Here is the best piece of free consultancy I would give anyone involved in Retail or call centres or digital or Omnichannel etc. and want to be taken seriously. It's the best textbook on the basics of Conversation Analysis and you can get it on line at amazon book depository for a ridiculously low price.
Conversation is the richest source of actionable insight we have available.
It is the most common most highly available source of insight we have and it is actionable.
It is an area of remarkable research with practical applications already delivering continuous improvement
In real time
You can change business outcomes
and it's cheap with a massive bang per buck....this book is your best investment of the year.
(and finally if you are not reading this stuff and not investing in this field, as a client or a CX Expert member of the CX Foundation network.....I would tell you you are an idiot!
If you are seeking recognition as an expert by the Customer Experience Foundation and to be recommended for major projects it is now required reading. This is the first required reading for Emotional Conversation Analysis we have specified and we will add more if you wish to develop as an expert in this field)
This book outlays some of the fundamental rules you can apply today and start change within every part of your organisation.
To quote Professor Stokoe in the first chapter:
."Talk .......is designed by humans to get every facet of a life accomplished"
Talk is designed to be understood.
Organisations are more than poor at this, because no-one really stays up to date with the science of business. BUA instead of continuous improvement is common culture and it is at the root of what turns a successful business into a dinosaur.
We don't understand conversations and emotions well enough. These are some of the real parts of customer experience and they are far too low on everyone's agenda.We build pipes and channels through which we communicate but we have no real idea of what's the meaning of going on efficiently.
We know who when some aspects of why and how but not the one means in understanding we designed to help ourselves understand each other.
If you still talk about surveys rather than trying to get a better conversations you are behind what is going on now - in the conversation your customer wants to have you understand them and .....you can change the outcome more efficiently!
More people got training on NPS last year than on CONVERSATION. You would not believe it was possible to be so irresponsible.
This is like coming to an interview as the CEO of a Fortune 500 company and saying "I really don't get all that basic maths stuff leadership, analysis or project management - is it important?".
I would advise any board to find out what a candidate knows about conversation as basically as if you are talking about understanding spreadsheets reports or how to use a smartphone.
In business you should know about conversation.
This is the first step towards understanding conversation.
I know that a lucky few are coming to our London Event to hear Liz Stokoe talk and have a chance to ask some questions and we are hoping she may join us for an hour for our Level 1 and Level 2 Managing Customer Emotions Workshops and Certification in Greece between the 25th and 28th of February.
(By the way...please stop asking for free tickets for London its a charity experience that raises money for an organisation that provides experiences for young people that build their confident. As for Greece..don't even think about it.)
I hope we can persuade Liz to do some do some digital classes but if you are training with the foundation you need to read this book. You won't understand all of it straight away...like any new system of thinking it takes time to understand the detail of conversation. It's one hell of a good start.
It has some important basic lessons you can learn and how to use some of the important basic tools of conversation analysis and then you can take it from there.
if you are in business you should be able to help your organisation understand a conversation!
Mo,