Summer is perfect for front desk training. It is a good time to set goals and themes for the upcoming season and to get everyone who works at the front desk feeling excited and enthusiastic about their jobs. At the end of every season we like to sit down with our front desk staff and get their feedback as to what worked and what needs work. After all, they are dealing with your customers, day in and day out and get a very good feel as to what the customers like and dislike about your day-to-day operations.

Setting goals is a great way to get things moving forward. Let’s say your goal is to increase students or to increase the number of classes each student takes, it is a good idea to put a graph up on the wall of where you are and where you want to be. Put projected dates on the graph so that your staff knows exactly when these goals should be met.

Making lists is another good way to improve and help with your training. Put down the five most important things that you feel could streamline your front desk operation and then ask your staff to do the same. The lists may be identical or you might find that the staff has different ideas of what the main priorities are. Listen to what they have to say because if they are happy with the way things are running, they will be able to do a better job for you. My advice would be to first deal with the issues that they feel are important and then start the training of ways you want to improve what happens at the front desk. 

Many times your front desk person is the first person that a prospective client talks to, so it is extremely important that everything they say and do reflects your philosophy and ideals. Perhaps you do not currently have a front desk person. Maybe you feel that you are not going to be able to pay someone, especially if you are just starting out or running a very small studio. But without the right person or people answering your phone at all times and talking to potential customers who drop in as well as current clients, you are severely limiting your potential for growth. If you are the one person who does everything—teach, choreograph, run the front desk and manage your office—you need help. Even if you hire one person to help you run your studio, it is going to make a positive difference to your bottom line and as a result you will have the finances to pay that all important employee. We have usually found that more mature people who are used to dealing with children and parents make the best candidates for front desk personnel.

A couple of years ago we decided we wanted to increase our enrollment by a specific amount and also to increase the number of classes that each student took. We met with our front desk staff and gave them a terrific incentive, a trip to Puerto Rico, if the increase was met. We made the number that we were looking at pretty high and honestly were not sure that they were going to be able to meet it because it was so high. Well, six months later there we were on the plane with our four front desk employees because they had truly risen to the occasion and surpassed our original goals. They were so in love with the idea of going to Puerto Rico for free that they made it happen. Of course the trip was not cheap, but the excitement and goodwill that it created, not to mention the big enrollment increase, made it very worth while to us. Now I am not suggesting that you need to extend yourself to this degree, but giving your staff a fun and exciting reason to accomplish their goals makes for a happy staff and successful studio.

Here is a training list guide that you can use as a reference for this 'summer study':

5 FRONT DESK IMPROVEMENT INITIATIVES

1. Make sure that when someone walks through the door, they are greeted verbally and with a smile. Giving your clients the feeling that they are welcome is very important and if the person coming in is looking for a studio to teach their child, they will be much more forthcoming if they are made to feel at ease.
2. Keep the front desk area and/or the lobby clean. This is important because if your clients see a lot of clutter, it will not instill a lot of confidence in them that your front desk and studio are organized.
3. Make sure that there are definite places for definite files, and information that the front desk needs to have is at their fingertips. This is especially important if there is more than one person running the front desk.
4. Keep a daily front desk log. Each day, all issues or conversations that have not been resolved should be written down so that the next person knows exactly what has happened and can continue to work without being in the dark about what has gone on the previous day. This communication really helps with the smooth running of the front desk.
5. Keep your front desk staff fully aware of upcoming events, rehearsals, workshops—any information that they are going to need to know when they get that multitude of phone calls or visits to the front desk.

We also like to have sessions with our staff during which we pretend that we are the customers and they have to show us exactly how they would deal with the situation and the person. This has proven to be very helpful. We can help them have a better understanding of how we would like to have the questions answered and give them a wider knowledge of what exactly we offer in the terms of classes and services. Helping them develop more confidence in talking about what we offer and improving customer service will help everyone in the long run.

Summer is a great time to expand our knowledge and become better at what we do. Enlist your staff to help you make your studio the best that it can be.