High Quality Customer Experience – learning from retail SCONUL Winter Conference 7 th December 2012, London

1. High Quality Customer Experience – learning from retailSCONUL Winter Conference 7th December 2012, London Matt Cunningham, Customer Services Manager Loughborough University Library

2. Starting point • “We’re a Library – we don’t have customers!”

3. Staffing - changing workforce profile and culture • 2004 – 30 staff: • many of whom had been in post for upwards of 15 years • 100% female (apart from me) • Little outside experience of customer service outside Library • 2012 – 32 staff: • 33% are current or recently graduated students • 6 men! • a range of nationalities (Nepal, Greece and Ghana) and ages (teens, 20s, 30s, 40s 50s and 60s) • Library experience no longer essential criteria, customer service experience and IT skills paramount • Reflect 2nd Library value (developed by staff and users) • “Staff that are approachable, helpful, knowledgeable, courteous and take pride in working for the University Library.”

4. Challenges and benefits Challenges Benefits Promotes high levels of customer care Staff from different teams work together for the first time Larger workforce to call on, freeing up academic librarian time More representative of student body • Some resistance from other teams for dealing with circulation queries • Concerns from some staff about transience of student staff • Not all staff are confident about having a customer facing role • Higher recruitment burden

5. Staffing - development • Mandatory customer care training for all Library staff once every five years • Fish – “choosing your attitude!” • “One stop shop” – integrated helpdesks • core competencies and a robust referral system • extensive training programme • Customer Services Group established (drawn from all teams in Library) • Involvement in Library wide projects and cross team groups (e.g. training/marketing)

6. Results of changes • IIP 2010: • “A strong learning culture has certainly been well established over the years, and this is viewed as vital to the continuing success of the Library in terms of providing exceptional customer service and meeting student and fellow University colleagues needs.” • CSE accreditation in 2011: • “The commitment of the management team, and the whole staff, to deliver the best possible service to all users is totally apparent. The continuing amount of customer-led improvements is impressive... customer service is at the heart of everything they do.” • Library User Survey 2012 – enquiry desks ranked as the 1st out of 15 Library services users were most satisfied with

7. Contact details • Email: M.S.Cunningham@lboro.ac.uk • Tel (01509) 222353

8. Source materials • Changes in CS Team during RFID • Dissertation https://dspace.lboro.ac.uk/dspace-jspui/handle/2134/8820 • Conference paper http://library.bcu.ac.uk/conferencecunningham.pdf • Staff training • Mandatory customer care training http://pdwww.lboro.ac.uk/eventdetails_single.asp?cid=2089 • Fish http://www.charthouse.com/productdetail.aspx?nodeid=24103