The customer service manager is essential in industries that deal directly with consumers. This, basically, means that customer service managers are crucial to almost every commercial industry going. At its very core, the job is to make sure that the company can do as much as is reasonably possible to satisfy the all-important client.
As a customer service manager, you are at once responsible for creating a customer service policy and for making sure that it is implemented. You will have to train up your staff so that they can deal with any imaginable situation in the appropriate manner.
While this gives you great power, it also gives you annoying responsibility: questions, complaints and outright rants will inevitably get shoved upstairs to the manager. This is the one case where the wisdom of The Wire may not apply; the shit does not always roll downhill.
Salary & benefits
The annual salary of a customer service manager differs largely from company to company. A manager in training can get £19,000 a year while more experienced managers can get as much as £45,000 to £50,000.
The usual income for qualified customer service managers, however, is somewhere between the two extremes.
Working hours
The job is office-based and does not offer any travel opportunities. There are instances when the manager has to meet a customer outside of the office, but this is rare.
Working hours depend on the company’s operational hours. However, it is a typical eight to nine hour job.
Customer service managers can work in the main office of the company or the company’s contact centre. Trainees or assistants work in service desks.
Due to the nature of the job, customer service managers need to talk with customers, most of whom will be irate and frustrated. This is the usual cause of stress in this job, so those who aim for this position need to be able to handle stress in face-to-face situations.
Entry
Employers will consider applicants from any background for this job and no undergraduate degree is required. Marketing and management degrees will help professionals progress in the field later on, but are not necessary for entry level positions.
Customer service managers need exemplary communication skills; managers should be able to convince and, at times, appease annoyed and unhappy customers. This takes great skill and patience. The job, being a managerial position, requires managers to have great motivational skills as well.
Training & progression
Those who want to become customer service managers usually start as customer service assistants. From there, they work their way towards being a manager. It’s possible to become a customer service manager with a postgraduate degree.
However, there are available courses for customer service managers in the field of communications and corporate solutions, so it’s a good idea to check these out.
A career as a customer service manager can open a lot of managerial job posts for a professional, but attaining further credentials through the completion of short programmes and courses may be necessary, especially for progressing in more specialist managerial job posts.