Managing Difficult and Demanding Clients

Managing Difficult and Demanding Clients
Date: Wednesday, 15 October 2014

Time: 15.40 registration, 16:00 – 18.00 Seminar

Venue: Clarke Willmott, 138 Edmund Street, Birmingham, B3 2ES

CPD: 2 Hours CPD Accredited by the SRA

Fees: £45+ vat for members, £55 + vat for non-members

Speaker: Candy Bowman

Like most relationships, clients are relatively easy to manage when everything is harmonious. However, the clients who are the hardest to please provide an opportunity to increase trust and loyalty in the firm and can also be the most personally satisfying. This session highlights the skills and understanding required to deal with the more demanding and difficult clients in a positive, professional and constructive way, whilst maintaining dignity and self-esteem.

The session will cover:

Timeless issues around service
21st century specifics
The service equation
Client perceptions and responses
Communication mix – telephone compared with face to face
Taking an assertive stance
Vocal, visual and verbal techniques to soothe difficult situations
Accurate and active listening
Dealing with outbursts of anger
The anger management curve
Communicating effectively and graciously with highly talkative clients
Techniques to stay calm under pressure
Personal action plan

Key benefits:

Improved awareness of the client experience
The ability to see beyond the difficulty
Understanding why people may be demanding
Techniques and key words to calm difficult situations
Enhanced communication skills
Improved ability to stay serene when confronted with outbursts of anger

Candy Bowman – profile

Candy Bowman is an extensively experienced communication skills specialist. She has worked on training programmes for HSBC, The Post Office and was lead training consultant for the Disability Rights Commission in advance the formation of the Equality and Human Rights Commission. She has developed and run her own service business and been a partner in an independent record label. Her ethos, formed early in her career, is that the best route to business development and quality of working life is through good communication by positive, confident people. This is coupled with the notion that each encounter with every client counts, either to enhance sales or reputation. Having grown up surrounded by solicitors and barristers – her late father, Sidney Bowman, was a highly esteemed partner at a firm in Manchester – she has a deep respect for excellence in legal practice.