[civsa] Summer Tours

[DJ Dull-MacKenzie]

Scott, et al:

Boy, do I hear you. I am very fortunate in that my guides/ambassadors are paid and I have the financial wherewithal and support to add significant incentives to ensure that we can meet the needs of our summer crush. Even still, it's difficult to secure sufficient student staffing when it comes to vacations/breaks (especially Spring Break, when no amount of financial incentive will encourage a student to give up their spring break plans).

For summer, however, we offer a significant incentive to anyone willing to go whole hog and work "full-time" during the summer - which we actually define as 30 hours per week for any 8 of the 12-14 weeks of our summer season. Though we tend to only get from 4-8 students to do this each summer, they are the bread and butter of our summer programs. In addition to financial motivation, we attempt to create a mystique about working the summer as well as other intangible benefits. We try to do some fun events, emphasize staff bonding (stuff they can do on their own at no expense to us) and the ability to gain seniority/priority/status, etc. Some strategic photos shown at staff meetings in the spring of the summer crew doing something fun/cool/different have been effective.

But otherwise - I agree - how do you get blood from a stone (especially during Spring Break!!!)?

-DJ

From: listserv [mailto:listserv-bounces at civsa.org] On Behalf Of Scott Kirkessner
Sent: Thursday, July 28, 2016 2:20 PM
To: 'listserv at civsa.org'
Subject: [civsa] Summer Tours

Hey CIVSALand!

Summer Tours right now are a hot mess - we have been seeing nearly twice as many people on tours this year as last year, and we have been struggling big time to get coverage for tours.  We were pretty solid up until about 2 weeks ago, and will be struggling right up to the first day of school.

I had a few round and round conversations with the "higher ups" regarding tours in the off-season - see I want to offer a limited schedule, because our guides have limited availability.  They expect us to offer tours all the time.  When I said once that I can't force our students to work breaks, their response was "Why not?"  My response was "they're students" and their reply was "they're *employees*"

So how do you guys do it?  How do you ensure you have enough Ambassadors in the summer time?

Scott




[Block U Logo]

Scott Kirkessner, M.Ed.
Assistant Director, Campus Experience
Advisor, University Ambassadors
The University of Utah
201 South 1460 East, Room 250s
Salt Lake City, UT 84112
Office: 801.585.1995
scott.kirkessner at utah.edu<mailto:scott.kirkessner at utah.edu>
admissions.utah.edu/visit
facebook.com/UtahAdmissions<https://www.facebook.com/UtahAdmissions>



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