Have you ever called an organization and been totally surprised by the professionalism of the person answering the phones? Or even worse, have you ever called your own office and been surprised by the phone etiquette that your staff is using? These phone situations cannot only be annoying, but could be causing your organization to lose business. The best way to handle this situation is to develop a good standard operating procedure for the front desk staff. Most standard operating procedures, SOPS, are used and needed in facility operations and are widely used in plants and manufacturing industries.
However, SOPS are starting to be used in all types of jobs and industries including front desk jobs for the purpose of quality control. SOPs are basic instructions that are easy to follow and provide key information regarding an ongoing task that is conducted on a regular basis. A good SOP will tell the who, what, when, where why and how a task is to be done. The first step is to ensure that the procedure is documented on paper that has the organizations' name, logo and address on top. The next step is to write the name or title of the task or procedure that is being done.
The procedures can be as simple as 'Handling Incoming Calls at the Front Desk' or a managerial procedure, such as 'Front Desk Quality Control Checks.' After writing down the title, space down and write the purpose for doing the procedure. For example 'Purpose: To establish guidelines for handling incoming calls at the front desk,' 'To act as a reference or training guide to be used by all personnel' or 'To ensure that all calls are handled professionally, in an effective and efficient manner.' After writing the purpose, write down who is normally or routinely responsible for handling the task. 'Staff Person Responsible: Receptionist, office assistants and clerical personnel.' Space down again and write locations, if necessary. This is optional, but can be necessary if you have multiple locations that may need to do the task differently depending on where they are located.
'Locations: All central office staff in the corporate office.' Once the 'who' and 'where' are written, space down and write what is being done and what products, equipment or materials are required.
'Procedure: All phones operate under the Viacom telephone system. Telephone set up and usage manuals are located in the front desk file cabinets. Step 1: On a daily basis in the morning the front desk receptionist should ensure that the 'night phone' voice mail system status is turned off. Step 2 and Step 3 follow after Step 1.'
In this example, at some point the procedure should address what the person should say when answering the phone. 'Thank you for calling the XYZ organization.
How may I direct your call.' Another standard that can be set is based on how long a caller can or should be left on hold. Provide an outline of how to do certain phone functions, such as transferring a call and include the corresponding telephone manual reference page number. The standard operating procedures can be broken down into sections. Such as: Section 1: Answering incoming calls; Section 2: Transferring calls; Section 3: Checking and transferring calls into voice mail; Section 4: Taking messages; Section 5: General phone etiquette.
Desk Manual Template Word
The general phone etiquette section should include basic dos and don'ts, such as: 'Never hang up on or be rude to a caller; 'Do not eat or chew gum while answering phones,' 'Make sure to ask a caller if they would mind being placed on hold and wait for the callers response prior to placing them on hold' and 'Ask a caller if they would like to be placed into voice mail before automatically transferring them into someone's voice mail.' After writing the procedures, determine if they are easily understandable or user friendly by having someone who does not routinely do the front desk procedure to attempt doing the procedure utilizing your SOP without any other guidance. Be prepared to do revisions to the procedures based on their input. Have others read and review the procedure to ensure that anyone and everyone can use and understand the procedure. Once the procedure has been finalized, obtain approval for usage from the division head, departmental director or manager and ultimately the CEO, executive director or president of the organization, if needed.
Their signature should be placed at the bottom of the procedure along with the approval for usage statement. A sample statement can be: 'This standard operating procedure is in accordance to the organization's mission statement and has been reviewed and approved by the following staff persons - list staff person name and title.' Put an effective date on the procedure.
The standard operating procedure should be distributed to all staff that will be responsible for doing the task. Some organizations utilize an 'Adherence to Standard Operating Procedures' form upon distribution of the procedure for their front desk staff to sign off on. This form consists of a basic statement, such as 'I have read and I understand the standard operating procedures for the front desk office. I agree to adhere to and use the procedures.'
The date of distribution of the procedure is placed on the adherence form. Tips. You may want to have the front desk staff to assist with creating the standard operations. This way, he will feel like their input is valued and are more likely to adhere to the procedures that they help create. Provide a copy of the procedures to the HR department to keep on file and use during front desk training and orientation, if needed. Keep a file of the signed adherence form so that if deviations from the standards occur, employees can be reminded of their agreement to use the standard.
Making a Desk Manual Work for you You know that a desk manual is a good idea. Writing one makes you articulate all the internalized processes and systems that you have acquired with experience.
You have the chance to examine your knowledge, fill in any gaps and show your commitment and professionalism by being ready to share it. Not only can the office run smoothly when you are on holiday because you have been efficient and made all these preparations but you won't lose out on opportunities because no one else could do your job. Expand your Matrix:. The most flexible form for a desk manual is in a ring binder. This allows you to shuffle pages around and refer to individual sections.
Plastic pockets are a nice optional extra to keep the pages from falling out but aren't strictly necessary and it is nice to be able to write directly on to the page, taking only a couple of seconds to make a note of something. Choose a good, strong folder and print out the Deskdemon Desk Manual Cover, which you can download. It's a very good idea to write your contents page as you add things.
You are unlikely to need an in-depth table of contents, but you can always write a separate contents page for each section should you want one. Write in pencil so you can make adjustments later.
You can download a contents page to help you get started. It might appear easier to write a desk manual on computer, but it is actually much easier to have it to hand, always on your desk and ready to write things in to. Good old-fashioned pencil is exactly the right tool for doing this. You can update the information as it changes, such as when someone has a new telephone number, job title or name. Using pencil also allows you to make alterations while keeping each page looking neat and tidy without messy cross-outs. Using a pencil on one paper copy is much more environmentally friendly than creating a copy on computer and then printing off another page every time a detail changes. Realistically, how many other people are going to need your job manual?
Only the person filling in for you. If anyone wants a copy then they can have a photocopy. Above all, a folder is much more flexible than a computer file. You can take it with you when you have down time to fill.
You can't lose a copy because of computer viruses or crashes. You can make it into volumes should you need to. The first thing to go into your desk manual after your title page and your table of contents should be your official title and job description or role profile.
This helps you to keep in mind your purpose within your organization and, more importantly, helps anyone filling in for you while you are on your well-earned vacation, know what they should be doing. It is a rare admin whose day-to-day work fits the job description exactly. That is why the role profile needs to be backed up by your duties and responsibilities list.
Download a copy. Write down all the day-to-day duties and mark them as daily, weekly, monthly, seasonally or occasionally. Later on you will create separate sections for each of these categories. The duties and responsibilities list should give you a lot to think about. It is also very useful when you are about to have an appraisal. The list will clearly show the new responsibilities you have taken on.
It will also help you plan. As you articulate what you already know you will see clearly what will be coming up in your week ahead. In later issues we'll be looking at Desk Manuals for specific types of departments and roles, in the mean time, print out our handy template pages to help you begin and get started on your own Desk Manual!
Your Action Plan. Review the original article on Desk Manuals, from the Expand your Matrix Section above. Download the forms and make changes to them so that they fit your workplace look and style. Begin your own Desk Manual!. Explain to your team the location and purpose of your Desk Manual. and let us know how it works out for you.