Wait… I can get compliments?

Disclaimer: I’m actually really proud of myself for this so I beg you, don’t shit on my day.

So, I’m the kind of person who bases their self-worth on the opinions of others. Not healthy, I know, I’m working on it. I digress.

I worked in a different call center before my current that gave you a bigger bonus if you got compliments from customers – but only if they were given directly to management. It didn’t matter if it was only on a call. I’m not saying the compliments on calls were worth less to me, but I began basing my job performance on compliments that got to managers. Unfortunately, that only happened twice during my time there.

I’ve been at my current job about five months and I’ve had customers cry when I tell them I can get them an appointment. Side note: I schedule car inspections here. My last job was making sure people got everything from my company that they’d ordered.

My first compliment was last month and I was so embarrassed when I had to go get a manager. While the customer had been talking about how great he thought I was, I still thought he was going to complain. Nope! Gave me a hell of a review. Not that it matters at this job – customer opinions only matter if they’re negative.

I found out about my second last week when my site manager walked by and patted me on the shoulder, telling me I’d done a good job. I guess I looked as confused as I felt because she stopped and asked if anyone one had told me one of the Quality Monitors at one of the financing companies we schedule inspections for called and told them how great a job I did handling an irate customer. Said customer had complained about their agent there, so our client had to do a quality check. I remember that the agent had stayed on the line to assist with this unruly customer, so I guess they heard my part, too. This is one of the best compliments I’ve gotten – I had almost blown up on the guy. Glad I didn’t!

My third happened today. One of my coworkers looked at me funny while on a call and told the customer to hold while she got management. I got a call so I couldn’t listen in, but shortly after that I got an email telling me a customer had called back and it took three attempts to get to my call center (we have at minimum 5 locations) just to make sure management knew how well I’d done.

I want to put this into context: I was at my last call center 9 months and got two compliments that went to management. I’ve been at my current for five months and I’ve gotten three.

Has my customer service gotten better or do people just have lower expectations from my company? I’m pretty sure it’s the latter, but I’m perfectly fine with it. I feel better about myself right now than I have in ages.