Enhancing the user experience Promoting a service culture through customized staff training

Abstract

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to highlight a series of initiatives generated from, and managed within, a major university library and aimed at improving a customer service focus. Design/methodology/approach - The paper documents a series of approaches, including a customized staff training package, that were intended to enhance users' experience with staff. Over a period of six years the responses to a biannual user survey were tracked in order to identify improvements, or otherwise, in users' perceptions of staff performance in terms of their customer service. Findings - The survey results seem to indicate that improvements in users' perceptions of staff performance have improved with time and have done so most dramatically following a series of self-initiated workshops conducted by library staff. Research limitations/implications - While it is difficult to directly correlate the successful outcomes with the initiatives, including the staff-conducted workshops, it will be necessary to continue to track users' perceptions of staff to ascertain whether the trend is sustainable or an aberration. Originality/value - The paper provides a unique perspective of applying a range of approaches aimed at improving the user experience with staff in a major Asian university library. The success of these approaches is linked to the outcomes of the library's biannual user survey.