Customer Service Week Resources

Activities • Bulletins • Celebration Stories and Ideas • Printables • Puzzles • 

People’s Choice Awards

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Build Stronger Teams

Are you a Speedy Gonzales, Gumby or Martha Stewart? That was the question that reps at Cox Health were pondering during Customer Service Week 2009.

The Physicians Billing team wrapped up it’s week-long celebration with a pot luck lunch and awards ceremony on Friday. Actually, there were two types of awards. First, were the “Oscars,” in which reps received recognition from management in categories such as Dedication to Accuracy and Offering Assistance.

Then there were the People’s Choice Awards in which reps recognized each other. A form listing the various categories for recognition was distributed prior to Customer Service Week. Reps voted for winners in eight categories including the following:

  • Speedy Gonzales: This person is a go-getter, he/she approaches issues with a sense of urgency, produces high-quality results, is persistent, and stays on top of things.
  • Payton Manning: This person is a team player and is always willing to do whatever it takes to get the job done right.
  • Gumby: This person represents flexibility. He/she is always willing to help a coworker, has excellent multi-tasking skills, and will assist in any area where there is a need.

To create your own People’s Choice Awards, view all eight of the categories used by Cox Health.

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Secret Agents Discover Other Departments

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To celebrate Customer Service Week, the team at Systems Services of America took a page from the classic television series Mission Impossible.

While the theme music played on reps’ computers, each person selected an unmarked envelope with their mission … should they choose to accept it.

Dressed in trench coats and dark glasses the team made their way through the building gathering important information. The goal was to learn about the many steps taken to ensure worker safety in the company’s warehouse. The idea would work equally well to inform and educate staff about other departments.

After all of the safety information was gathered, the staff met at a non-alcoholic cocktail party to celebrate the week and share their new-found information.

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Gala Director’s Luncheon

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Build Stronger Teams

At the Memphis IRS Employee Resource Center, Customer Service Week is a time to show reps how much they are appreciated, celebrate milestones, recognize outstanding service, and connect with coworkers and former employees.

How do they do all that in one week? It’s a very busy week.

Each day is celebrated with a different theme and then there are the major events like the gala Director’s Luncheon on Thursday. While the management and leadership team serves lunch, the Director’s Awards and the Length of Service Awards are presented. To make this event even more special, executives and former employees from near and far are invited to attend and share in the celebration.

Another important event was incorporated into the celebration when the team received its 4 millionth customer call. That’s like one call from each person in the state of Oregon. It’s an amazing milestone, which was celebrated by all, including a special gift for the lucky rep who took the call.

Finally, to wrap up the festive week, a special video was created. It included highlights of the 2010 event as well as prior celebrations.

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Celebration Spans 8,000 Miles

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Build Stronger Teams

The celebration at Approva Corporation in Virginia was designed to include everyone from local service staff to support staff over 8,000 miles away. To get everyone involved three different types of events were organized.

  • Department-Wide. Each day, members of the service and support team received a small token of management’s appreciation. By the end of the week everyone had a treasure chest of mementos from the week. The team was also treated to a thank-you lunch, which was hosted by the Senior Vice President of Global Customer Solutions. But the highlight was surely the desk-chair parade. Teams of service and support staff worked together to transform their chairs into festive “floats” for a parade through the department.
  • Company-Wide. The entire company joined in a mid-week celebration with a giant cake and words of thanks and encouragement from the company CEO.
  • World-Wide. Finally, the off-site service and support team in India celebrated Customer Service Week as well. They hosted their own parade with amazing costumes made entirely from paper. While the groups are over 8,000 miles apart, they bridged the distance by sharing photos of their celebrations.
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Theme Photos Create Memories

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Build Stronger Teams

Each year, the team at Health Plan of the Upper Ohio Valley finds an opportunity to take individual and group photos during Customer Service Week.

The 2009 celebration included a “Night at the Oscars” party with dinner, goodie bags and more. The paparazzi were on hand to photograph each rep as she walked down the red carpet. Because there is only one man in the department, he individually escorted each woman and posed for a photo.

The following year, the team celebrated with a holiday theme and the lone male rep dressed as the Easter Bunny. He posed for photos with each rep and distributed plastic eggs filled with surprises after each photo was snapped.

The photos are wonderful momentos of the celebration and are sure to bring a smile for years to come.

If you don’t have an opportunity to take team photos, consider distributing disposable cameras so that you are sure to capture the fun.

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Managers Serenade Their Stars

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Build Stronger Teams

At Horizon Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Jersey, the weeklong celebration focused on teambuilding.

The first activity to bring people together was a special scavenger hunt. The instructions were to seek out supervisors and managers (excluding your own), introduce yourself and ask for their signature on your raffle ticket. The tickets were entered into a prize drawing for movie tickets or lunch with the department managers.

Manager Dena Williams tells us that even the department ’s director got into the spirit and had people stopped her all over the building to request her signature.

The second activity was the Star of the Day program. Stars were nominated by team members and supervisors. Each day a group of managers visited people who were nominated. They read the accolades from the nomination forms and distributed large paper stars. But the highlight of the presentation had to be when the managers broke into an original song, as they thanked reps for all they do each day.

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Lunches Hosted by Other Departments

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Build Stronger Teams

At Snap-on Diagnostics the customer care team celebrated with a different theme each day. And while here on the east coast the weather was definitely chilly, on the west coast they were able to enjoy a beach day at the office (the forecast called for a high of 90 degrees). There was also a pajama day, a sports jersey day, and more.

The team also enjoyed sharing a catered lunch each day. To make this possible, managers from Sales & Marketing and Finance each hosted a lunch to thank the customer care team for their hard work throughout the year.

It’s a wonderful way to build strong bonds with other departments, to recognize frontline staff, and stretch the celebration budget.

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Teams Focus on Core Values

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Build Stronger Teams

The team at AliMed celebrated Customer Service Week 2012 with an Olympic theme that focused on fun and some powerful messages.

To begin, the entire department was divided into five cross-functional groups. Each group represented an Olympic ring and a core attribute of great customer service.

Each group created materials and activities to share their attribute with the entire team. They used word searches, crosswords, tip sheets in the form of bookmarks, and more. Each day, a different attribute was celebrated:

Monday — Red — Positivity
Tuesday — Black — Empathy
Wednesday — Blue — Integrity
Thursday — Yellow — Communication
Friday — Green — Problem Solving

In addition to the color days, there were daily activities including an awards ceremony for reps with Olympic-related categories such as the AliMed Sharp Shooter, the person who has “the quickest trigger finger on the phone and is always on target.”

Throughout the week, the Olympic Medal Leader Board showed each team’s medal count. Winning teams received raffle tickets, and prizes were awarded at the end of the week.

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New Moms and Babies Visit

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Build Stronger Teams

The team at Systems Services of America has been celebrating Customer Service Week for years. But each celebration is fresh, fun and creative. Last year it brought together individuals, departments, and even former staff.

The service department celebrates on three out of the five days when everyone is on-hand to celebrate together.

Manager Dianna Bailey-Thompson shares highlights of each day:

  • Day 1. The festivities start with a company wide kick-off breakfast. Everyone is included to “signify everyone’s role in customer service,” says Bailey-Thompson. The service team also played a version of Jeopardy, with questions about the company. The prize for each correct question was a dress-down pass.
  • Day 2. The highlight of the second day was a Ladder Ball competition. This team-building activity saw reps randomly assigned to teams and then asked to invite one person from outside of the department to join their team. There was also a special surprise when the entire operations crew arrived in the customer service department with gifts for the reps and inspiring words from the Director of Operations.
  • Day 3. The final day’s activities focused on stress relief and included a catered lunch and visit from two reps who had left the department to have babies. “The babies were referred to as the ‘CSRs in training,’” says Bailey-Thompson.
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Spirited Pep Rally

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Focus on Fun

Delta Dental of New Jersey celebrated Customer Service Week with four busy days leading up to a luncheon and pep rally on Friday.

The entire company was split into teams of roughly 20 people each. Smaller departments joined together and larger departments were broken down into smaller teams. Each team was asked to create a cheer and to decorate a rolling office chair for their float in the pep rally.

During the company luncheon each team rolled out their float and performed their cheer. Ellen Schworn in the human resources department describes the scene, “We laughed as we watched associates become cheerleaders and drill sergeants before our eyes, heard clever spirit-filled rhymes, and were genuinely amazed at the floats as we saw originality beyond belief.”

The winning team was called the “First Floor Flossers.” This is Delta Dental after all. The team dressed in navy blue, built a float called the S.S. Spirit of Service, and created a cheer to the tune of the theme song from the television show Gilligan’s Island.

While the event sparked a lot of creativity and spirit, perhaps most important of all was that everyone came away with a new appreciation of their friends and colleagues.

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Home Movies

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Focus on Fun

The customer support team at Network Communications Inc. starts planning for Customer Service Week in January.

After all, a companywide celebration for 600 takes an enormous amount of planning and coordination. And while the celebration is on a large scale, many of the elements can be incorporated into a celebration of any size.

The festivities start the Friday before Customer Service Week when members of the customer support staff visit all employees to deliver goodie bags. The bags contain an agenda for the week, puzzles, and games such as word finds and crosswords, and a few sweet treats.

During the week there are three catered meals for the entire staff of 600: a Monday morning kick-off breakfast, a Wednesday luncheon, and a Friday afternoon Closing Ceremony complete with an assortment of tempting desserts.

Throughout the week, the entire company is invited to try their skill at a wide range of puzzles and games and all participants are awarded raffle tickets. Then at the end of the week, tickets are drawn and prizes are awarded. Participation in all activities is high, because there are some very exciting prizes in the raffle.

Don’t have the budget for big-ticket gifts? Russell Schuster, Customer Service Week Chairperson, tells us that many of the prizes are actually vendor gifts. So if your company policy restricts employees from accepting gifts, why not collect them for your own Customer Service Week raffle?

Finally, the highlight of the celebration was a fully costumed training movie staring the NCI customer support managers.

Seven screenings throughout the week, including one evening screening for the night shift, ensured that everyone had a chance to see the movie and to enjoy some traditional movie-time treats.

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Five Great Theme Days

  By Celebration Stories and Ideas, Focus on Fun

A great deal of thought and planning went into the Customer Service Week celebration at Estep Enterprises. Each day featured a different theme with coordinating decorations, food and activities. Many guests were also brought in to entertain and amaze the team.

  • Monday’s theme was farmyard fun. The office was decorated with down home farm flavor and each associate fit right in with the cowboy hat and bandanna provided. But no farm would be complete without animals so Estep brought in a petting zoo complete with alpaca, sheep, cows, a rooster, and more.
  • Tuesday’s theme was magic. The office was decorated in black and silver with giant playing cards and top hats. To add to the excitement, a professional magician performed for the team.
  • Wednesday’s theme was camping. Once again, the office was decorated appropriately with a wall-sized poster depicting fall foliage, a campfire complete with tissue-paper flames, and a tent.The team enjoyed breakfast and lunch at their “campsite” as well as a little friendly competition to see who could pitch a tent, climb inside, and zip the flap the fastest. Team members then moved outside to test their skills on a giant inflatable rock-climbing wall.
  • Thursday’s theme honored Estep’s Georgia home. The office decorations were inspired by Georgia icons and included a representation of the Chatahoochee River running right through the department. An arts and crafts activity was the highlight of the day as a local paint-your-own pottery studio came to the office. Associates decorated mugs, which were then fired at the studio and returned to Estep.
  • Friday’s theme was the Olympics. Olympic rings, glowing torches and shiny medals decorated the department. Associates competed in a range of relay races and other events to see who would bring home the gold, silver and bronze.
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