He suggests all restaurants revisit and clarify their core values to ensure their teams understand how to be sensitive and inclusive. Difficult customers are a natural part of working in customer service. defuse the situation phrase. Stick to "yes" or "no" questions. Tell the customer, "I know that you are upset, and I would like to help you. These writers use defuse well:. What challenges could I have in dealing with a customer who has a different style preference from my own? Sometimes telling a joke can get groups of people to relax. A good rule is to apologize for your own actions and the actions of your company, never for the way your customer feels or is acting. The Oxford Online Dictionary does not include the meaning in its definition of diffuse; instead it has a usage note: “Diffuse means, broadly, ‘disperse’, while the non-literal meaning of defuse is ‘reduce the danger or tension in’. Someone has commented in a forum as follows: “and sorry for the devil’s-advocate position here, but it may actually be something that bears a touch of consideration), the misuse of “diffuse” does make at least a wee bit of sense if you look at one of its implied definitions in context. Enjoy!). If a customer interrupts you while you are already helping another customer, smile and say, "I'll be with you as soon as I am finished with this customer.". Cobuild recognizes it, but Collins, Macquarie and Merriam-Webster do not. When I started writing this, I thought diffuse is wrong in all circumstances. How should I respond if something a customer ordered hasn't arrived after two weeks and the customer has emailed the team expressing concern? Another word for diffuse. What do you think about this?". Does the saying go, "diffuse the situation" or "defuse the situation?"? With standoff and the others listed I find it odd. Be prepared for the customer to raise his or her voice or resort to name calling. And sometimes that starts with how you behave as the listener. So, I can see that there may well be a shift in collocational primings going on. What does defuse the situation expression mean? Some customers can be more difficult than others. % of people told us that this article helped them. You both need to relax in order to have open communication. I always thought it was diffuse but in a textbook I see defuse and that definitely makes sense! Keep in mind that empathizing doesn't necessarily mean giving the customer whatever he or she wants. Mark Schettler, general manager of Bar Tonique in New Orleans, happens to be a white male, yet the majority of his staff comprises people of color or members of the LGBTQIA+ community. In many cases, this will calm the situation down and give you the opportunity to rebuild the relationship with the other person. Demonstrate commitment to lending a helping hand if the situation gets worse. In that case I diffused, or diluted, the situation, slowing it down but not stopping it. Always follow-up with the customer to make sure he or she is satisfied with the outcome. If you really can’t stand to see another ad again, then please consider supporting our work with a contribution to wikiHow. This information should not be considered complete, up to date, and is not intended to be used in place of a visit, consultation, or advice of a legal, medical, or any other professional. If they are angry or want information you can't provide, ask a supervisor to intervene. And new results. Try saying, "Thank you for that suggestion Mr. X, but I can't do that because of our company policies. Everyone likes to hear his or her name, and just referring to the customer as Mr. or Ms. Get your manager, or call your boss, if you're all alone. Do not continue to ask the customer questions that encourage them to continue the conversation. In its literal meaning (sort of obviously, because it consists of the prefix de- + fuse (noun)), defuse means “to remove the fuse of an explosive device in order to prevent it from exploding”: in its literal sense, according to the OED, it’s a relative newcomer (1943). This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Ask the customer, "Can you explain what happened? Cathy Habas specializes in marketing, customer experiences, and behind-the-scenes management. Having a good knowledge of your organization and policies can help you negotiate with this type of customer and offer viable solutions to his or her problems. If I were a teacher and three students continually cause trouble when seated together, I might defuse the situation by seating them in distant parts of the room from each other, which cuts their collective power. If she gets angry, get security. Just don't let them get a rise out of you, remain polite and helpful. I find myself considerably (if one can be, linguistically speaking) in (or of, in the US) two minds. Let's find a way to work this out." ( Log Out /  Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Now my view has changed slightly, though I would never use it myself. There are eight noun objects with which they both collocate. This suggests to me the possibility that, whereas the Cobuild editors acknowledged the weight of usage that is tending to legitimize what many people would still consider a mistake, the editors of dictionaries for learners prefer to discourage students from muddling up the two words. Don't be condescending. Is a player throwing a Holy Mary an example of "deus ex machina"? Sometimes, a tense situation arises when someone blames us for something or confronts us on an issue. Let the customer know exactly what you are doing to resolve the situation. Avoid apologizing in a way that seems like you're belittling the customer. As regards US pronunciation, I think I see what you mean. Thanks to all authors for creating a page that has been read 543,524 times. Ask questions of the customer to better understand. Approved. Don't keep on floundering - you'll only aggravate an already tense situation. Everyone, regardless of their race, gender or sexual orientation, should feel comfortable dining in any restaurant. Try to remain humble and decide whether or not you may need to apologize. Just try to remain calm and do your job. If an employee or manager approaches you with anger or tension, a productive conversation is unlikely to take place. People of all ages can be disrespectful. However, “spreading” is not the only meaning of to diffuse, and it is here that its physical meaning of “dispersing” light comes into play. If you feel you are being harassed, always tell your supervisor. Diffusing tense situations quickly can also help to set a precedent that unruly behavior is not tolerated. There seem to me to be three ways of looking at this issue in “correct usage” terms: In the OEC, these two lemmas do not differ much in frequency: they occur just over twice in every million words of text (compared to, say, “big”, which occurs nearly 400 times per million). ( Log Out /  Because diffuse works as an adjective, diffused is only necessary as a verb form. At a pinch, this would work for “situation”, and possibly “tension”, but surely the only way to “diffuse” a bomb would be to blow it up – the exact opposite of what the Guardian meant. “We treat our customers like we’d want our family treated.”. Speak in a polite, yet genuine tone. For example sentences such as Kevin successfully diffused the situation are WRONG, while Kevin successfully defused the situation would be CORRECT. Upon sitting, the group was told by a team member another guest didn’t want to sit near black people. What if a customer wants something I cannot provide? Do not make any promises that you cannot keep. Definitions by the largest Idiom Dictionary. What diffuses / is diffused can be abstract or concrete, and in the latter case it has a specific physical meaning when light is involved: “to cause light to spread evenly to reduce glare and harsh shadows”, e.g. All content on this website, including dictionary, thesaurus, literature, geography, and other reference data is for informational purposes only. while defuse means" reduce the danger or tension in". Your dealings with customers should never hurt your company, but be an example of the quality service that your company provides. If not spotted and addressed quickly, these disagreements can burst into an argument that needs to be diffused before it escalates further. Please help us continue to provide you with our trusted how-to guides and videos for free by whitelisting wikiHow on your ad blocker. NBC host to Trump: 'You're not like someone's crazy uncle', Fact-checking the Trump and Biden town halls, ESPN Falcons reporter Vaughn McClure dies at 48, Actor explains Trump's oddly high Latinx support, Feds examining source of alleged Hunter Biden emails, 'Captain America' is taking on Trump ahead of election, Blood type may predict your COVID-19 risk: Study, Giuliani's daughter defies dad and endorses Biden, C-SPAN penalizes Scully after false hacking claims, McConnell breaks with Trump on stimulus deal. The verbs diffuse and defuse sound similar but have different meanings.. Diffuse means "spread over a wide area". Do not allow the customer to insult or touch you. Cathy has contributed to sites like Business and Finance, Business 2 Community, and Inside Small Business. I shall be blogging regularly about issues of English usage, word histories, and writing tips. A character is a caricature.”–Ernest Hemingway This week’s challenges are a little different. Can we try ____ instead?". In other words, a situation is conceived of as something explosive, like a bomb. Employees may worry about their productivity statistics, feel like they can't meet an important deadline, dread giving a presentation to a client or even fear a layoff. But, even though diffuse turns up several times with bomb and words in that set, it still feels completely wrong, at least to me. Our new mobile app offers easy ordering at your fingertips. Change ), You are commenting using your Google account. Most dictionaries do not accept this use of diffuse, but Cobuild does, presumably, as an impeccably corpus-based venture, after having examined the evidence of actual use. A good rule of thumb is to under promise and over deliver. If the suggestion is something that you are not able to do, be honest with the customer. They are listed in descending order, according to the ratio of occurrences of defuse to diffuse: situation, anger, confrontation, standoff, tension, row, crisis, bomb. For example sentences such as Kevin successfully diffused the situation are WRONG, while Kevin successfully defused the situation would be CORRECT. It also worth noting that both Cobuild and the Oxford note reproduced above have the same noun object collocate: tension. Commonly confused words (19-20), She is coping because she has learned that forgiveness is the only way to diffuse ire and hatred.