IN June 2018, I attended a workshop in Shah Alam to revise two training courses which are compulsory for travel agents and tour operators to attend.
The first course is for successful applicants before new business licences are issued to them and the second for licence renewal.
In the group assigned to develop the module on safety and security, I conceptualised and proposed several new measures. They were accepted in the workshop and subsequently incorporated into the revised training course, which was later conducted nationwide.
One of the measures was on the need for all organisations to have contingency plans but over 99% are without them.
This prompted me into developing a new training programme on contingency plans. After that, I started conducting training workshops in Kota Kinabalu and Kuala Lumpur.
Last month, I flew to Langkawi to participate in the revision of the same course that was last held at Shah Alam three years ago.
This came after the resort island had reopened from Sept 16 to fully-vaccinated local tourists who had tested negative for Covid-19.
Recently, while discussing with several training experts, I discovered many were not very clear about standard operating procedures (SOP), which are a set of step-by-step instructions developed within an organisation for its personnel to carry out routine operations for ensuring consistency.
It then dawned on me that I should have conducted workshops on SOP first before leapfrogging to contingency plans, which are similar to SOP but used for handling emergencies, accidents, incidents, and natural or manmade disasters that include robberies, riots, attacks or terrorism.
However, there is a big difference in writing down SOP for routine work and contingency plans for acting in emergencies. SOP must be very detailed so that all staff, including those who are new, can understand clearly and perform according to set standards and expectations.
On the other hand, contingency plans are for handling situations that seldom occur, and many people are usually at a loss when disaster strikes. Therefore, contingency plans in PDF format must be stored in phones for easy retrieval, advising what to do and who to call immediately.
Contingency plans would include the contact numbers of relevant staff tasked to handle various situations and also suppliers of various services who include a locksmith for unlocking a tampered office lock, or the nearest mechanic wherever and whenever a vehicle breaks down.
Therefore, contingency plans would differ from one organisation to another and must be updated quarterly, with the change of staff and suppliers such as replacing old contact numbers with new ones and all staff undergoing timely briefings and adequate training to plug any gaps.
On the other hand, SOP stay largely the same, but staff must be monitored closely to ensure they are following written instructions and called out immediately when they donât.
It is up to individual companies to decide what their SOP should be and how well they are enforced.
A great SOP would require all customer feedback to be recorded by the staff, monitored by a superior and when necessary, take restitutive measures without delay.
The success or failure of an organisation depends on whether the top management is informed of customer feedback.
Regardless of whether feedbacks are complaints, concerns or compliments, they are equally important, and personnel must be trained to handle all of them well.
Consumers who bother to complain could become the most loyal customers if shown due respect and caring efforts made.
Likewise, customers who share their concerns should be appreciated as ignoring them would make them feel unimportant.
Similarly, staff must be taught to say thank your upon receiving a compliment, as customers would be disappointed if they do not get an appreciative response.
Hence, SOP are necessary to ensure all personnel deliver quality and consistent service and engagements with colleagues, customers and suppliers in a most professional manner and not left to individual discretion, and certainly not at their whims and fancies.
But most businesses, including those in travel and tours, do not have SOP in written form. Staff may perform according to their own assumption, interpretation or observation. All these could easily lead to misunderstanding and miscommunication, resulting in low productivity.
Without written SOP, small and medium enterprises are built on weak foundations that could easily crumble as they grow bigger in a booming economy.
With good SOP, they grow into strong and large corporations. With contingency plans, they could even overcome future shocks.
YS Chan
Petaling Jaya
