As I mentioned in an earlier post, I am helping with the Maine SkillsUSA competition in Outdoor Leadership. Part of that involves reviewing the skills we assess. Some of them are straightforward—navigation, first aid, and responding to emergencies. But one area that quickly becomes a challenge is measuring basic customer service skills.
In outdoor leadership, technical skills matter, but the experience a guide provides is perhaps more important. A great guide knows how to read clients, anticipate needs, and create a trip that leaves clients with good lasting memories. But how do you objectively measure something as subjective as good customer service?
I've done some asking around, hoping to find a well-established way to assess this skill in a structured competition. So far, nothing truly useful has surfaced. Unlike navigation, where you can score someone on whether they arrive at the correct destination, customer service is more nuanced. It’s about tone, body language, and adaptability—things that are tough to quantify.
One approach could be role-playing scenarios where competitors handle different client interactions—dealing with a nervous paddler, handling a last-minute change in plans, or responding to an unhappy customer. Judges could then score them based on criteria like communication, empathy, and problem-solving. Another idea is gathering feedback from real clients during training trips, but that’s harder to implement in a timed competition setting.
Ultimately, this is a critical piece of being a successful guide, and I’d love to hear thoughts from others both clients and guides. Have you seen an effective way to measure customer service in guiding? Let me know—because the goal here isn’t just to judge competitors but to help develop better guides for the future.
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