I'm just sayin'

I get so frustrated with people who leave voice-mails at my office with message like: “This is my tenth phone call and no one has called me back.” So, knowing that it’s something I can help out with, I call the person back… and it just rings and rings and rings. How would they know if someone has called them back or not if they don’t have a voice mail system for me leave them the information they need. Or, better yet why don’t they call during the business hours that I leave in the out going voice-mail so that I can help them out then? Help me help you. Sheesh.

Being A Good Receptionist: Part 2

As I have mentioned in other posts I am a receptionist and administrative assistant for a growing company. My tasks day to day vary largely but mostly come down to a few things: 1) being polite and courteous, 2) being knowledgeable about the company I work for, and 3) being open and available to help out almost all of the time.

The second thing on my list is a little bit more complicated and usually comes down to experience and a willingness to gather information. You will get questions from callers about the company and for different people and sometimes people are going to need to get the answers from you. If you are a temp it would be understandable for you to not know how to answer every question that comes to you, but it’s more important to know who to go to in order to answer those questions. And of course, it should go without mention that the longer you are in a certain position/ office the more you should know about it.

Lastly, your job as an administrative assistant is, by its nature, to assist. Learn how to prioritize, and who to prioritize for. I am an admin. for the entire office, and my office my tasks are based on first come first serve basis for all but one VP. Also, I’ve been given the right to say “no” when a project comes along that I don’t have time for. I love that. It is not secret that to be an admin. you need to be a organized person, if you aren’t become one. Make lists, create a filing system for your tasks, and know where and what they mean.

All in all the most important parts of being a receptionist and administrative assistant come down to personality, knowledge, and organization. Even if your goal isn’t to be the best receptionist to grace the office system, it could be an opening in to another position if you work it right.

At the tone you know what to do...

After calling people almost all day everyday for the past few weeks and for the most part getting an answering machine message I have a few observations to make. One: The prerecorded message that comes with the machine is very annoying. Two: do not have your small children make the message, yes it's cute the first time but after that I really would prefer just about anything else. Three: Do NOT just record your favorite song for your message, I do not want to sit there and listen to Beyonce or George Straight for a minute just because it's YOUR favorite song.

Ship This!

I spent about half of my day today on the phone with various "representatives" of Fed Ex trying to track down five packages that have no shipping history after being picked up each over a week ago. Let me tell you, they must be having some serious problems with their package tracking systems because of these five packages three were express shipping, two were ground shipping and none could be found. Mind you these were not the only packages we were having picked up and being neither on the sending or receiving end we really are flying blindly as to what the website or our shippers are telling us. Of the three express packages, one was picked up and never scanned again, one was never actually picked up (yet was scanned as such on the website), and yet another was confused for a ground package and delayed. The two actual ground packages I have no actual hope of ever tracking down though the (mostly) kind people on the other end of the phone seemed to assure me other wise. I say mostly kind because there was one gentleman I encountered in my five or so phone calls today that did not in any way seem helpful or willing to divulge information that many of the other representatives had given me freely, like the case number. I had another one who was quite genial but disconnected our phone call after putting me on hold for ten minutes. All in all I am not dissatisfied with my phone conversations as I, for the most part, got the information and assistance I was seeking but all in all my faith in their abilities to keep track of a package are dwindling rapidly.