How to be an ‘incredible’ office receptionist

A good first impression always counts, and as the first point of human contact for any business, here are some tips to being an ‘incredible’ office manager and/or receptionist:

Build your brand

Develop and build strong relationships with the leaders in your company. Expanding your network in the company and building rapport with your co-workers will help you gain better insights to what can be improved around the workplace, and your co-workers will often be honest — which is a good thing! These relationships also help you build a personal brand for yourself, and will ultimately make you feel great dealing with internal queries.

Manage your time

Manage your time effectively by understanding the differences between tasks that are urgent, and tasks that are important. Urgent tasks are time sensitive, where as important tasks may carry a higher priority. It is up to you to triage and work out what needs to be done. ultimately, if you follow through, you may bring back more time in your day!

Stay Upbeat!

There’s nothing worse than speaking to a potential customer or client on the phone (or in person) when all they hear is along the lines of ‘my life sucks’… (Yes, they can pick this up). Try to mirror the persons tone and energy levels as closely as possible and you will also find you will feel a lot better about yourself after the interaction.

Be Transparent

Ensure that your guest book, message books and diaries are easy to read and understand to your managers and co-workers. Especially if you are part-time, the full-time office manager will find this especially important.

One job at a time

You might be an great multi-tasker, but it really is important to handle one task at any given time. If you’re writing an email, then don’t service customers at the counter until you’re finished, and vice versa. Why? Because no matter how great you are, that’s when mistakes happen (like when you missed someone’s name and have to ask for it again).