It hits at the same time every day: that moment when you just can’t focus any more and all you want to do is put your head down and nap.

You may be tempted to grab a cup of coffee or a snack to perk yourself up, but there are healthier ways to deal with the afternoon slump. Here are some suggestions:

• Take a quick walk outside or down the hall to get a change of scenery. Schedule activities that require walking around for that time of day. Cheer yourself up with a good laugh. Chat with coworkers about something funny or pay a brief visit to a humorous Web site.
• Stretch at your desk or try a bit of office friendly exercise, like yoga.
• Eat breakfast before work to give yourself more energy throughout the day.
• Have a healthy snack like yogurt, an energy bar or peanut butter with crackers instead of candy or cookies.

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Thinking about where your customer is coming from will help you to get to the root of his problem, and thus to the solution, sooner.

Believe it or not, most customers don’t set out with the goal of ruining your day. They have specific needs that they simply rely on you to meet.

When a tense situation erupts, you’re often left wondering what your angry customer wants from you. Read on to gain some insight into problematic customers and how you can calm them down.

Angry customers want:

• You to solve their problem. An angry customer usually enters your agency with an objective in mind, whether it’s speaking to a specific person or having a certain check mailed to him. If he doesn’t get what he wants, he’s likely to become even angrier. But oftentimes, the constraints of your job don’t allow you to do what he asks. In those cases, fulfill the customer’s other needs (listed below) to decrease the chances that the situation will escalate.
• Help. Few things are more infuriating to a customer than to tell a service rep about his problem, only to hear, “That’s not in my job description.” Customers need to see that you’re at least making an effort to help them. So, if you’re not the right person to solve their problem, for example, tell them that you’ll put them in touch with the person who is.
• Choices. Customers will feel more secure and in control if you give them choices. If a customer asks to speak to a supervisor who’s not in, for instance, instead of just telling her to leave a message, ask whether she’d like to leave a message or come back at another time when the supervisor will be around.
• Acknowledgement. One of the most frequent mistakes customer service reps make is to start right in on solving a customer’s problem without paying attention to the customer’s emotional state first.

Upset customers want you to validate their feelings almost as much as they want you to take care of their tangible problems. A simple statement like, “You sound angry about that” can reassure them and calm them down.

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Providing employees with meaningful feedback will help them improve their performance. Yet fewer than half of employers use feedback effectively, according to a New York University poll.

What prevents supervisors from providing the right feedback? Lack of perspective, assertion, personal involvement, and understanding, according to senior consultant Jamie Higgins of the Monitor Company and Diana Smith of Monitor University.

They offer this advice to ensure your staffers receive targeted guidance:

1. Keep Perspective. Every story has two sides, so your point of view is also limited. Use feedback as an opportunity to foster dialogue, not a monologue.
2. Be Assertive. Don’t back down when a worker resists your feedback. Stay firm and focused; remember that wishy-washy comments aren’t helpful. Instead, foster learning by asking what types of problems he or she has faced. Then, offer suggestions.
3. Get Involved. Sub-par productivity has multiple causes. Make sure you’re not impeding your employees’ work. Ask focused questions like: “What could I do to help you complete this task on time?”
4. Show Understanding. Mistakes happen, but covering them up doesn’t help. Find out what led to the mistake, and then ask the employee to identify steps to avoid that mistake in the future. Your feedback will provide real learning and development.

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To change the alignment of a paragraph, you can click the Align Left, Center, Align Right, or Justify buttons on the Formatting toolbar (the Home tab’s Paragraph group in Word 2007). You can also select Format | Paragraph, click on the Indents And Spacing tab, and choose the desired setting from the Alignment dropdown list. But, when you’re typing up the paragraph you need to align, where are your hands? They’re on the keyboard, of course. Instead of breaking the flow by moving to the mouse to apply alignment settings, you can keep your fingers on the keyboard using the helpful alignment shortcut keys listed in Table A.

Cut out this handy table and keep it next to your desk so you can use these shortcut keys on command.

Table A: Alignment shortcuts

Note: On the Mac, use [command] instead of [Ctrl]

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Although you probably think of your job in terms of helping customers when they come to you with requests or problems, another key way you can be of service is to sell them products and services that meet their needs. Be aware of the following opportunities to make a sale:

• Reorders: Ask the customer if it’s time to reorder a service plan or update a product.
• Problems: Sometimes a customer will mention a problem that a new service or product could solve.
• Cross-selling: Mention add-on services or products that you think could help the customer.
• Up-selling: Suggest that the customer might be better served by an upgrade or a higher-quality version of the product she’s currently buying.
• Special offers or promotions: Make customers aware of sales or special offers that pertain to them. Not only are they more likely to buy an item if it’s on special, but they’ll also see you as looking out for them.

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