“The One Stop As a Small Business”
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One Stops operations have primarily focused on assessment, career planning, counseling & training of their customers. No one would argue that these practices must continue to be the core competencies of the American Job Center.
I propose that additional core business processes need be to be emphasized with the overall driver and narrative being that the One Stop think of itself as a small business and be run that way. Core processes are the essential functions a business performs to achieve its goals.
Thinking and acting more like a small business would also have incremental positive effects in engaging the business community. Ultimately all this combines to better serve the customer base – adults, dislocated workers, youth, employers – toward attaining established performance measures.
Here is a list of my recommended One Stop “Core Business Processes”. Take a few moments and conduct a self-evaluation of your One Stop’s practices. You may find this to be a valuable tool to generate discussion with your team.
Don’t hesitate to contact me with your thoughts!
Read each and rate how your One Stop is operating based on the following six-point scale: Strongly Agree, Agree, Agree, Neither, Disagree and Strongly Disagree.
- Strategic Management:A plan exists that reflects our One Stop’s mission statement and objectives. All our AJC staff are included discussions about goals, understand their role to achieve them, and employ a cohesive product value message to local market and stakeholders.
- Marketing/Promotion:Tactics are in place to actively promote our AJC to compel customers and the business community to call and consider the AJC a valued resource.
- Sales Planning/Job Development: Job development and placement activities are strategic and integrate sales planning practices targeting labor market identified sectors of growth, demand occupations, employers and linked to customer backgrounds and training attended.
- Business Service Engagement: All our staff confidently represent the One Stop when presenting its scope of services during employer inquiries, job development and placement activities. This includes demonstrating effective customer engagement behaviors resulting in productive business relationships gaining their participation and retention in the workforce system.
- Customer Experience:Our customers experience a participant-centered approach during assessment, counseling and career planning including their guided-active involvement of the management of the career exploration and decision-making process.
- Staff Communications:Our One Stop working environment exhibits open communications, everyone participating, not holding back on their ideas or opinions with management. Staff treat each other with respect and listen to and value all input for consideration.
- Business Intelligence/CRM: We make data driven decisions to when developing strategy and policy. There is management and monitoring of performance results to ensure a proactive response performance trends to attain performance measures.
Aramini Management is a management and business consulting practice. Since 2005 we have assisted organizations in the corporate, educational and non-profit arenas execute management and operational improvements to attain their goals and better engage their customers and staff. Our experience includes One Stop Career Center operations and community college workforce development and training grant programs for corporate clients.
“John Aramini Delivers Message of Exceptional Service & Change at GSETA Conference”
I was excited to be selected to present for The Garden State Employment & Training Association (GSETA) at their 36th Annual Workforce Development Conference in Atlantic City on October 3 & 4, 2018. The GSETA Conference brought together national, state, and local stakeholders of the workforce system.
My session “Exceptional Service: Enhancing the Customer Experience” focused on instituting customer quality assurance practices and the potential reinvention that Workforce Development Board members and One Stop management staff may need to implement to attain the Workforce Innovation & Opportunity Act (WIOA) performance measures emphasizing “effectiveness servicing employers”.
I discussed the notion that this involves the combined efforts of introducing new business practices and building a customer-centric culture. I suggested that this is a new knowledge base to be acquired, which is now equally important, yet distinct from those capabilities when providing career planning and training services. Competence in business development, employer engagement and customer service are essential to maximize relationship outcomes when interacting with the business community. Performance measure implications for One Stop business practices include CRM, marketing, sales planning and targeting.
In addition to sharing new concepts and ideas, attendees had the opportunity to participate in exercises readily applicable back on the job for use with their staff to generate discussion and to introduce potential improvement actions. For example, an exercise based on the following Core Customer Service Beliefs began the dialogue on customer engagement and establishing standards:
- Achieving performance measures and building your organization’s brand reputation requires an organizational and team effort.
- Exceptional customer service is personal accountability, choice and ownership.
- Customer service is not just a department or a training program: it is a way of behaving and a core value for an organization.
- Meeting internal customer needs improves overall customer service.
- Co-worker relationships are equally important as communications and services with your stakeholder groups.
- Superior service and engagement are expected between co-workers, supervisors within departments, and among departments.
- The customer is your ultimate employer.
- Listen to your customers and cherish the complainers: they can provide you with valuable insights that you may not be aware of.
Aramini Management is a management and business consulting practice. Since 2005 we have assisted organizations in the corporate, educational and non-profit arenas execute management and operational improvements to attain their goals and better engage their customers and staff including experience with One Stop Career Center operations and community college workforce development and training grant programs for corporate clients.
” A Prescription for Fixing Things”
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I like fixing things – not mechanical things. My most complicated tool is an electronic screwdriver. I enjoy working with organizations to get a project back on course, transforming a department with scattered direction or a company without a cohesive sense of brand and team.
When asked about a formula for introducing change, reinvention and direction, time and time again, it does start by taking a look at the “hard” side of the organization: its core business practices data, reporting, and outcomes. But there is also a significant emphasis on the “soft” aspects of the organization to establish a work environment where information flows freely among everyone to effectively address customer needs and improvement opportunities. Impact people to give them the opportunity to make a difference and the hard side of will follow. The following outlines a prescriptive framework with potential tactics to add to your own toolkit:
- Clarify mission. Clarify what the organization’s mission and strategy are. What do they want to accomplish? How does this relate to the department or area you have been assigned to? Anything particular they wish to modify or improve on?
- Determine measurement systems. What tools are they using to evaluate performance in achieving that mission? Is measurement taking place at the department and sub-department level? How are staff evaluated?
- Don’t prejudge with solutions to already know the cause of the problem, but verify root-causes. This can be difficult to do as your past experiences and instincts kick-in. What does organization think the obstacles are? Confirm with fact-finding that this is the true cause of the lack of meeting deliverables. With multiple staffers and departments, you may find some positioning and finger-pointing blame, with reality somewhere in the middle of all that.
- Pick your spots. Decide what you really need to focus on and what you can let go for now. It is easy to get sidetracked on items with little leverage on the outcomes but can cause a big stink when addressing them.
- Ask a lot, talk a lot, and listen a lot. Over communicate, repeat critical messages, and explain reasons why so everyone begins to live it. Be transparent and accessible to break down communication barriers: answer questions and provide information.
- Be half-full, not half-empty. Even when problems are screaming out at you, don’t scream back – making people feel defensive. You want them to be a part of the solution.
- Give credit, and timely feedback. Tell people when they are good and when their work isn’t so good.
- Push back. Key stakeholders may pressure you to address certain items perhaps of low value. You may need to say you will handle them but not now, but when and why.
- Be a buffer and advocate. Don’t let other managers run roughshod over your staff. Let them know to pick their fights with you. Work teams value knowing you are on their side.
- Provide tools and resources to do the job. This could include helping people open doors, removing barriers, and being their sounding board as needed.
“Taking Your Organizational Pulse”
Your doctor conducts a physical exam to see how your body is performing. The medical exam typically isn’t time consuming and designed to ensure that you remain in good health.
Is there a routine check-up that you could initiate on your own organization to get a pulse on its performance? Essentially, taking a snap shot of outcomes and work behaviors to stay ahead of the curve to address potentially developing issues.
Allow yourself and your management team thirty minutes to think through these questions for your organizational check-up and some fact-finding for potentially needed improvement actions:
- How are sales trends vs. last year? Ahead? Stalled? Behind?
- How many new accounts were developed in the past year?
- Is revenue up due to increased volume or a price increase?
- Is the account base up, flat or down?
- How much repeat business from established accounts?
- Are sales leads forgotten: people asking what ever happened with a prospect?
- What “new” ideas have your staff generated in the past year?
- How many new ideas did they actually take responsibility for and execute?
- Are new initiatives getting bogged down in department silos?
- Does your staff come to you for all decisions?
“Serious About Improving Service? Ask Your Staff.”
Your staff will have valuable insights and examples on service gaps and improvement opportunities. It may require some courage and thick skin to question your staff for their input on service. I do not suggest this unless you are really open-minded to what you will hear and are prepared to effectively respond with action. Staff are closest to the customers and the organizational practices that link to the customer.
And of course, do go directly to the customer for their input. Surveying your customers is an essential step to obtain quality assurance and satisfaction measures. This can be post customer service call questions, customer relationship surveys conducted periodically and simply a confidential post card for mailing after their visit to your location.
Who is the customer? Anyone you provide a service to can be included in the concept of customer. This includes your internal customers. Management, supervisory and co-worker interactions are as equally important as communications, programs and services with your external business customers, community representatives, clients, students and all stakeholders.
While you may be excellent in serving your direct clients and customers, you should be just as exceptional in providing service to each other. This is whether you are a private corporation, not-for profit or educational institution. An organization’s staff image outside the organization is reflected in their internal working relationships. Your employees are the face of the organization. Ask them the following:
- What are examples of our organization providing exceptional service to our customers?
- What are examples of our organization providing poor service to our customers?
- What causes poor customer service at our organization and within your department?
- How do you think our customers would rate of our organization’s service to them?
- What do you think our organization and your department can do to better service our customers and to build their loyalty?
- How would you rate our service to each other – that is, our internal customers?
- What improvement opportunities exist within our internal customer interactions?
- What do you think, that I as your manager, can do to improve customer service?
- What do you think you can do to improve your own customer service effectiveness?
- What do you see as the benefits of an improvement?