I like to think that I serve "internal customers" well. I like to treat my fellow co-workers the way I would want them to treat me, with respect and importance.
Gina, that is a great idea. Everyone desearves some recognition and appreciation. This "feel good" can in turn have a ripple affect and reach your students as well.
Shannon Gormley
I implement "Faculty Appreciation" each term to boost employee morale. Faculty Appreciation may consist of friendly competitions, pot-lucks, drawings & prizes, etc.
Excellent practices, Cory! I get the sense that you've made your internal customers a priority at your institution, which is great. Most days, it's the simple things that make all the difference, like asking "how can I help?" or "how's your day going?" I imagine your internal customers appreciate your efforts and find your enthusiasm a bit contagious. Keep up the great work.
Shannon Gormley
I am constantly working at serving my internal customers. I have good rapport with all departments including the campus director and general manager. Communication is a huge priority of our school. We do this with weekly meetings, emails, memos, etc. We are continuously interacting and improving to help understand each others duties and strive to work together so were all effective at what we do.
With a dual role, I am a Student Service and Career Service Administrator so I always make it a habit to interact with all co-workers whether they be in another department, an instructor, recruiter, externship site supervisor and all internal customers for that matter. Without excellent communication skills amongst us we will never be successful.
I try to always meet or "make an appearance" with each co-worker throughout each and every day. I find it very important to know whats going on and what issues are important from co-worker to co-worker. If I can learn this it makes my job a lot easier to succeed. I will continue to work at this from a simple "hi, how are you doing" to "how can I help you". You can never be too good at these sorts of things!
People talk about their experiences with businesses and when they get some outstanding service, they tell their friends, and anyone who will listen. Outstanding service is appreciated and rewarded
Great ideas, Lucy! I get the sense that you welcome the feedback of others you work closely with to help ensure your continous improvement. That's wonderful and will aid you in increasing your success with your internal customers as well as your external customers.
I believe, I work very well with my internal customers, but I think there is always room for improvement. I could improve my future interactions by asking the departments, that I work with for their feedback and If could do anything in my department to make everything run smoother for everyone and all departments.
Thanks for sharing Brenda. It sounds like your group communicates well. What specifically have you done in order to ensure that you keep up the high standard of good communication with your school?
We are a small college so the communication if with other staff and departments is well. We obtain quarterly meetings to discuss anything that could be improved or needs to be worked on. Then we come up with a plan that can help better the issue.
These are great ways of ensuring your message is communicated to everyone and can help eliminate the chance of misinterpretation.
Communicate across departments and hold monthly team meetings
I love the idea of "building bridges" between departments to positively impact student service. How do you believe you can do this at your school, given that things seem to be working pretty well already?
Our institution is small, so our interaction and communication between departments is well maintained. We have monthly meetings and are updated regularly on improving systems. I think that building more bridges between departments would be helpful, so that other departments understand how each department functions, which will result in an overall better institution.
Daily recognition can be very powerful! This is a nice touch, Joseph. How might you go about putting an incentive system in place for outstanding customer service?
I make sure each one of my employees knows on a daily basis how much I appreciate their effort. Perhaps provide an incentive system for outstanding customer service.
Nice approach, Jose! This public acknowledgement of desired behavior may inspire others to follow the lead. What are some examples of going "above and beyond" at your school?
Recognizing staff and team accomplishments and contributions can definitely help to improve internal customer service. Doing this in staff meetings on a regular basis ia a great way to ensure you are serving your internal customers. Keep up the good work!
we make sure to have quarterly staff meetings to acknowledge staff that have gone above and beyond-
make weekly acknowledgment meeting, and give the staff member that has shown the best customer service, an item they can place on their desk, and then it'll switch every month.
Hi Andrew,
It's great that you want to take care of your internal customers too! As you know, this can be an effective way to boost morale and increase collegiality amongst departments. The monthly meetings would be a great place for the reps who participate in "walking in the student's shoes" to share their experiences and insights.
I'm sure your team will appreciate the opportunity to come together to enhance the customer service experience internally and externally.
Great plan.
