Blog Archives
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Above The Wing Versus Under The Wing Training
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday March 7, 2012In today's increasingly knowledge based economy, human capital is the single most important source of competitive advantage. Pressure from competition requires organizations to continuously work to improve the quality of their products and services. Many companies are moving toward being more and more service oriented, as opposed to product oriented. They are building services around their products to enhance the delivery and maintain the increasingly discretionary customer. People are the key to carrying out those increased and enhanced services. Maintaining a competitive advantage through people requires an ongoing investment in their development, so that they can stay current in a rapidly changing world. It is also an important... -
Promoted to Supervisor from the Floor or Frontline – What Do I Do Now?
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday February 29, 2012Management Scenario: Mike has been a maintenance technician at XYZ Aviation for 18 years. He is the most knowledgeable and dependable maintenance professional on his team. Jerry, his supervisor, recently retired after 35 years on the job. Mike was promoted to Maintenance Supervisor because of his experience and commitment to the company. Mike was of course thrilled with the promotion, but he has had some challenges. The guys on the floor are all his buddies, so it has been a tough transition from “buddy” to supervisor. It has also been difficult for Mike because he has never had any formal management training with tips on how to be a successful leader. This scenario happens quite frequently in the aviation/aerospace industry... -
How to Manage & Address Ambiguous and Awkward PAX/Customer Interactions While Maintaining Professionalism
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday February 22, 2012Sometimes: 1. Situation: Passenger/Customer will engage in conversations which are highly sensitive, for example, a recent decision made by service provider’s management. 2. Response: Aviation service provider has no answer or avoids providing a response. 3. Result: An awkward and sometimes embarrassing conversation. Try these suggestion for possible responses instead (if you can) : 1. Passenger/Customer will engage in conversations which are highly sensitive . 2. Aviation service provider listens carefully. 3. And: Promises to respond as soon as possible. Promises to follow up with an answer either personally or via department... -
Time Mode - "Time Wasters"
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday February 15, 2012This is the final article in this series about “making time count” in the workplace. The four categories of activities that most professionals spend doing on a typical workday: Firefighting; Attention Getters; Capacity Building; and Time Wasters . This week we will highlight the final category of activity: Time Wasters. Time Wasters are activities that are done each day that do not result in any productivity. If an inordinate amount of time is spent surfing the web, playing computer games, watching television, or visiting every co-worker who will listen to a good story, then time is being wasted . Time management gurus will tell us that nobody really plans to waste time, so time wasters cannot be described as proactive... -
Time Mode – "Capacity Building"
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday February 8, 2012The previous three articles focused on “making time count”. The four categories of activities that most professionals spend doing on a typical workday: Firefighting; Attention Getters; Capacity Building; and Time Wasters . This week we will highlight the third category of activity: Capacity Building . Capacity Building takes two forms: building relationships and building technical skills. Both are important, but both require time. People must spend time together, working on projects, talking, and visiting over lunch. Too many organizations view it as a waste of time if two employees are found visiting during “work hours”. The fact is that people build trust with each other by talking about work issues, family life... -
Time Mode – "Attention Getters"
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday February 1, 2012The previous two articles focused on “making time count”. The four categories of activities that most professionals spend doing on a typical workday: Firefighting; Attention Getters; Capacity Building; and Time Wasters . This week we will highlight the second type of activity: Attention Getters. There are a number of things, at any moment, competing for our attention. Some of these things draw our attention immediately, even if they are not important. We have all been in the situation where we are on the brink of solving an important work problem with a coworker---and then the phone rings. The ringing phone is vying for our attention; it is urgent, but not as important as finishing the significant headway we are making with... -
Firefighting Mode!! -- Make Time Count Instead of Counting Time
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday January 25, 2012Last week our article highlighted four categories of activities that most professionals spend doing on a typical workday: Firefighting; Attention Getters; Capacity Building; and Time Wasters . This week we will highlight the first category: Firefighting---or Crisis Mode. This mode includes tasks and activities that must be done, but that come up suddenly or unexpectedly. Firefighting means devoting time to important and urgent matters, but not having control of the activities because we are “reacting” to some external force beyond our control. Javid, an airport manager, is thinking about the three items he must complete by the end of the day as he drives to work. As soon as he gets to his office, he writes down his... -
Make Time Count Instead of Counting Time
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday January 18, 2012These days it seems that more than ever before people are working harder but have less time to get things done. This may be due to layoffs of their co-workers (that used to share the workload); cutbacks that affect the tools they need to do their jobs; the increased pace of work that must be done to “keep up” with competitors; among other things. Time management experts have provided some relief by helping us organize our priorities. Each of us has many roles and functions on any given day in our jobs. Most days may vary to a certain degree. But if we step back and look at a “typical” workday, there are probably several things that are done on a regular basis. Peg Pickering’s book Prioritize, Organize: The Art of... -
The True Source of Customer Satisfaction — A Lesson From the Past
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday January 11, 2012In 1941, Frederick Roethlisberger wrote a famous article about satisfaction that still holds powerful lessons for every person who is involved in service delivery. Roethlisberger wrote of what became known as the Hawthorne experiments, a series of studies that sought to answer the question: How can employers make employees more productive? At first, researchers fiddled with lighting, temperature, variations in work breaks, and the like. The researchers found that none of these things predicted increased productivity. Slowly but surely, what came to light is that people were more productive when they were more satisfied, but still, what caused satisfaction? The answer soon emerged. People’s satisfaction increased when they... -
The Top Seven Tendencies of Service
By ServiceElements, Christine Hill - Wednesday January 4, 2012ServiceElements, an organizational development company that focuses on service in the aerospace and aviation industry is completing its first decade in 2012. Focusing on service has proven to be an increasing trend as companies are faced with a new, ever changing breed of customer expectations in the new millennium. As we start a new year, here are the top seven tendencies of service as seen in our work over the past decade with many aerospace and aviation organizations: #7: "Good internal customer service leads to good external customer service delivery and therefore to higher organizational success. It is a natural bi-product." #6: "People are different...perspectives are shaped by experience, generation and...
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