New Webinar: "Creating Service Excellence in Your Library"

Creating Service Excellence in Your Library: Lessons From the Best Customer Service Businesses
A Library 2.0 Service, Safety, and Security Webinar with Dr. Steve Albrecht

OVERVIEW: 

While you may have your favorite fast food menu item, the Gold Standards for service quality are Chick-fil-A and In-N-Out Burger. Need to get a new Apple product? There are many reasons why the Apple store in your mall is a better choice than your local electronics retailer. Why do we tend to go to the same restaurants, coffee shops, and retail stores? Low prices and a convenient location are not the only reasons.

The best service providers do these things, over and over:

• They value their customers’ time.
• They have systems in place that make it easy to do business with them.
• They screen, hire, and train employees who care about serving both their customers, bosses, and co-workers.
• They value the historical legacy of their founders. They teach that history and work culture to all new hires.
• Their employees are empowered to solve problems and make good decisions on behalf of their customers and the business.
• They listen to their customers’ concerns, complaints, and good ideas.
• They don’t harm their reputation, especially in the social media space.

Can we apply these lessons to the library? Yes, but only if we are prepared to look closely and differently at how, why, where, and when we do business with our patrons.

This session brings Dr. Steve Albrecht’s many years of writing and teaching not just customer service, but customer service excellence. He will discuss how you can help your library model best practices from the best service companies, even as a specialized public-sector business.

LEARNING AGENDA: 

• How to hire library staff for politeness, enthusiasm, and work ethic.
• How to make it easy for your patrons to do business with your library by creating systems that empower motivated employees to do their jobs well.
• The power of patron satisfaction surveys. The need for data to make decisions.
• Developing your perception of the Patron Service Value Model.
• Lessons learned from not-so-great service public-service providers: the IRS, the state DMV, and the Building Department.

DATE: Thursday, September 10th, 2026, 2:00 - 3:00 pm US - Eastern Time

COST:

• $99/person - includes live attendance and any-time access to the recording and the presentation slides and receiving a participation certificate.
• To arrange group discounts (see below), to submit a purchase order, or for any registration difficulties or questions, email admin@library20.com.

TO REGISTER: 

Click HERE to register and pay. You can pay by credit card. You will receive an email within a day with information on how to attend the webinar live and how you can access the permanent webinar recording. If you are paying for someone else to attend, you'll be prompted to send an email to admin@library20.com with the name and email address of the actual attendee.

If you need to be invoiced or pay by check, if you have any trouble registering for a webinar, or if you have any questions, please email admin@library20.com.

NOTE: Please check your spam folder if you don't receive your confirmation email within a day.

SPECIAL GROUP RATES (email admin@library20.com to arrange):

• Multiple individual log-ins and access from the same organization paid together: $75 each for 3+ registrations, $65 each for 5+ registrations. Unlimited and non-expiring access for those log-ins.
• The ability to show the webinar (live or recorded) to a group located in the same physical location or in the same virtual meeting from one log-in: $299.
• Large-scale institutional access for viewing with individual login capability: $499 (hosted either at Library 2.0 or in Niche Academy). Unlimited and non-expiring access for those log-ins.

DR. STEVE ALBRECHT

Since 2000, Dr. Steve Albrecht has trained tens of thousands of library employees in 28+ states, live and online, in service, safety, security, and leadership. His programs for both staff and library leaders are fast, entertaining, and provide tools that can be put to use immediately in the library workspace. His books include:

The Library Leader’s Guide to Employee Coaching: Building a Performance Culture One Meeting at a Time (in-press, Bloomsbury, 2026)

The Library Leader’s Guide to Human Resources: Keeping it Real, Legal, and Ethical (Rowman & Littlefield, 2025)

The Safe Library: Keeping Users, Staff, and Collections Secure (Rowman & Littlefield, 2023)

Library Security: Better Communication, Safer Facilities (ALA, 2015)

Steve holds a doctoral degree in Business Administration (D.B.A.), an M.A. in Security Management, a B.S. in Psychology, and a B.A. in English. He is board-certified in HR, security management, employee coaching, and threat assessment. He has written 28 books on business, security, and leadership. He provides a loving home for four rescue dogs. 

More on The Safe Library at thesafelibrary.com. Follow on X (Twitter) at @thesafelibrary and on YouTube @thesafelibrary. Dr. Albrecht's professional website is drstevealbrecht.com.

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