How To Win At Work & Develop Your Guest Service
Ski instruction is a customer-facing role. The interaction you have with clients is not only over the counter. No, instead you are spending 2+ hours with your clients so, in order to do a good job, get repeat clients and succeed in this industry, you need to develop your guest service skills. Here are our top 5 tips for having good guest service:
1. Greet everyone in your group personally and 'try' your best to remember names
Yes - remembering names is hard, particularly when you've been given 8 people for two hours and you had a different 8 people two hours ago. We get that even showing your clients that you're trying to remember their names can go a long way. It makes the lesson far more personal and makes it easier for you to tailor the lesson to each and every person in the group.
2. Look presentable
There's nothing worse than paying upwards of $150 for your lesson only to find out that your instructor is a scruffy, mumbly person that can't do their jacket up properly or comb their hair. It may be an exaggeration but it happens! Just take a little bit of time before you head out to greet your guests to ensure that you make a great first impression.
3. Take the time to explain yourself (Especially when teaching adult lessons)
You can feel very silly when told to do a random drill that makes you do a weird movement whilst skiing down a slope... unless you understand why you're doing it and how it's going to help your technique. Make sure you explain yourself to your clients so that they understand why what you're teaching them is going to help.
4. Be safe and keep your guests safe
This is of upmost importance when you're out there, on the hill with clients. You need to understand that the decisions you make directly affect other people and their safety. Therefore choose safe areas to stop, make sure you brief your clients about safety throughout the lesson and follow the alpine responsibility code to keep yourself and others happy on the hill.
5. Upsell
People come to resorts for multiple days and they can always improve. Instructor pay scales work by giving the instructor a bonus for private request lessons. You will make more money if you can turn your group lesson the day before into a private request the next day so show your guests something different, ensure they have fun and see value in having you again tomorrow all by themselves.
