Customer service is tough enough in the best of times, it becomes even more challenging and difficult if you have to deal with angry, upset, frightened or abusive customers. If you deal with difficult or angry customers, no doubt you understand the stress and frustration YOU feel as an employee, not to mention the sheer amount of time these customers can "eat up". Now you can learn to deal with hostile customers more professionally, and reduce the amount of stress and time associated with difficult customer service situations. The Defusing Hostile Customers Workbook will teach you how to deal with tough situations. We'll tell you what techniques you can use to get ranting customers to stop ranting, and start listening. We'll teach you to use very specific techniques to both calm people down, and shorten difficult interactions. We'll even help you have more confidence in tough situations, and provide workplace violence related safety tips. The Book This workbooks weighs in at over 200 pages, and doesn't just tell you what to do, but provides exercises you can do to practice customer defusing skills. The answers to the exercises (and detailed explanations) are provided at the back of the book. It's like a seminar in a book, but you don't have to do "role-playing" to practice. The workbook was originally designed for those working in government, public sector and publicly funded organizations, including educational institutions (e.g. schools, school boards). Don't be fooled though. The skills and techniques inside apply to virtually any type of job that involves interacting with customers or clients. Here's just a few of the things included: . Nature of Hostile Behavior . How Hostile Situations Escalate . Principles of Defusing . Art of Self-Control . Starting Off Successfully . Using Co-operative Language . Verbal Self-Defense Techniques . Acknowledgment Tactics . Countering Non-Verbal Intimidation . Referral Techniques . Telephone Hostility . Limit Setting About The Author, Robert Bacal Robert Bacal has trained thousands of people to defuse hostile customers, over the last twelve years. In fact this book is based on his seminar, and contains techniques drawn from psycholinguistics, psychology, and perhaps more importantly from the thousands of customer service staff that have attended his seminars. He is also the author of Perfect Phrases For Customer Service, published by McGraw-Hill. For more information about Robert, click here.