About a year after being laid off from her job at Americorps, mom applied for a position at Enterprise, the car rental company. I remember that they called her for an interview, and when I talked to her about it she felt like it went well. But she didn’t get the job and was very disappointed.
Here is the cover letter she sent with her resume, which I found on her old computer a few months after she died:
May 20, 2009
To Whom It May Concern:
I am pleased to provide you with information regarding my skills, particularly in the area of customer service, training, and developing great teams.
Over the last twenty plus years, I have been working in the areas of Customer Service and Customer Service training and development.
I am skilled in bringing teams together and creating opportunities for those who work with me to become more than their whole.
You will have seen from my resume that I was a Team Leader with First Data, handling incoming calls for Sprint. At First Data, I eventually became one of the trainers, and I developed a short form to measure specific skills.
At Cox Communications, I was tasked with hiring, training, and growing teams. During my tenure there, I was asked to turn a customer service team into a sales team. At first, the CSRs were hesitant because they were not used to selling; however, in their first year of sales, our team sold more than the original sales team.
During my seven years In the Alachua County School District, I was recognized for developing an AmeriCorps team that was specifically geared to helping underachieving readers to reach their goals. This is relevant to a call center environment because it included recruiting, hiring, training, and growing great tutors.
Great customer service is a must in any environment, but it is especially critical in an environment where voice and manner are the only touches.
I am happy to provide you with my resume, and I believe that my skills will prove to be an asset to Enterprise.
Cordially,
Kathleen A. Gagne