May 29, 2024
It’s 2:00pm on a Tuesday, and while most employees in the office are focusing hard on what needs to be done by the end of the day, or what needs to be completed by Friday, Sheila Clissold knows that it is time to check every conference room at the office and make sure that it is in tip-top shape and well stocked with any necessary items. Two other employees will do the same thing at designated times throughout the day.
Sheila is the Catering and Events Manager for one of our clients based in Texas, and she, along with five others, make up what our regional manager, Mark Starnes, refers to as “Team Small, but Mighty”.
In keeping with our dedication to building teams that run lean and efficient, our incredible hospitality team is a testament to that. Not only do the offices that they serve boast more than ten conference rooms and multiple coffee stations that must be tended and restocked regularly, but events are common and range from two people to 300 people.
On a more regular basis, our hospitality team find themselves arranging small breakfast and lunch meetings for both internal personnel and external visitors to the office, sometimes providing grab-and-go options. The procedure for this has been honed over time to ensure that all needs from food and drink, to plates, cups, and clean-up are seamlessly coordinated.
On less regular occasions, the team finds themselves arranging larger gatherings and parties where their creativity really shines. This leaves options for new vendors, displays, and the potential for new challenges to arise. Luckily, our coordinating team has become excellent at adjusting with little notice to ensure that everything runs without a hitch, regardless of the circumstances.
Working by the phrase “the clock runs us”, our team knows exactly when set-up for each event needs to occur, what time deliveries are, how long to expect the event will last, and what time break-down is. They know that everything should be ready at least 15 minutes in advance, even accounting for last-minute changes and adjustments that sometimes must be made. When they are done planning, all details, regardless of how fine, are all accounted for.
Last year alone, our Mighty Hospitality Team catered 546 individual events of all sizes, with 28,000 meals served!
The takeaway from their experience, far from flaunting their well-earned achievement, was to say that they have learned the specific preferences of those they are serving regularly. This could mean anything from leaving out a pot of coffee at an event just because they know one person would really enjoy it, or using real china rather than disposables to please an individual who is attending. They’ve taken the time to note the dietary restrictions of the individuals and make sure that choices are available to each and every one of them. As Sheila put it “In most cases, we don’t need to make exceptions just in case, we’ll do it just for the specific person.”
We often say of all our business process services that we approach it with a white-glove mindset, focusing on customizing where possible and offering excellent service that our clients can rely on. We think our hospitality team shows an excellent example of this, showing up with a positive outlook and working hard to provide exceptional results in all they do.
While our team is always on the lookout for accommodations to make our clients comfortable and satisfied, it’s not just for the client, but for the individual people that they serve. We’re proud of the work that they do and proud to have them representing GLC in our clients’ offices. In many ways, the services that we provide are meant to be intangible: organizing, digitizing, making sure businesses run more efficiently and profitably. This is not the case with our hospitality team. The people they encounter don’t need time to assess if the systems we have in place are working for them. They can see the service playing out in real-time and space. For that, we are grateful to know that they are as committed to excellence, as we are in all that we love to do.