The New Year is an ideal time for CEO’s to consider improving services.
Take a minute and begin with a walk- through of your facility, just as if you were a first time patient or visitor. Spend a few minutes and document the processes your clients experience as they enter the facility and engage in your services.
While all of us have made a lot of claims about going paperless these days, but has your organization? When I visit my doctor I often still have to fill out the same 4 pages of forms. Not much different than the days before computers. High tech, high touch? Hardly.
The idea behind CEO’s and managers doing a walk-through is to identify the barriers and practices that are off-putting to your customers, or that fail to live up to the message you want to give them about your services. However, you need to go further than the waiting room.
This is not so much about how staff treat your customers, as it is about the kinds of processes you put your customers through that you may not have considered. Repetitious procedures can add up to a negative experience. Some larger organizations have used “mystery shoppers” with good success, by having them contact your organization as a “patient” would. All results of “mystery shoppers” should be shared with staff so they know how they are doing with their communication and courtesy skills.
Improving services and community relationships will help identify a host of potential negatives that need attention. Questions can arise over, how often do we replace pillows? In one instance, the walk-through found towels were too small for a child to use them. If you are relying on staff to attend to these details, you may be very surprised. Staff rarely see these kinds of issues or pay any attention to such physical details.
Experiencing your organization the way a customer does can be an eye opening experience and can result in improving services.
