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Morgan Hill, California
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the centralized phone receptionist chronically routes calls erroneously, which
frustrates and overburdens staff.
Additionally, calls are generally filtered through a central receptionist, which does not
routinely perform adequate screening in order to route callers to the correct staff
person.
118.
Recommendation:
The City Manager should ensure that the Central
Receptionist function receives adequate training to filter incoming calls so that
they are routed to the appropriate staff.
Also see our above recommendation to front provide reception staff with additional
training to filter calls more effectively.
A formal return email and phone call policy should be included in the Division’s
Policy & Procedures Manual that requires all staff to return all phone calls and emails
before the end of the day to further the City’s overall goal of providing excellent
customer service. This was included in an earlier recommendation.
Training/Cross Training
Staff indicated that some training has occurred outside of the office in recent years,
however, staffing constraints have left staff with little time to attend outside training.
In addition, some staff and focus group interviewees reported that additional
supervisory training appears to be necessary for managers and supervisors, as well as
development review processing training for some contract planners and newly hired
planners.
For example, it was widely reported that some contract planners are not adequately
supervised and are not properly trained on the City’s development review process,
code interpretation practices, policies, philosophies and file maintenance
requirements. As a result, development review processing and file maintenance varies
significantly among planners. These differences have created frustration for
developers and regular full time planning staff. For example, regular full time staff
must take over contract planners’ projects at the implementation stage (e.g., building
and engineering permit processes) because Contract Planners only process current
planning projects through the decision-making stage (e.g., Director, Planning
Commission and/or Council approval). Processing and file maintenance differences
among contract planners and regular full time staff often prevents a seamless
transition, which slows processing.
In addition, there is a perception by some that newer planners are not being
appropriately integrated into the City’s system and instead have been inserting their