She had worked closely with the businesses and her bilingual skills set the stage for honest communication. It opened the door for this kind of training to occur and allowed cross cultural concerns to be addressed. Listening to experiences with an ear toward understanding takes time and sometimes requires asking hard questions. As you develop a program it may seem like the planning conversations are not making any progress or going too slow. But the phrase, “you need to go slow to go fast”, could not be more true. As an educator, it is very rewarding and gratifying to rethink assumptions and reformulate the lea rning experience for a new, unique audience! With “We Serve”, extension faculty approached the traditional topic of customer service through a new lens to meet the changing needs of the Extension customer in rural Nebraska.
REFERENCES
Heskett, J. L., Jones, T. O., Loveman, G. W., Sasser Jr., W. E., & Schlesinger, L. A. (2000). Putting the service-profit chain to work. (Product No. 4460, HBR On Point). Cambridge, MA: Harvard Business School Publishing Corporation. Burkhart-Kriesel, C., and Francis, C. (2007). Red carpet service – Linking rural communities to travelers and tourists. Journal of Extension, 45(2). Available at: Red Carpet Service--Linking Rural Communities to Travelers and Tourists (joe.org) Claridy, S. (2009), What is customer service? The Consortium Journal of Hospitality & Tourism. 14(1) 103-108. Available at: WHAT IS CUSTOMER SERVICE?: EBSCOhost Robles, M. (2012). Executive perceptions of the top 10 soft skills needed in today’s workplace. Business Communications Quarterly. 75(4) 453 -465. Available at: BCQ460400.indd (se.edu) Dixon, M., Ponomareff, L., Turner, S., DeLisi R. (2017). Kick-ass customer service. Harvard Business Review. January-February, 110-117. Available at: https://hbr.org/2017/01/kick-ass-customer- service.
2021 NET Conference Proceedings
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