I’m sorry, but who do you think you are speaking to???

The phone rings in the office, my colleague answers it and then spends the next 10 minutes speaking to a person who thinks it is acceptable to be rude and somewhat aggressive, needless to say, she politely told him that we can not help him and ended the call (when she finally got a word in). It got me thinking about how although customer service is an essential part of a successful business relationship it goes both ways and the customer/client should also invest in the relationship in order to get the best service.

As recruiters we have two sets of relationships that we nurture – The Client and The Candidate. In very basic terms we aim to build good relationships with the client in order to find relevant candidates for their business when they need to recruit. This means that we need to understand their business and equally we need to understand the aspirations and ambitions of our candidates in order to successfully match them. So if a bad impression is set from either party, then we can not knowingly set them up with potential opportunities or candidates. We have a professional duty to ensure that when we arrange for clients and candidates to meet it is because we feel that they are suited to each other both professionally and in terms of personality. If we feel someone has a bad attitude, it isn’t in our interest or indeed ethically right to represent them if we feel they just aren’t a very nice person.

Of course although particularly rife in sales-based businesses, it happens in most other industries too. One of the accountancy practices we work with has told me on several occasions they have fired clients that they find too difficult and so cause stress for the staff and excess time being spent on their accounts; they prefer to work with people that respect their service. It’s the same for us, if a candidate or client is unnecessarily rude or difficult, we will simply not represent them, why should we put up with it?  

Yes it is a competitive market, and of course you have to work with one or two people that you don’t particularly gel with, and that’s fine. In business you do have to be thick skinned, however, sometimes a line has to be drawn. When does occasionally abrupt and dismissive become rude and aggressive? It’s those  that step over that line that we will not work on.

So what’s the moral of this story? The customer is not always right, which we could all do with remembering at times.

Kate Smart