The brief
The Magic Garden, a family attraction, opened at Hampton Court Palace in March 2016. It proved very popular with nearly 300,000 people visiting it in its first season.
“We were delighted with the success of the Magic Garden.” explains Julie Dent, admissions and contact centre manager for Historic Royal Palaces. “But increased visitor numbers brought new processes and pressures for our team. We had to impose time limits for visitors and suspend entry when we reached capacity – things we had never had to do before at Hampton Court Palace.
When we reviewed how the season had gone, it was clear that our team had varying levels of experience, tolerance and resilience when dealing with challenging conversations with visitors. We wanted to provide them with a programme of development so they could deliver effective customer service and create the best experience for visitors.”
Why Connor?
“Connor took the trouble to meet with our team as we wanted to deliver training jointly with our chosen partner. They got to know us, understood our concerns and then developed a personal programme of development that absolutely focused on addressing these.” continues Julie.
The approach
“Connor developed a half day workshop for all of our Magic Garden team, including me.” explains Julie.
Two Connor consultants worked with 14 people including team leaders and admissions staff to help them overcome their concerns over a second season at the Magic Garden. Following this, the Connor team worked with the team leaders at Hampton Court Palace to deliver the same programme as part of an induction for 16 seasonal members of staff, who were recruited to deal with increased visitor numbers during peak times.
“Right from the start, the engagement was valuable. Connor enabled us all to reflect on our experiences from 2016. It was an emotional, cathartic session. The team committed to the development and improving our individual and collective capabilities.”
