Theater techniques put Translink on route to better customer service: Role‐plays change the mindsets of bus employees

Abstract

Purpose

Describes how Translink Metro, which runs the buses in Belfast, improved customer service through an award‐winning training scheme where actors posed as passengers.

Design/methodology/approach

Outlines the reasons for the program, the form it took and the results it achieved.

Findings

Explains that, following the program, passenger complaints dropped by 30 percent, the number of compliments for good customer service doubled and passenger numbers increased by 2 percent a year, despite recession.

Practical implications

Focuses not on skill provision per se but on sharing understanding, agreeing the ways of handling different situations and the behaviors to consider when reacting.

Social implications

Highlights the role of customer‐service training for bus drivers and inspectors in helping to make Belfast a more attractive place for tourists and inhabitants alike.

Originality/value

Reveals how the power and passion of art can help to make more fulfilled, rounded employees, and so improve business performance.

Citation

(2010), "Theater techniques put Translink on route to better customer service: Role‐plays change the mindsets of bus employees", Human Resource Management International Digest, Vol. 18 No. 2, pp. 21-23. https://doi.org/10.1108/09670731011028447