Employee training is essential whether you operate year-round or run a seasonal business. In the lead-up to your busy season, you will be training new hires and giving yourself time to get your full staff up to speed on your business operations. 

Whether you’re looking for a refresher on custom fields or customer service basics, FareHarbor offers resources to get you and your seasonal staff comfortable with your Dashboard, day-to-day operations, and other aspects of your busy season operations. 

To help you get set up for your peak season, we’ve put together this guide to seasonal training that you can use for your entire team. Follow these steps for a great start to your season!

Why You Should Train Seasonal Employees

Many companies experience a boost in business during a certain season, and for some, that means you will need to hire temporary employees. Getting them up to speed quickly enough to support your business during your seasonal rush affects your other employees, your customers, and your bottom line. 

Set Them Up to Succeed

Seasonal employees are often the face of your business during your busiest time of year, and they probably interact with high volumes of customers. Customers don’t know who your seasonal staff is, but they do expect good, consistent customer service, especially if they are repeat customers.

Not only should your employees favorably represent your business during facetime with customers, but they must also be intimately familiar with how your activities run. 

Recruit Returning Workers

Just like you find yourself searching for seasonal workers year after year, seasonal workers are hoping to build relationships with businesses to return to work. They will be more likely to return for your next busy season when they feel supported. 

By giving them the tools to succeed, you can build up your pool of returning workers for the next time you need short-term support. 

Tips for Training Seasonal Employees

1. Deliver Essential Dashboard Training

One of the best ways to have a smooth season is to make sure your Dashboard is set up to meet your expectations—and more importantly, that you and your staff are comfortable using it! 

We recommend starting with the pre-busy season Dashboard checklist. Here, you can review Dashboard setup, important settings, and reports. This is a good place to loop in any essential staff members who will also need to access certain parts of your Dashboard throughout your season.

Some Dashboard tasks are simple to perform yourself, once you get the hang of them. Here are a few Dashboard actions you might consider training new (and existing) staff on. 

• Add users: Add a new staff member to your Dashboard and allow them to take reservations, update bookings, and more.
• Use the availability updater: Make quick changes to multiple availabilities and items simultaneously. This helps you save time and ensures accuracy across your calendar. 

• Manage an item’s listing: Put your activity’s best face forward by updating an item’s basic info, photos, or health and safety policy. 
• Refund a customer: Issue a full or partial refund directly from a customer’s booking. You can also issue a refund on a canceled booking using a gift card.
• Set up custom fields: Optimize your book form for your specific activities by gathering additional information from your customers, like if they want to add transportation, or enter the number of participants in a group experience. 

Pro Tip: Request a Live Training

Whether you plan to train seasonal staff members or need a refresher on certain Dashboard actions, you can request a live training session with a FareHarbor specialist at any time. Contact FareHarbor Support for details.

2. Utilize the Help Center & Other FareHarbor Resources

Getting seasonal staff up to date on your Dashboard can be an ongoing process, and FareHarbor is here to help year-round. 

One of the best ways to support seasonal staff is by making sure they know what resources they have available if they need assistance. Along with showing them how to use your Dashboard, don’t forget to show them the FareHarbor Help Center and how to contact FareHarbor Support. 

Attend Live (and Watch On-Demand) Webinars 

FareHarbor webinars are an excellent way to get seasonal staff members acquainted with the Dashboard, and give them the chance to get their questions answered live. The FareHarbor 101 and FareHarbor for You webinars are geared toward your entire team, including business owners, reservationists, and tour guides. 

• • FareHarbor 101: Create a Foundation for Success: Start here to learn all the tips you need to be the most successful FareHarbor user possible. 
  • FareHarbor for You: Tools for the Reservationist: Train your reservationists on everything they need to know about making and taking bookings.
  • FareHarbor for You: Tools for the Guide: Train tour guides on essential Dashboard actions, like viewing their daily manifest, and skills a tour guide should master. 

You can explore the full FareHarbor for You series here, as well as register for our upcoming live webinars. 

3. Train Seasonal Staff for Daily Operations & Customer Interactions

With the Dashboard training underway, don’t forget about the other day-to-day aspects of the job, like leading tours, checking customers in, and interacting with guests in general. 

Some of this information will be new for seasonal hires, while it can serve as a refresher for more seasoned staff members.

Promote Hands-On and Peer-to-Peer Learning

If you need to get new team members up to speed quickly, hands-on opportunities help them practice the types of scenarios they’ll experience on the job. 

• Get new hires acquainted with your business: Give them an on-site tour to show them all the important areas at your business.
• Let them shadow other staff: Send your new hire out on a tour with a more experienced guide.
• Encourage tour guides to be independent: Let guides go off script to create authentic moments that are sure to stand out to customers. 

Focus on Business Knowledge and Customer Skills

While your new hires are likely experienced in customer service, they still need to learn the nuances of your specific business.

• Provide front desk and booking training: Instruct team members on how to answer the phone, respond to social media messages, and interact with customers.
• Train staff in handling customer complaints: Dealing with challenging customers is just part of the job. Make sure your staff is prepared. 
• Review the many ways to improve the guest experience: Like the insider tips about your area that make the experience memorable.

Enhance the Employee Experience with Tools & Resources

Training seasonal staff can feel like a chore when you don’t have clear processes in place. Using tools like the Dashboard and scheduling software can relieve some of the burden. 

• Create a resource list: Make sure staff have essential information at their fingertips like contact information for other team members, Dashboard login credentials, area maps, and more.
• Onboard new hires to your staff scheduling software: Set your team up for success by using staff scheduling software to help them track their work schedules. 
• Set employees up with their daily manifest: During your busiest times, it’s helpful for tour guides, drivers and crew members to review all bookings for the day on the manifest.
• Instruct employees to set up crew notifications: Crew notifications help staff stay informed on upcoming assignments, new bookings, and more.
• Ensure all employees download the FareHarbor app: This way, they can access the Dashboard on the go!

Training seasonal workers will positively affect your whole team’s performance. It is a worthwhile investment that will pay off as your season advances. Consider the training experience as a whole and what it can look like for your specific team.

Looking for more pre-busy season tips? Check out this marketing and SEO checklist.