, “Hi Roger. This is Kimberly from the Quail
Run office. I just got your email and I am so sorry
about your experience and wanted to talk to you right
away about it...”
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