What has happened to the customer service industry? Where have all the good customer service people gone and when did it all become so eroded? I have been wondering this myself and although there are still pockets of satisfactory service that do exist, more often then not the customer experience is quite appalling. The good news is with a little bit of thought and planning facilities that do make the effort will likely see an increase in program participation and greater cost recovery. How to create this “WOW FACTOR” experience for your community and within your facilities is what this session is all about. We will review 20 proven customer service strategies and how they can be implemented right away. This workshop was created with every level of the organization in mind from Managers to Front Line Employee and should not be missed.

Access to document: D27_Donna_Hutchison.pdf

Collaboration in Human Services: A Study of the ECHOES after-school program
Erin Cornelius, University of Northern Iowa (Cedar Falls, USA)

Human service organizations have recently been compelled to fight for resources that are in short supply. Collaboration by organizations coming together and sharing resources to provide services has been suggested as a solution to the problem of limited resources. An analysis of the literature on collaboration in human services leads to the identification of themes- reasons for, processes of, barriers to, and supports for collaboration. There are many articles on reasons for, processes of, and barriers to collaboration, but very few on the supports for successful collaboration in a human services setting. Bronstein’s model of Interdisciplinary Collaboration is analyzed as an effective and concise model for the supports for collaboration. The purpose of this study was to operationalize Bronstein’s supports for collaboration by studying the ECHOES after-school program in Waterloo and Cedar Falls. The research question was: How can Bronstein’s supports for collaboration be operationalized, using her categories of interdependence, newly created professional activities, flexibility, collective ownership of goals, and reflection on process? The methodology that was employed in this study was analytical and interpretive. The participants for this study were ECHOES employees, agency collaborators, and school district personal. The data consisted of qualitative interviews and reports about the ECHOES program that were collected as part of the evaluation process for the ECHOES after-school collaboration. A Boolean analysis was used to organize data into matrices, while employing open coding procedures to create categories that fit the data. Results of this study further define Bronstein’s supports for collaboration and place them in a practice-centered environment. Not only do we learn what her supports look like in practice, but we learn where they happen and with what resources or assets. This study has many implications for the practice of collaboration. Decreasing resources for human services and increasing needs for human services make it essential that these services are provided in the most efficient, yet effective, manner possible. Collaboration, then, is essential to make the most of resources that are available to provide the best services possible.