At noon a teller at a bank raced frantically back and forth between the drive up window and the lobby window trying to process transactions at the speed of light. Unfortunately, the pressure of the growing lines caused him to get flustered and make mistakes that customers caught later.
High avalanche danger at a Colorado ski resort created an unusually high volume of calls from vacationers to the very small guest services team. The volume of calls overwhelmed a representative and she became terse with the guests on the line.
A customer service representative had to process a pile of paperwork before the end of the day, so he placed his phone on “do not disturb,” so the queue of frustrated callers could not get through to anyone.
When people get too busy, customer service can go out the window, and this is dangerous because people will avoid lousy service if they can. Associations are no exception.
What are the pressure points at your association? Where and when does the staff get the busiest and how is that member experience during busy times? Take a look at event registration, the weeks leading up to the annual meeting, during board meeting preparation and at the board meeting, and renewals. Evaluate the quality and tone of emails, phone calls, and in-person interactions during those peak times.
If you find a gap in the customer service consider ways to take the burden off of staff.
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