Teamwork

Yesterday; Marc, Andrea, Aaron and I took a break from the office and went to lunch. It was our “summer-is-over-let’s-recap-and-see-what-we-need-to-do-to-improve” meeting. And it went very well.

Aaron’s solution to improving just about anything is simple: more technology. We made great advances this year, loading up check-in lists to Google docs which made things much faster. We set records of having our money reconciled and canteen cards done by 6:45. Now if we could just get bar codes on everyone’s three-week letters, we could just scan them in. In a matter of years, we won’t need anyone to actually work check-in – just have kiosks! Of course, it won’t ever go to that, but the bar code idea’s not bad. And technology would help improve our system: we could run credit cards at check-in and – best of all – if we went to doing express via Google docs, too, then I would know every kid who has arrived which would make switching kids to different cabins on registration day easier. It’s so much easy to move a kid who has arrived yet!

Marc is the quiet one in our meetings, but that’s because he’s processing everything before he puts in his two-cents. He’s all about getting technology up and running if we know what we want, so that’s good. And he agreed that putting the summer staff to work more on registration days would lighten our loads, maybe to the point that we wouldn’t have to work so many of them! He’ll also be my go-to person to get the right things up on the on-line registration, not to mention solving the number 1 problem we add: the ability for parents to log back in to their account and pay their remaining balance!

Andrea thought the summer went wonderful! But her only experience was last summer when computer systems got changed over and that ended up being a disaster. With that in mind, I didn’t have a very tough act to follow! She also thrives with lots of people around. She had ideas about moving some things to make the flow of people easier and she really wanted to use more of the staff to fill in some gaps. What we’ll be working on most is improving the junior staff check-in and communication. Although it improved a little over the summer, I did get a bit tired of 13-year-olds thinking they knew how to run camp as soon as they put on a staff shirt. I mean, it might be my first summer, but I’ve at least got 20 years of living up on them. Right?

As for me, I am ever about making things more efficient. Anything that will save me or others some time, I want to see happen. And, apparently, I’m pretty good at it. Aaron said he hasn’t seen a better summer as far as that went – and he really appreciated that I had everything ready to go well before starting time. For me, that’s a matter of course. I don’t want to be spinning circles as 200 kids arrive on our doorstep. And if I don’t, surely no one else does.

All in all, it was a very good meeting. My project now is to write up the final report on it and e-mail it out to everyone. And then to make the improvements that fall under my responsibility. But what I got out of the meeting most was this: we are a team. It’s amazing to work with a group of people who want to see you succeed, support what you’re trying to accomplish, and are there to fill in the gaps when you just can’t do it. I have always seen my place in an office as a supporting role. I’m not in the forefront…and I don’t want to be. That can be a frustrating position unless you have a good team you’re supporting. And I do. So, even though things are going to get more difficult around here as we transition from kids (who don’t need a lot to be pleased) to women (who need the world and then some to be pleased), having my co-workers behind me will get me up those hills. And I hope I can do the same for them.