Excellence cannot be achieved overnight but only through continuous improvements and measured quantitatively or qualitatively. Organizations must take concrete steps towards excellence. It doesn’t matter if these are baby steps if it’s in the right direction, or the improvement is incremental if it delivers results, or how insignificant the activity might be if it helps achieve goals and objectives.
One gap to fill is the training of our security, housekeeping, and maintenance on our CHEFS, SPACE, and SERVICE. Although they’re outsourced, they are our “Front-liners” and mostly, our customers’ first Point-of-Contact. They act as our intermediaries. It should be clear to them that their function must be aligned with our VMVs. They should have a common view, clarity, and understanding of FOPM’s objectives. They should embody and personify the things we value for us to achieve the state of being TOP OF MIND.
A class-room setting echo seminar is an effective way of orienting our front-liners. CHEFS can be filtered down to its core, to its most important aspects. Example, the Finance aspect of CHEFS may be limited to why it’s important to have it, what can they do to help us achieve financial targets – safety, security, proper maintenance, cleanliness, diligent use of materials to help save money. CRC can design a tailored-course, or the PH may coordinate with CRC for filtering. Sessions can be done in batches to avoid disrupting operations.
As this is the responsibility of the Admin, sessions should be conducted by the PH and assisted by PEs and AOs. They’re knowledgeable, trained, certified, and they put CHEFS into action. They can add a personal touch by drawing examples from their experiences. This will also boost their fluency on the five aspects of PM because they will have to speak about it time and time and again. It will make them confident speaking in public and to our clients. Confidence is one quality that every Admin Team member should have. Practice makes perfect. This is personal development in action.
When a customer steps inside the property, front-liners are the very first to greet them, the very first reflections of our values. They will be the first impression on how we manage a property. They are one of our “make-or-break” paths toward TOP OF MIND status. It’s important to provide them with the right knowledge. With the resources available to us (laptops, projectors, training rooms), this should be very easy for us to do.
If we want excellence, we must speak the same language. It doesn’t matter if one is regular, project-based, or outsourced, everyone must speak the same language. If we want to achieve TOP OF MIND status, we must begin bridging the gap between us and the customers.