National Customer Service Week 2023: Challenging barriers to inclusivity and enhancing recognition
Every October, our colleagues participate in National Customer Service Week, a week-long opportunity to raise awareness of customer service and its vital role in a successful business operation at Minster Law. 2023 was jam-packed with activities each day, with lots of learnings taken from the week and recognition of our customer service heroes. Take a look back at our highlights from this year.
Back to the floor
Our managers took part in a back-to-the-floor challenge that saw them swapping out their regular day to join their teams on the phone, responding to emails, drafting court documents and more. As explained by operational governance manager, Laura Bleasby, “There is nothing more rewarding and insightful than being immersed in the operation. To understand the needs of the customer, you have to experience what they do, and understand the role you are expecting your colleagues to perform. Without that level of understanding, you cannot truly say you know your customer!”
Many of our managers took part including client relations manager, James Heseltine, said “I had a great morning spending time supporting with some of the day-to-day processes within our claims team. It was good to understand how the team work together to support customers and manage the varied workstreams to ensure claims continue to progress towards a successful conclusion. It gave me a fresh perspective on some of the things we do and was a morning well spent.”
Inclusive Service Workshop
We arranged for colleagues from around the business to attend an inclusive services workshop delivered by Stonewall. The session focused on how we can remove barriers to our services for the LGBTQ+ community, focusing on understanding identities, language, and experiences. Holly Martin, one of our trainee solicitors, said “I found the session with Stonewall extremely beneficial and educational. I learnt terms I hadn’t come across before and came away with knowledge I could implement into my work life which would allow me to be as inclusive and respectful to our customers as possible. The session was really engaging and clearly enjoyed by all who attended.”
As a member of Minster’s EDI committee, Ashleigh Percival spoke about how important the workshop was to the committee’s initiatives for the year. “We’ve really focused on customer accessibility in 2023. We believe that to be truly accessible to all our customers, we need to increase our learning and understanding to help us improve. This workshop on inclusive services from Stonewall has really helped in highlighting to us some of the barriers members of the LGBTQ+ community face when accessing everyday services, particularly in the legal sector.”
Great Service lunches
We relaunched our quarterly great service lunches during customer service week. As part of the initiative, we invite colleagues from across the business to share their positive feedback with us. Every quarter, we’ll be inviting a shortlist of colleagues out for dinner with members of our executive team to celebrate the fantastic recognition they’ve received. It’s important to us at Minster Law that we recognise the great responses we receive from customers, colleagues, and partners about members of the Minster Law team.
Meeting and anticipating our customers’ needs drives our customer-centric culture. National Customer Service Week forms part of our customer commitment, where each and everyone of our colleagues has our customers’ best interests at heart. And at our heart, we leave no customer behind, harness insights and feedback, and provide them with a personalised service. Our business is about helping people, it’s who we are and it’s what we do.
