Shared values: From classroom lessons to teaching moments in customer service

Shared values: From classroom lessons to teaching moments in customer service

While the world observes Teachers’ Day on October 5, in India, we celebrate a month earlier, on September 5, to mark the birth anniversary of Dr. Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, a great teacher, renowned scholar, educationist, and advocate for empowerment.
We've all had different kinds of teachers in our school years. Their influence continues to shape us as professionals. Some inspired creativity, others instilled discipline, while many patiently walked us through challenging lessons. If we reflect, each teacher has made an impact on our lives, just as every customer interaction leaves a mark on both sides.


The common ground for teachers and customer service

Patience and endurance

Teaching and customer service require patience. Customers may come to us frustrated or overwhelmed by circumstances. Sometimes, the stress of the moment affects them more than the “issue”. Like teachers guiding students through confusion, customer service professionals' empathy and patience offer clarity and reassurance alongside solutions.

Simple communication

Teachers excel at breaking down complex concepts into simple, digestible lessons. Customer support agents require this skill to help customers find solutions with simple and easy navigation steps. A simplified process helps customers get hooked on our business. 

Empathy and encouragement

The best teachers are remembered for the way they made us feel: valued, encouraged, and raised our confidence to achieve more. Great customer service works the same way. A thoughtful email, a clear solution, or a proactive follow-up can turn frustration into trust and confidence.

Adaptability and continuous learning

Every student is different, and good teachers adapt their methods accordingly. In customer service, no two tickets nor two customers are alike. Support teams offer guided support through calls, live chats, webinars, and one-on-one sessions that mirror interactive lessons.

Beyond the issue

Teachers don’t just answer questions; they prepare us for future challenges. Likewise, customer service empowers agents to not only solve current tickets but also guide customers through proactive tips, tutorials, and community discussions that help them succeed long-term.

Feedback and growth

Teachers evaluate, correct, and encourage us to grow. Customer service thrives on feedback through CSAT surveys, community discussions, and follow-ups. Each interaction is a chance to improve, both for the organization and the customer relationship.

How does Zoho Desk embody teaching principles?

Knowledge base: Articles, FAQs, and screenshots serve as textbooks for customers.
Help center: A virtual classroom for customers to self-learn, track tickets, and stay informed.
Community: A space for peers and agents to exchange insights, like collaborative learning.
Continuous empowerment: Zoho Desk provides proactive support, product updates, product walkthroughs, and trainings to keep customers engaged and confident.

Time for reflection

Just like how our teachers have left lasting imprints on our lives, the service we provide to customers leaves an impression on them. Each successful issue resolution can help a person grow and thrive at work.

We’d love to hear your experiences:
  1. Which teacher has influenced you the most, and how have their lessons carried over into your professional life?
  2. Share teaching experiences you've had with customers: imparting knowledge, building trust, or guiding them through challenges.
  3. Can you recall a moment where your patience and empathy changed the course of a customer interaction?
At Zoho Desk, we believe in celebrating not just service, but the spirit of teaching that underpins it. Thank you for continuing to share your experiences with us; it helps us connect, learn, and grow together.

Happy Teachers’ Day to all the teachers who shaped us, and to every customer service professional who continues to teach, guide, and empower their customers.

Best wishes, 
Lydia | Zoho Desk

    Access your files securely from anywhere









                          Zoho Developer Community




                                                • Desk Community Learning Series


                                                • Digest


                                                • Functions


                                                • Meetups


                                                • Kbase


                                                • Resources


                                                • Glossary


                                                • Desk Marketplace


                                                • MVP Corner


                                                • Word of the Day


                                                • Ask the Experts



                                                          • Sticky Posts

                                                          • Register for Zoho Desk Beta Community

                                                            With the start of the year, we have decided to take a small step in making the life of our customers a little easier. We now have easy access to all our upcoming features and a faster way to request for beta access. We open betas for some of our features
                                                          • Share your Zoho Desk story with us!

                                                            Tell us how you use Zoho Desk for your business and inspire others with your story. Be it a simple workflow rule that helps you navigate complex processes or a macro that saves your team a lot of time; share it here and help the community learn and grow with shared knowledge. 
                                                          • Tip #1: Learn to pick the right channels

                                                            Mail, live chat, telephony, social media, web forms—there are so many support channels out there. Trying to pick the right channels to offer your customers can get pretty confusing. Emails are most useful when the customer wants to put things on record. However, escalated or complicated issues should not be resolved over email because it's slow and impersonal.  When you need immediate responses, live chat is more suitable. It's also quick and convenient, so it's the go-to channel for small issues. 
                                                          • Welcome to Zoho Desk Community - Say hello here!

                                                            Hello everyone! Though we have been here for a while, it’s time to formally establish the Zoho Desk Community; we’re really happy to have you all here! This can be the place where you take a moment to introduce yourself to the rest of the community. We’d love to hear all about you, what you do, what company or industry you work for, how you use Zoho Desk and anything else that you will like to share! Here’s a little about me. I am Chinmayee. I have been associated with Zoho since 2014. I joined here
                                                          • Webinar 1: Blueprint for Customer Service

                                                            With the launch of a host of new features in Zoho Desk, we thought it’ll be great to have a few webinars to help our customers make the most of them. We’re starting off with our most talked about feature, Blueprint in Zoho Desk. You can register for the Blueprint webinar here: The webinar will be delivered by our in-house product experts. This is a good opportunity to ask questions to our experts and understand how Blueprint can help you automate your service processes. We look forward to seeing


                                                          Manage your brands on social media



                                                                Zoho TeamInbox Resources



                                                                    Zoho CRM Plus Resources

                                                                      Zoho Books Resources


                                                                        Zoho Subscriptions Resources

                                                                          Zoho Projects Resources


                                                                            Zoho Sprints Resources


                                                                              Qntrl Resources


                                                                                Zoho Creator Resources



                                                                                    Zoho CRM Resources

                                                                                    • CRM Community Learning Series

                                                                                      CRM Community Learning Series


                                                                                    • Kaizen

                                                                                      Kaizen

                                                                                    • Functions

                                                                                      Functions

                                                                                    • Meetups

                                                                                      Meetups

                                                                                    • Kbase

                                                                                      Kbase

                                                                                    • Resources

                                                                                      Resources

                                                                                    • Digest

                                                                                      Digest

                                                                                    • CRM Marketplace

                                                                                      CRM Marketplace

                                                                                    • MVP Corner

                                                                                      MVP Corner







                                                                                        Design. Discuss. Deliver.

                                                                                        Create visually engaging stories with Zoho Show.

                                                                                        Get Started Now


                                                                                          Zoho Show Resources


                                                                                            Zoho Writer Writer

                                                                                            Get Started. Write Away!

                                                                                            Writer is a powerful online word processor, designed for collaborative work.

                                                                                              Zoho CRM コンテンツ






                                                                                                Nederlandse Hulpbronnen


                                                                                                    ご検討中の方




                                                                                                          • Recent Topics

                                                                                                          • Passing the CRM

                                                                                                            Hi, I am hoping someone can help. I have a zoho form that has a CRM lookup field. I was hoping to send this to my publicly to clients via a text message and the form then attaches the signed form back to the custom module. This work absolutely fine when
                                                                                                          • Playback and Management Enhancements for Zoho Quartz Recordings

                                                                                                            Hello Zoho Team, We hope you're all doing well. We would like to submit a feature request related to Zoho Quartz, the tool used to record and share browser sessions with Zoho Support. 🎯 Current Functionality As of now, Zoho Quartz allows users to record
                                                                                                          • Currency limitation when integrating Zoho CRM & Zoho Books

                                                                                                            Brief Video of Problem: https://www.loom.com/share/d61d1d07d0904e149d80c1901a22418e. Background ·       Our business is based in Australia and we have to have Zoho Books in AUD to comply with tax and reporting regulations in Australia. ·       We sell
                                                                                                          • Bigin Android app update: Zoho Books integration

                                                                                                            Hello everyone! We’re excited to introduce Zoho Books integration on the Bigin Android App. Once the integration is completed in the web(bigin.zoho.com), the Zoho Books tab will be visible in detail View of Contacts, Companies, and Pipeline records. The
                                                                                                          • IMAP Migration from Gmail

                                                                                                            I have been trying to import my email from a Gmail server and keep receiving the following error. I have reduced the security, activated imap and no improvement. The link to the Google support item has not helped. Unable to connect to your account. Please
                                                                                                          • Your Incoming has been blocked and the emails will not be fetched in your Zoho account and POP Accounts Click here to get unblocked.

                                                                                                            When entering my account, this error is thrown at me, and I deleted a good part of my deleted messages, but I still can not unblock it, I would appreciate your help. reservas@lineasperutravel.com
                                                                                                          • Email login error

                                                                                                            Login successfully but email page error
                                                                                                          • Request for Creating Multiple Email Accounts on One Mobile Number

                                                                                                            Dear Zoho Team, I am planning to shift all my work-related communication to Zoho Mail because of its reliability and features. For my work, I need to create 3–4 separate email accounts for different purposes. Could you please confirm if it is possible
                                                                                                          • Signature issue

                                                                                                            Problem: The signature does not appear when replying or forwarding an email. solve issue: settintgs/Signature Check option place a signature above the content with quotation marks
                                                                                                          • Unable to Receive Emails on Zoho Mail After Office 365 Coexistence Setup – Error: 553 Relaying Disallowed

                                                                                                            Hello, My domain name is bigniter.com, and I’ve been using Zoho Mail as my email service provider without any issues. Recently, I followed the steps outlined in the Zoho documentation to enable Coexistence with Office 365: 🔗 https://www.zoho.com/mail/help/adminconsole/coexistence-with-office365.html#multi-server
                                                                                                          • mail admin not loading

                                                                                                            i am trying to login to mailadmin ... gears keeps rotating forever... its not a password issue whats so ever ... not cookies issues whatsoever from android app i can login but there so few things to do from there .. i changed ip address the same... i
                                                                                                          • Unify All Zoho Video Meeting Experiences into One Standardized Platform

                                                                                                            Hi Zoho Team, We would like to share an important user experience concern regarding the current state of video meeting functionality across the Zoho ecosystem. The Problem Within Zoho, there are multiple ways to initiate or schedule a video meeting: Zoho
                                                                                                          • Unify All Zoho Video Meeting Experiences into One Standardized Platform

                                                                                                            Hi Zoho Team, We would like to share an important user experience concern regarding the current state of video meeting functionality across the Zoho ecosystem. The Problem Within Zoho, there are multiple ways to initiate or schedule a video meeting: Zoho
                                                                                                          • Changing Account in Quote form does not update address information.

                                                                                                            I am trying to update the address information in a quote I've created. I corrected the address in the "Account" but that did not change in the quote. If I re-enter the Account Name in the Quote form, nothing updates. How do I fix this?
                                                                                                          • Zoho One Backup of entire account

                                                                                                            Hello, When using Zoho one is there a way to backup your entire account of all apps that you are using \ activively using in a single step or do you have to backup each applications data individually? Thanks,
                                                                                                          • ZIA in Zoho Cliq

                                                                                                            Is It possible to use the ZIA feature from Zoho Analytics in the Zoho Cliq?
                                                                                                          • CRM Mobile reports

                                                                                                            When our engineers finish a job they like to email the customer a job report. This is best done todate as an email template but we can find no way to include an image field from that module. Is there any other options?
                                                                                                          • why cant i access my email account. it keeps asking me for reverifiying my account by entering my password.

                                                                                                            I cant access my account. it keeps asking me for reverifcaton by entering my password. once its entered it asks for it over and over.
                                                                                                          • Issue with “CC” and “Subject Details” of the initial mail when reply / replied all / forward using Zoho Mail Client (Desktop / Web Mail / Mobile App)

                                                                                                            It is observed that when I reply / reply all / forward a mail using Zoho Mail Client (Desktop / Web Mail / Mobile App), the “CC” and “Subject Details” are omitted from the mail which was replied/forwarded. However this is not the case with outlook mail
                                                                                                          • Unable to send Emails - 452 4.3.1 Temporary System Error

                                                                                                            Whene ever i request smtp server to send the email (without attachment). i recieve error "452 4.3.1 Temporary System Error"
                                                                                                          • I can't receive email

                                                                                                            I cannot receive any email sent to my Zoho email after the free upgrade plan trial is finished.
                                                                                                          • Help for the alisa adding

                                                                                                            Sorry, I would like to add a paypal alias on my domain email address. However, the system blocked it. How can I do it?
                                                                                                          • Problem with Writer and Workdrive

                                                                                                            Hi team, I’m the super admin for our Zoho One org. WorkDrive is active, and Zoho Docs is deprecated for our org. However, Zoho Writer cannot connect to WorkDrive at all — we’ve cleared cache, tried incognito, and restarted several times. I was able to
                                                                                                          • Lite plan attachment said 250mb but actually 25mb ?

                                                                                                            Lite plan attachment said 250mb but actually 25mb ? I can't attach over 25mb files, and can't receive mails has attached files over 25mb too
                                                                                                          • How to change a BAS that has been filed

                                                                                                            I have discovered that a group of expense transactions were accidentally placed in a asset account rather than an expense account. As a result I need to adjust the transaction and consequently most of my BAS to correct the error. Because the BAS have
                                                                                                          • Zoho Books | Product updates | August 2025

                                                                                                            Hello users, We’ve rolled out new features and enhancements in Zoho Books. From the right sidebar where you can manage all your widgets, to integrating Zoho Payments feeds in Zoho Books, explore the updates designed to enhance your bookkeeping experience.
                                                                                                          • Closing Accounting Periods - Invoice/Posting dates

                                                                                                            Hi, I have seen in another thread but I'm unsure on how the 'transaction locking' works with regards to new and old transactions. When producing monthly accounts if I close December 24 accounts on 8th Jan 25 will transaction locking prevent me from posting
                                                                                                          • Feature Request: Email Follow-Up Sequences Similar to Zoho CRM

                                                                                                            I’m wondering if Zoho Recruit is planning to introduce a feature similar to the Email Automation – Follow-Up Sequences that is available in Zoho CRM. In CRM, this allows users to send a series of timed follow-up emails triggered by specific actions (for
                                                                                                          • Constant color of a legend value

                                                                                                            It would be nice if we can set a constant color/pattern to a value when creating a chart. We would often use the same value in different graph options and I always have to copy the color that we've set to a certain value from a previous graph to make
                                                                                                          • Zoho Projects - Task Owner filter at Project level

                                                                                                            Hi Projects Team, The feature requests I would like to raise is the ability to create a custom view at the project level for projects with tasks owned by a user or users. For example "Ashley's Projects" custom view might contain a list of project in which
                                                                                                          • Good news! Calendar in Zoho CRM gets a face lift

                                                                                                            Dear Customers, We are delighted to unveil the revamped calendar UI in Zoho CRM. With a complete visual overhaul aligned with CRM for Everyone, the calendar now offers a more intuitive and flexible scheduling experience. What’s new? Distinguish activities
                                                                                                          • Option to Customize Career Site URL Without “/jobs/Careers”

                                                                                                            Dear Zoho Recruit Team, I hope you are doing well. We would like to request an enhancement to the Career Site URL structure in Zoho Recruit. In the old version of the career site, our URL was simply: 👉 https://jobs.domain.com However, after moving to
                                                                                                          • Old vs New Value for Deleted Lookup Values

                                                                                                            Suppose the following scenario, where a value in a lookup is deleted: 1. User has countries form 2. Form A has a lookup to countries form 3. User selects Italy in Form A and saves it with the Italy ID 4. Form A report shows Italy 5. Italy is inadvertently
                                                                                                          • Send mass email using my secondary email

                                                                                                            Hello, When I send an email to just one person from Zoho CRM, a complete email editor appears, where I can choose which of my email addresses I want to use in the From field. When I send a mass email, there is not such option. I can only select the email template. When I configure an email template, I can choose who is in the From field, but I can't set it to use my secondary address. The only way to send a mass email using my secondary address that I can think of is swapping my two addresses in
                                                                                                          • List of hidden features

                                                                                                            Hi Friends, I had another support chat today and low and behold the feature that I wanted just simply needed to be "enabled". I thought I'd share, and maybe see if others had some similar experiences. 1. This one is from 5 ish years ago. I asked if there
                                                                                                          • customize payment page

                                                                                                            Is there a way to customize, other than the theme colour, the payment page that customers are taken to from invoices? I can't seem to find a way. I just don't like the formatting of the current page and would like to make it look better. I've looked at
                                                                                                          • Super Admin Logging in as another User

                                                                                                            How can a Super Admin login as another user. For example, I have a sales rep that is having issues with their Accounts and I want to view their Zoho Account with out having to do a GTM and sharing screens. Moderation Update (8th Aug 2025): We are working
                                                                                                          • Are Environments Worth It?

                                                                                                            In concept, Environments in ZC is a great idea. I think the flow is pretty smart when you compare it to GitHub, especially for a low code audience. However, in practice, I've found it to be unpredictable, and I've only used it a few times. Aside from
                                                                                                          • Enhanced duplicate check for Leads in CRM

                                                                                                            Hello Everyone, We are excited to announce that you can now check for duplicate entries in leads by comparing them with similar records in the Contacts Module. Previously, when you added a lead, only the converted leads were checked for duplicates. This
                                                                                                          • Pause(1);

                                                                                                            I'm using scheduler to invoke an interaction via http post with an external service. The schedule code uses a for-each loop that runs so fast my external application's log files get messed-up (they are named by date-time stamp). What I'm suggesting is
                                                                                                          • Next Page