Not Everyone Responds Positively to Coaching

I've been doing a lot of call coaching lately. I always approach a call coaching session with a positive attitude. Hey, I'm a nice guy, generally a glass-half-fuller, and I want the call coaching experience to be a positive, encouraging experience. Nevertheless, I can't control how the person I'm coaching will approach the session:

• Some people are very insecure and receive any constructive criticism, no matter how constructively delivered, as a destructive blow to their psyche.
• Some people hate being held to any standard. They want to be free to say anything on the phone the way they want to say it without being accountable to anyone. The call coach, in their minds, becomes the bad-guy simply because he/she is the face of a process they don't like.
• Other people have a very strong sense of pride that will never allow them to admit that they sometimes perform below par or have obvious opportunities to improve.

I have the experience of coaching some of the same people for well over ten years. I've run into examples of each person described above. After ten years, call coaching sessions are still uncomfortable and tense. I don't enjoy contentious call coaching sessions nor do they. Nevertheless, I look back and see how well these individuals have improved. Their QA scores used to be in the low-to-mid  80's. Now they regularly perform above 95 on a scale that has only gotten more strict with time.

With that knowledge, I walk away with a smile on my face and quietly give myself a gentle pat on the back. They have improved. The customer is getting great service. I've continued to approach each session with a positive attitude and have done my job - even when someone walks away from the session in their usual huff muttering my name in a curse-laden whispers.

Creative Commons photo courtesy of Flickr and Dave Apple.