Says Ms Nina Kochhar, co-founder, Upgrade Management Service, "From airlines to hotels, corporate offices to public sector departments, banks to embassies, public dealing is part of business and these days, customers everywhere demand better service. In the competitive world of business, only those businesses that render improved customer service will survive."

Ms Kochhar explains that at Upgrade Management Services, a new genre of professionals have developed a better customer management training service, which grooms business house employees in serving customers or guests better than the competition.

Explaining how Upgrade's customer service benefits the client, Ms Kochhar says, "When we are hired by a client, we first do a mystery customer audit to understand the state of service in the company. This audit is then followed by actual training at the client's premises. After the completion of the employee training, we also conduct an evaluation of the trainees."

Upgrade Management Service is basically a customer management consultancy that helps organisations achieve quality service to its customers. To this end, Upgrade offers a comprehensive package that begins with a mystery customer audit from which a training analysis is derived. The actual training module is then customised on the basis of this training analysis.

Elaborating on these modules, Mr Upaul Majumdar, also a co-founder of the company, says, "The training module differs from organisation to organisation, depending on their nature of business, customer profile and business processes. The faculty members at Upgrade work as facilitators for our business clients, and they also encourage the participants to find their own solutions to change. Our training principle is `Tell me I may forget, Show me I may not remember, Involve me and I'll understand'."

"Nowadays what requires to appease a customer to visit again is something more than just a smile," Mr Majumdar continues. He adds,"One should understand the mood of his customer and one should also mind that customers have more purchasing power and they can be vicious to get back at a company through forums like the consumer court."

The basic thrust of the training programmes provided by Upgrade is to make the staff of any company customer friendly so that they come back again and again. The main object is to build an enduring relationship with the client business house and its customers. "While senior staff in an organisation are generally aware of the importance of building up the level of relationship with their customers, the lower level employees lack this and it is the front office staff of an organisation who confront the customers. These front office and lower level staff need grooming," said Ms Kochhar.