On day 15 I asked if I could meet with Mr. Garrett to
thank him for the chance to learn about his company as an intern.
Mr. Garret was very informative and asked me what I had
learned overall. I explained that I learned about the structure of his company,
the importance of communication channels among staff, and the proper etiquette
for communicating with clients. I also learned that in a small company team
members have to take on many roles and be able to be versatile enough to
multi-task.
Day 14 -
Field Work
I was
allowed to tag along with a field technician to jobs. The day started at the TelComTec
office. The technician communicated with the manger about jobs and potential
hurdles. After materials for jobs were collected from the warehouse, I got in a
company vehicle with the TelComTec technician to head out to several service
and maintenance jobs. The jobs that we had were all originated by a service
call. The TelComTec office had scheduled and dispatched the jobs to the
technician through a scheduling app that the technician had on his phone. I
hand come full circle in the TelComTec process. Earlier in the week I took the
calls from the customers now I was out in the field addressing the customer’s
needs. We went out to customer offices as far as 30 miles away from the
TelComTec headquarters. The technician had to communicate with customers by
properly introducing himself and stated his visit's purpose. The technician had
to listen to the customer’s concerns and then set plan of action with the
customer. Then he applied troubleshooting techniques. When the job was complete,
he met with the customer and communicated the findings, the process used to resolve
the problem, and then recommendations. Finally, the customer was asked if their
all their needs were met with the service visit.
Day 13 -
Operations and Project Planning
On this day
I sat with the TelComTec team in the war room or conference room. The team
meets in the morning to discuss upcomming projects and the progress of current
projects. Communication between team members is critical for the completion of
proper projects. The success of the project is dependent on the execution of
the guidelines, and timeframe set by the manager and the leaders of the
assigned projects. Any hurdles or setbacks have to be communicated from the
technicians to the project lead, and then the project manager. During the
meeting project managers will place calls to customer contacts and outside
contractors to communicate updates and discuss potential setbacks as well as workarounds
to challenges. The meeting lasted about one hour. Then I looked at some project
diagrams.
Day 12 - Warehouse Training
I spent the
day learning how to inventory and stock products that came in from vendors. I
Scanned barcodes and stocking items for TelComTec. The scanned information was
saved on a scanner device and uploaded to the database. When a product is sold
by a TelComTec manager or technician the item is removed from the database and
the stock count is updated in the database. At TelComTec there are no sales reps,
the managers or technicians sell all the products and the database keeps track
of the merchandise. The warehouse products are organized categorically,
based on the technology it is applied to.
Day 11
I was allowed to make calls and receive calls the full day. I started the day by receiving calls and was assisted on scheduling appointments for service visits. I was very comfortable taking the calls and followed the guidlines provided during day 6 and day 7. I then made call backs at the end of the day to follow up on service visits. I was also comfortable making call backs and getting feed back from clients.
Day 11 felt like a full day of work.
Day 10 - More customer support training.
I spent the day watching dispatch take calls and make calls. At the end of the day I made a couple of calls to follow up on completed jobs. All calls to customers were short and pleasent. I got a couple of positive feed backs and all customers agreed to complete a email survey, which I sent out after the calls. I felt comfortable making the calls and got better after couple of calls.
Day 9 - TelComTec Customer Support part 2
Additional training for answering and returning calls
Mostly got training on communicating with customers that left voicemails on the phone system.
5 P's
Prepared
Now the history of the service call and study the notes.
Present
Start the call by presenting the description of the job
Polite
Be respectfull and treat the caller like you would like to be treated
Patient
Allow the customer a chance to explain the problem
Personable
Be friendly
Professional
Stay on topice and remember you are talking with a business client
Proactive
Take good notes and make appointment time and date that works for the customer.
Day 8 - Dispatch
Grid
Dispatch
additional training
I mostly watched
dispatch close out jobs on the software and call customers back.
Script for follow
up calls-
Start by asking for
the contact on the ticket. Introduce yourself and ask if their needs were met. Always
offer customers options for a return visit if needed. If the job requires an additional
visit use empathetic language and reassure them that their issue is important. If
no follow up is required send an email with a survey.
Day 7 - Dispatch
Grid
I received
detailed training on how to use the dispatch software, Service Fusion. The
software allows for scheduling appointments. The software is cloud-based and
contains a database of all the customers TelComTec has serviced over the last
30 years. When creating a service request a registered customer name is
required. If the caller is a new customer a new entry is created for the
caller. Then a technician is assigned to the job by the dispatcher.
Day 6 - TelComTec Customer Support
I started the day
by watching dispatch answer calls on the customer support line. At the end of
the day I got to answer a couple of calls. I was provided some guidelines to
keep in mind.
On my 5th day I spent more time at the office watching interaction between callers and dispatch but also got to see the head of the Cabling department make some call backs to customers to see how their projects had turned out. I was told that the importance of the call back was to encourage the customer to feel comfortable with communicating any future needs. Today I realized that TelComTec is about customer relationships. It seems that this is where the business gets all its returning business and business referrals. "The business has been around almost 40 years and the reason is they don't lose customers and grow relationships" said the head of the Cabling department.
On my 4th Day - I watched Dispatch take service calls
and handle service requests.
All TelComTec Service requests come in one of two ways, a
phone call or a company email. Dispatch consists of a couple employees that
take the calls and get the customer information and request and turn it into a
ticket, which is scheduled immediately. If the request is urgent it is
transferred to the appropriate department to be handled by the head of that
department.
The interaction between dispatch and the clients is very
formal but also very pleasant. TelComTec seems to be very good at making the clients
feel as if they are very important.
On my 3rd day I spent time with the heads of the two
departments, Cabling and Information Technology (IT).
The cabling department manily deals with wiring of any type
of cables, audio, video, and CCTV. All these services deal with wiring so it
makes sence that they fall under this department. Video involves anything TV
related, such as projectors and screens. Audio involves Sound systems for
businesses. CCTV involves security cameras systems.
The second department is Information Technology (IT). It has
the most complex services at TelComTec. IT involves anything related to
computers, and communication of computers with each other and the internet. In today’s
world phones are a subcategory of computers. I was told Services offered by
TelComTec IT would be covered at a later day.
Picture from the TelComTec Lab (computer cabling example)
On my first day, I met Ron Garrett, the CEO of TelComTec who is also the owner. He showed me around the office which is a small space consisting of a lobby, and a couple of personal offices, conference room, and a lab/testing area. Additionally, there was also a large warehouse filled with tech gear.
For the most part I watched the inner workings of the office
and talked to Mr. Garrett about the business history and structure.
Mr. Garret explained that TelComTec was founded by two
former AT&T technicians in 1986. The business was started in a home garage
with the goal of providing telecom services to the city of San Diego. These
services included telephone wiring, and basic business telephone installation.
Mr. Garrett started as technician in 1990 and eventually bought the company in
1996 with the help of a bank loan that was paid in full in 2006. Today
TelComTec consists of small office staff, with 2 department heads, 12
specialized technicians and various subcontracted temp technicians.
