The Platinum Rule of Service

A hand checks a box labeled "Excellence" on a transparent rating scale, with options "Good," "Average," "Poor," and "Very Poor" in a blurred indoor setting.

Course Overview

“Treat others the way you want to be treated” is a phrase we’re probably all familiar with. Commonly referred to as the “Golden Rule”, this guiding principle reminds us to treat others with kindness, respect, and consideration, because that’s what we want for ourselves.

Great, right? Well, there is one catch: everyone is different. This is where the Golden Rule has its limitations. While you might want one thing, your peer may want something completely different. To acknowledge and validate our individual uniqueness, the “Platinum Rule” was born.

The Platinum Rule is about “treating people how they want to be treated". This is an important distinction, because this shift in mindset allows us to consider the wants and needs of others rather than putting ourselves at the forefront. Built on the foundation of the DISC Behavior Skills and Assessment, we’ve designed training to equip your team with relevant and applicable skills to elevate their level of service and meet customers where they are.

The focused topics of this training program include the following:

Learning how to identify the customer’s behavioral style
Adapting to the customer’s pace, phrasing, and pitch
Understanding the different ways to help retain your customers
Solving the customer’s problem in their own vocabulary

Learning Outcomes

Understand that the “Platinum Rule” is a wonderful gift you can give your customers.
Discover your style using DISC for Customer Service.
Be comfortable identifying the different behavior styles.
Learn ways to adapt your pace, phrasing, and pitch to the customer.
Understand customers’ varying styles in order to meet their needs.

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“Get closer than ever to your customers. So close that you tell them what they need well before they realize it themselves.”
Steve Jobs

Business Outcomes

Better Communication

Enhanced Company Reputation

Consistency of Excellent Service

Fewer Customer Complaints

Increased Customer Loyalty

Program Format

This is a one-day, onsite, instructor-led session that can be split into shorter sessions to accommodate schedules.

Live remote training options are also available.

The program is presented in a multi-media, fun, interactive manner with group exercises to engage participants.

Materials support additional learning reinforcement.

Contact us to explore how we can meet your training goals! info@bonfiretraining.com / 800-888-4893

The Platinum Rule FAQs

Check out some FAQs, and keep in mind that we'll help you design the best and most effective program to meet your training goals and desired learning and business outcomes. Just give us a call or email, we're here to help! 800-888-4893 / info@bonfiretraining.com

The standard Platinum Rule Course content is typically seven hours in length and can be delivered in a full day to one group or scheduled in half-day increments over two days. This way, one group will see part 1 in the morning, and another group will see part 1 in the afternoon. That sequence is repeated for part 2 on the second day. This can help if you'd like to have some staff available to serve customers each day while the others are in training. We also have half-day programs available with fewer topics. As with nearly every course, you and your Bonfire trainer can decide which topics are most important to cover and whether the training should be the full seven hours, or a condensed 3 ½ to 4-hour session.

We recommend the Platinum Rule for all departments or teams looking to improve communication skills with internal and external customers. This includes frontline customer service representatives, team leaders, managers, supervisors and C-Suite members. The more team members that attend, the more the culture of customer service excellence will be integrated into your entire company. This can be an enterprise-wide training initiative.

This is a very common concern. Many of our clients decide that the long-term gain of interactive, hands-on classroom training is worth the short-term pain of being short staffed for customer interactions for a day or two. Rest assured; we have several options when staffing is a concern. We can divide your staff into multiple groups and run them through the training at different intervals, ensuring that no one is away for more than a few hours. We can also deliver the training after hours or on a weekend, or you can bring in groups from each department in your company, so no single department has everyone in training at the same time. We have worked around staffing issues many times.

It's important to reinforce the training within 30 days of the training program to ensure the techniques stick and become part of your culture. With that in mind, we have several recommendations.

We strongly recommend Bonfire’s Sustain the Training workshop, which teaches supervisors, team leaders and management to coach the newly trained staff on the new techniques and skills learned in the Platinum Rule workshop. It reinforces the new skills and helps the staff to practice them until they become habit. The coaches’ training provides real content that is coupled with a methodical approach to set your coaches and staff up for success. It’s the best return on investment insurance for your training.
We also offer customized refresher training. This can take place anywhere from 6-12 months after the initial training and will help the staff brush up on key techniques so that all of their skills are fully implemented.
Team Huddles, a Platinum Rule Reinforcement Guide, and BOOST Huddles are also great tools that reinforce the learnings from the Platinum Rule workshop.
Your Bonfire trainer is also available for advice and guidance after the training is completed. They’re just a phone call or email away!

Our onsite training is our best and most effective training solution for Platinum Rule since it is customized, interactive and fun. Our charismatic trainers are able to get the entire class involved and participating during the training. This makes the learning process highly enjoyable, and we have found that participants tend to learn and retain more with this format

Live remote training for our standard Platinum Rule course is also customized and is typically delivered over three total hours, usually delivered in two, 90-minute segments. That said, Bonfire is flexible and will adjust timing to meet your needs.

Who should attend?

Employees and members of management that are engaging in customer services interactions, whether customer-facing or internal to the organization, should attend.

Jeffrey Gitomer

“Customer satisfaction is worthless. Customer loyalty is priceless.”

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