Ready Set

Searching for clothes, trying them on and choosing them can be stressful enough, but imagine if there is more to the story.

In this episode, Georgie is joined by Cynthia Kralik, CEO of Ready Set, a charitable organisation helping job seekers facing disadvantage, walk into interviews and jobs with confidence, dignity and real support behind them.

Together, Georgie and Cynthia unpack how Ready Set goes far beyond providing interview and job outfits. They discuss how combining high-quality clothing with thoughtful, personalised styling can create an experience grounded in respect, care and hope. This isn’t just about trying on clothes; it’s about rebuilding confidence and creating a sense of possibility.
 
They dive into the importance of deeply understanding your customer and the customer journey, and why equipping volunteers and teams with context, so they truly understand the “why”, is critical to delivering meaningful, human-centred experiences.

The conversation also explores the impact of a calm, considered physical environments on the customer experience. Think spacious, light-filled change rooms and genuinely welcoming spaces that put people at ease.

If you care about customer experience, retail or great service in general, this episode offers practical ideas you can apply anywhere.

Subscribe for more conversations like this, share the episode with someone who’d value it, and leave a review to help others find the show.

Georgie Stayches, host of The Art & Heart of CX, brings a human lens to how businesses design Customer Experience (CX). She explores how every little detail impacts how a customer interprets, experiences and recalls a situation - from our senses to the built and natural environments - and how this can impact brand loyalty, word of mouth marketing and revenue.

Each episode she invites a special guess from all works of life and industries to share what they consider the art and hear of CX.

Want to hear more from Georgie? Her keynote presentations inspire audiences with real-world strategies to elevate CX, understand human behaviour and build lasting audience loyalty. 

Find out more at georgiestayches.com 

Transcript

Welcome And What Ready Set Does

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hello, I'm Georgie Stages, and welcome to the art and heart of CX. I am very excited to be sitting at a table at Ready Set in South Melbourne with CEO Cynthia Kralick to talk through not only this amazing organisation but how they work through customer experience because it's a really unique experience that they're providing for people. So first of all, welcome Cynthia. Thank you very much.

SPEAKER_00 0:31

And a pleasure to be here, George.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Oh, it's great. And I've known of ReadySet for some years now, and I'll get you in a short, you know, short moment to sort of talk through what you do, but it's always fascinated me, fascinated me because you act almost like a retail service, but you're not retail. And the service that you provide brings a whole nother level of requirements for customer experience. You've been going since 2011, and I know one thing that really stood out to me on your website is ReadySit gives confidence, dignity, and hope to those experiencing disadvantaged. Tell us how you do that.

SPEAKER_00 1:14

Great question. Look, we're a charitable organization, and so we've uh and our mission really is to support uh job seekers who are facing barriers to employment through the provision of uh clothing, that's one aspect, but also job readiness training through with support from our career coaches. And the the intent behind that mission is really to give people support where they need not the most, obviously, there are different aspects of their life that they need supporting, but it removes what we consider to be uh a practical barrier to employment. I mean, if you're looking for work and you're you don't have the confidence to walk into a shop, you don't certainly

Removing Clothing Barriers To Work

SPEAKER_00 2:03

don't have the financial means to purchase anything, having somebody work with you and give you really high quality clothing, fantastic advice on how to put an outfit together that suits your personality and the job that you're wanting to look for, uh just just relieves this enormous burden. And and you, you know, it's it's fascinating seeing the the transformation when you know from when people walk through the door feeling quite nice, I guess, you know, despondent and and and lacking that sense of you know self-esteem and feeling of dignity uh to the moment where they leave us and they just have a spring in their steps. So it is about giving people confidence, dignity, and hope, as you say, but it's also just removing what is a very real practical barrier on in their journey to employment. So they're really getting ready to face uh an a prospective employer, and so it just removes that that barrier.

SPEAKER_01 3:01

And you're one of the only, if not maybe the only organization of your type that works with any gender. So you work with um male, female, non-binary, LGBTQI, plus any community.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

Are you the you you're well certainly in Greater Melbourne, we are, if in terms of the a charitable organization like ours where we do both the career coaching as well as the styling and and dressing service. We were in you mentioned earlier that we were established in 2011, and we were at the time the only one in Australia that supported all genders. And I think it really came about. We were founded, by the way, by a group of amazing volunteers, and some of them are still with us, and they saw that there was a real gap

Why Ready Set Serves All Genders

SPEAKER_00 3:51

in and that men weren't there was no service like this supporting male job seekers. And so they were really determined to set something up that would fill fill that gap. Yes. And it's been really interesting actually to see, you know, since I've come on board uh just over three and a half years ago, and I've looked at the data, and really as far back as our data give, you know, tells us a story, we've had consistently 50% of our job seekers who are not female. And I think that's really telling an important story. And you know, we we find that males need uh the support as much, if not more, than than our female and non-binary.

SPEAKER_01 4:32

Wow, it's it's really interesting to look at that data, isn't it? And because I think sometimes there is an assumption of who needs the help. And so I'm sitting here in your office in South Melbourne and walking in the door, and it's just clothes racks everywhere, everywhere. But it is like a store, it feels like a store. It doesn't feel like second-hand clothes are being given out. And and your clothes are a mix, aren't they? Because you get given, you get donated clothes, but there's some brands that also support you. So some of the clothes you receive are brand new.

SPEAKER_00 5:07

Yeah, we're very lucky actually. We have a really strong supporter base of individual donors, and and it'll be people who go through their work wardrobes, they've have gently worn clothing that they feel is appropriate for us, as well as things with tags. I mean, I've donated things myself, but I've never worn. And and as you say, there are sort of clothing or retailers

Donations With Retail Level Standards

SPEAKER_00 5:30

or clothing manufacturers, shoe manufacturers that divert some of their oversupplies to us, or they may have stock that's run the course of its the season and it's gone through their sales, etc., and they no longer have a need for it, and they divert it to us. But equally, you know, because of the network of donors that we've established, we we've also got people that we can call upon and say, look, we're really, I mean, today, for example, we we we have had a need for, we've got a client that's coming in and it's actually 8XL, which is a quite a significant size, and it's not readily available in shops. And so it's about picking up the phone and and asking them if they can sort of send a few items to us so that we can support that person. But back to the point about it being sort of almost like a shop, I think it's really important for people, for people in general, frankly, but I think especially if you've if you're you've experienced hardship, you're experiencing hardship. And some some of the I we call them clients, by the way. Uh so if I refer to clients, that's what we're talking about. They some have experienced hardship throughout their lives. If they're young, you know, we we actually work with young people starting from the age of 15. Um, some of them have been in and out of the foster care system, or they've really experienced, you know, extreme poverty and and you know, disadvantage in their own families. We work with um, you know, prisoners who are transitioning out of the prison system, you know, people who have experienced mental health or domestic violence, there's a whole range of issues. So if you've if that's your that's your story, right, you walk through the door not really knowing how you're going to be treated and and what to expect of the experience. And and as much as you know, the the the the agencies that refer the people to us explain what we do, but I don't think that they really understand until they've walked through the door. And they're met with warmth and respect. They're you know, they they're immediately because it's we work on a booking system, they're sat down at reception and welcomed by the volunteers who are sort of sitting behind the reception desk, you know. Hello, John, and you know, treating them really with the respect that they they they they you know that that they deserve, of course. And then they've they work with two stylists and dressers who really get to know them and understand what their needs are, and they're given clothes that make them feel good. So it's not about you know giving them just a bag of clothes and saying, well, off you go. It's actually an appointment with them, they're you know, listening to what they what they would like and what colours they like and what styles they like, and and making sure that the outfit that they walk away with may feel fantastic in. And equally, when if they're meeting with one of our career coaches, you know, again, there's a level of nervousness because they some of them may have never worked before or they don't feel that they've got much to offer a prospective employer. So it's really working with that on, you know, on a one-on-one basis with a career coach who kind of encourages them to think about what they can do, what they want to do. So I think it's really, yeah, it's the experience is more than just okay, have a 45-minute session with the coach, and here you go, there's a bag of clothes. It's much more than that.

SPEAKER_01 9:14

And there's a real, there's a sense of nurturing here as well. And as soon as you walk in the door, you can feel that respect. Like we've just walked into the menswear. Yeah. Well, I should say the sort of business menswear, yeah, suits and jackets and so forth. Because it isn't just suits and jackets. You've got high viz, you've got casual wear, because every job is different. Exactly. It's right, everything, shoes, and and but everything is meticulous. And so you get a sense of the respect that the clothes are treated with, which of course then goes on to the respect that each of your clients is treated with.

SPEAKER_00 9:52

Indeed, indeed. And I think um I was mentioning to you earlier, Georgie, that we get amazing donations, and we're very grateful to our community who takes care in what they do donate to us. But, you know, for time to time, and it's, you know, as you can imagine, we all have different standards, right? We might get something that has a pool in it or a stain that will never ever make it to our racks because we we want the person that we're sort of supporting to feel not like they're given, you know, something that they're like. Go down to an op shop and maybe an op shop is you know, can quite easily sell those sorts of things. Yes. But we actually want everything to be clean. Yeah. There's, I mean, I've been working here for quite for three and a half years, and I've never got this whiff of musty smell in the place. It's all fresh, everything is uh unique, ironed and steamed, it's all you know, put really meticulously looked at. And if things that are donated to us don't meet that standard, well then we'll gladly on donate, and which we do to other charitable organisations. So we have about three or four that we work with, and they come here every couple of weeks into, you know, they alternate, pick up bags that we've, you know, the volunteers have sorted and determined that they're not suitable for our purposes. So, you know, nothing goes to landfill, which is which is great, and everything is repurposed. But as I say, you know, we only keep what we, you know, really high quality garments.

SPEAKER_01 11:22

And as you say, your clients come from it, maybe that they're coming to you from hardship and it could be a life cycle of hardship, it might be fairly recent hardship, they might be coming out of the justice system. So not only are they not equipped at the moment with the clothing, I I can imagine even if they had the means to walk into a Kmart or a Target, that is a really overwhelming experience. And you're coming to from a very different point of view of someone else who says, Oh, I've got a job interview, oh, I must buy a new outfit, and it's exciting, and this is really daunting. And so, how do you sort of journey map, you know, that experience that your clients are going through and how they'll how they feel when they come through the door and sort of each part of your services, you know, how you've tailored that.

SPEAKER_00 12:18

Well, as I said earlier, we work on a referral basis. So we work with uh we it's around 250 agencies that we work with, and they are they can be, you know, as I mentioned earlier, the the prison system. So there'll be a few, you know, centers there that we work with, or they might be employment services, welfare organizations, youth welfare schools as well. We work with the school network that work with with kids that uh for various reasons, usually it'll be sort of some intellectual disability or disadvantage. They they won't be going on to further study, and so they're preparing them to transition to work. So we work with an array of agencies, and I guess what they do at the at that front end is I mean, you obviously their objective

Referral Intake And Styling Questions

SPEAKER_00 13:07

is to get people into job, into work, and and they'll you know, do a little bit of that initial triage and to to work out, well, this person really doesn't have the means to do this themselves. Uh, it would be quite easy for them, maybe, because a lot of these organizations have received funding. So they could give them a you know $200 voucher and go say, say, go, go to Kmart. Yes. But they realise that actually it's more than just the clothes. It's more than just the colours, right? And so that's that's that initial triage is determined at the front end. When they book somebody in, we we get as much profile data as we can in advance. So we know obviously there's you know the gender that they identify as, if they choose to tell us if they're LGBTQI, they can, and it's not just you know, it's up to them. Some sort of basic sort of sizing information, the kind of job that they're going to go into, some preferences, all of those sorts of things to help the volunteers that morning, like in the morning, we run the report of who we've got booked in, and so that they begin to curate a selection of clothes just as a starting point. So, and it's really is just a starting point. And then once they're here, there's that conversation with them. And it'll go like this. Well, Georgie, you know, what kind of work are you thinking of doing? It says here that you're looking at getting into customer service. Do you have a preferred colour? You know, what what what kind of makes you feel good when you're wearing things? And and then they'll just start putting together an outfit. And and you know, and I've I've heard the volunteers myself, I'll say, look, I think we can do better than that. Just hold on, we're gonna see what we've got in the warehouse for you.

SPEAKER_01 14:52

So and then they'll put together full outfit, like it's like an image consultant. So they have their, you know, a style consultant.

SPEAKER_00 14:59

It is and they give them tips and tricks too about how to then kind of work with because we don't just give them one outfit. There'll be sort of a selection of things that they can mix and match, and then an invitation to come back if they get a job. Because as we all know, if you get a five-day a week job, you're not going to get paid on the first day. So you need an outfit to see you through at least the first week. And then equally with the coaching, which is a very a really important complimentary service, it is really about how to, how can that person usually they come to us because they're preparing for an interview. So, you know, we're a session with the career coach, it's all about, well, let's role-play some questions. And we have I hear these stories all the time, but our coaches say, Oh, you know, we've just received a phone call from, you know, you know, uh Andrew, who we saw last week, and all the questions that we were practicing, he was actually asked at interview. It just boosts their confidence.

SPEAKER_01 15:58

And so. And I imagine it's that sense of some people have got my back. I've got a team behind me indeed that are cheering me on. Yeah, helping me. When you were talking before about the questions at the volunteer team, which I do want to talk about as well. But the questions I ask, I love sort of, you know, what's your favourite colour? What do you feel good in? Because not, I mean, I like clothes shopping, but not everyone actually likes clothes shopping. Add the layers on that your clients have experienced and why they're needing this service that I can imagine it's for some of them, but maybe the majority, it's pretty daunting to come in here. And then to have someone say, you know, well, what size are you? Right, here's a size 10 outfit that might not be anything to what you would usually wear. So to be able to tailor it is amazing, but I love this the positioning of the questions because it invites a conversation rather than sort of really direct questions that you go, oh, I don't know, you know, it it I haven't worn work clothes before or whatever it is. Yeah. Do you when you work with the team of volunteers, how do you what sort of stuff do you go around about the language that you use and how we how to speak with the clients when they're coming in? Yeah, knowing how they'll be feeling.

SPEAKER_00 17:16

Yeah, and I think you know, like any job, I guess, you know, our volunteers, you know, are screened before we bring them on because it's really important for us to have make sure that the volunteers that are associated with Ready Set are the right fit. Yes. And and so there's that that initial, you know, obviously screen screening for want of a better word, but there's a conversation with uh an applicant and to understand why it is they want to volunteer with an organization like ours, or the experiences that they've had, and and you kind of get a sense there if they they're likely

Training Volunteers For Vulnerable Clients

SPEAKER_00 17:53

to be the right fit. Yes. But we also have training. And I think it's really important because you know, at the end of the day, our volunteers are at the working at the coal face with our clients, and it can be a really daunting experience for them, right? And and I think they know that that our our clients they're vulnerable, you know, and in the different degrees of vulnerability, but they are feeling vulnerable. So it makes them nervous too about how they're going to approach working with yes. So we have a really good mentoring and training program where they've got really great and comprehensive background information about who we are, what we stand for in terms of our values, the kind of people that we see and why they come to us. So they've got all that context, and then they they're buddied up with a more experienced volunteer who sort of works with them in the first, you know, usually it's around three weeks, you know, observing, you kind of working in partnership with that that more sort of more experienced volunteer. So you kind of get a real sense of what it means and the kind of language to use, etc. Though we don't script things from all of them, but I think it's um learning on the on the job, if you like, and working with sort of uh a mentor is probably is really effective. And and then and then the lead volunteer, if you like, is the the mentor gives the mentee an opportunity to kind of lead the conversation with the the client and and then gets receives feedback. But I think it's I think it's really important to set people up properly because I mean of course we want we want our clients to feel welcomed and treated with respect. But equally, I think it's it's just as important to make sure that our volunteers are kind of in a way set up properly, you know, and that we don't throw people in at the deep end.

SPEAKER_01 19:59

Oh, absolutely. And that's such a key thing with and in fact, I think every conversation I had in season one of the podcast, the the power of the customer experience at each thing came down to the staff or the volunteers. So you can automate, you can have technology, you can have the design, and I want to talk sort of a bit about that in a moment, but it actually comes down to that human connection. And and in a a world where you know AI, automation, technology are so prevalent, it's human connection that is playing more and more an important role in this. And as you say, the start, you don't want to throw your staff into a situation that they're not comfortable in. And then if you do, the client's gonna pick up on that as well. So the last thing you want to do is come in and and the the people that you're working with are nervous, and then you get nervous. So all those things add to how the client feels during the experience.

SPEAKER_00 20:57

And we run surveys for everyone. Uh, obviously, it's a bit of an optional, but most of our job seekers agree to it's a very quick survey. And in when I read the the results, obviously we capture data around you know the experience and how that increased their confidence and did it provide them with a set of skills they didn't have before, all of that. But when you read the actual, you know, just the written sort of comments from them, it's always about the volunteers. I mean, they they say, Oh, you know, we're just absolutely awestruck, you know, that that you know how we were treated and the volunteers were so thoughtful and kind. And that's what you hear from the the job seekers. So I think it that it's important that they have that experience. Yes, and that they feel like

Feedback Loops And The Volunteer Ecosystem

SPEAKER_00 21:46

people care exactly for them. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 21:48

And I imagine you would get I mean, any good customer experience is constantly tweaking and testing, and and the feedback from not only the customers or the clients, but the feedback from the volunteers too. Is there any feedback you've had? What could be the tiniest thing that has made you change a part of the process or that you hadn't thought of before or do you find sort of, you know, there's little bits of insights coming out.

SPEAKER_00 22:15

Yeah. I'm just thinking of the last survey, we're just about to run another survey now. So we like in most organizations, we run a survey, then we have action plans and all of that. So we're we're just about ready to launch our next one. We always ask for for feedback. I think it comes down to, I mean, in terms of the day-to-day processes and how we work with our clients, I think most most volunteers have seen because they've got great inputs into how to do things differently and better and they just they implement things. So not like we've got a prescribed process in every single detail. So I think it's good to see that there's this this unwritten pro sense of process improvement that happens every day, which I'm very pleased about. But I think it's more about and there probably is a little bit of a tension in a charitable organisation when you're working with volunteers as opposed to an organization where you've got paid employees. My view is that if you apply the same principles, you're actually going to get because what you want is job satisfaction. Yes. You want people to have clarity about what their role is and what they're meant to be doing. And and that yeah yeah that that they would when they're talking about the organization that they're speaking highly of it because their own experience has been a positive one right. And so I think it's that where I think there's an opportunity especially for a not for profit where you know to be perfectly honest we don't have the same infrastructure that a that a you know a business might have but you it's important to actually have those mechanisms in place because you know we we're fueled by our volunteer base. We don't have the financial means to have a large paid infrastructure. So if it wasn't for the volunteers we wouldn't exist as and so it's important to make sure that we understand the volunteer work experience and and tap into how how do we make their their time with us meaningful, purposeful gives them opportunity for that social engagement as well as sort of feeling that they're they're making a difference because they're giving very generously of their own time on obviously every volunteer gives at least one day some gets more than one day. We have volunteers that actually volunteer twice a week and that's a that's a big chunk of their personal time.

SPEAKER_01 24:58

It is yeah and there's lots of data around when people think of customer experience and we'll use that term for the client experience here that it's all about the customer and the client but if you have a good experience customer experience set up across your business or your organization it actually means happier staff and employees which actually brings a cost down because it's higher attention less turnover less need for more recruitment you've got happy customers or clients because the staff are happy so they work hand in hand the two things.

SPEAKER_00 25:37

Yeah well rather than looking at it from a sort of a silo approach is actually looking at the ecosystem. Absolutely and and I think that's you know it's volunteers and and our customers or clients but it's also anybody who supports us frankly they're in that pick that ecosystem as well because if if we're doing a good job and we're delivering on our mission we'll have the impact that we set out to have and we can talk about the impact and we can you know tell the story of the people that we support with our supporters who in turn are the ones who help us do what we do because they're the ones that are donating clothing. They're the ones that if we have a financial appeal going they support us financially and so we really need to be able to tell those stories in an authentic and meaningful way.

SPEAKER_01 26:31

Yeah so it's it is an it's an ecosystem. It is and and earlier we were walking around and I know the team in the sorting area were ex were talking about how many clothes had just come in in a a really short amount of time this afternoon. And one of the batches was beautifully pres you know batched up in soup bag bag per size. Now this is by the person donating the clothes. So your story is getting out there because it as you you know I mean you might get some but that it wasn't a bag in a rubbish bag that you know people had been cleaning out of their wardrobe and just sort of tossed this bag together and brought it in the respect that had been given to these clothes when they got dropped off and then to hear and see the excitement in the team's face by look how beautifully these have been packaged and delivered and and so then that puts a you know a spring in the step of your team working with the clothes which then just kind of has that ripple effect over everything. So your your messaging is getting out there obviously around that that care and that detail and that respect because it seems to be happening throughout the cycle. Yeah absolutely um so we've talked about how important the the team are here but I'm really interested also in the the sort of built environment and the the the the place that people come to because we know in you know retail there's lots of strategies around to get people to buy more or this one thing I just cannot get over in retail is you can have these amazing retail stores and then just the dirtiest change rooms which is where you're trying the clothes on to look at going am I going to buy this? Do I feel good in it? Do I look good in it?

SPEAKER_00 28:24

How have you approached things like the change rooms or the space where people come and have the meeting with their stylists how have you sort of approached the design of of those

Space Design That Calms Nerves

SPEAKER_00 28:36

kind of physical things that people physical spaces people will you know sit in and be in when they come in well you've just had a bit of a walk through oh we're in a fairly old building although I think it's one of the most I don't know beautiful in a sense it's an old art deco building in South Melbourne and it has a lot of character but we've been here since the very beginning right but you'll notice having walked through that the prettiest spots are actually the change rooms they have uh beautiful lead light windows and uh lots of light streaming through everything is clean and tidy so I you know for and very and I think quite spacious.

SPEAKER_01 29:20

I I I was gonna say they are absolutely huge. And if we know anything about how you know spaces impact people I mean natural light is just people who know me or have listened know how passionate I am about natural light and the impact it has on our serotonin and reducing anxiety reducing depression.

SPEAKER_00 29:40

Yeah and you're and then the size of the change rooms like I know even you know if I go and try on clothes and I'm not experiencing the the emotional sort of history that's coming with a lot of your clients but if I'm in a tiny change room I get claustrophobic I get hot and bothered I get really sort of twitchy you know it's like oh get me out of here get me out of these clothes everything's annoying me your the change rooms here are so big I can and you've you just feel they've got that space because this is daunting they're trying on clothes maybe for the first time in this sort of style maybe this is the first you know job they're going to where they need a suit plus you're working with people you don't know who are going to help style you in the yeah so that as you say they're spacious they're very private there's always for every client that we have there's always two volunteers working with them so that if one of the volunteers has to go out into the warehouse to choose something else the the person's never alone and so what will happen you know is the other the other volunteer that stays in the change room which by the way is separated with a curtain where the person has privacy to get changed they'll just be chatting away with them sort of because again it's making sure the people feel at ease and that they don't feel you know because I know I mean some people do as I say they do come in and they are actually quite nervous about the experience and so yeah so I so so in fact you know that those are the spaces I mean everything is neat and tiny as you can see when though we're I can bout everywhere I can bout even though there's clothing racks in some offices because you've got a big sale coming up but everything yeah it's neat and it's ordered it's not clutter.

SPEAKER_01 31:27

That's fine. That's you've got a lot of stock but it you know when you walk into a space it's clutter and you feel you know it just it's not calming. Everything in here feels calm and it's a little sanctuary that they're coming into it's interesting yes when you're talking about feeling at ease you know I often talk in my keynotes around how do you want your customers to feel but how and also how do they actually want to feel and so the fact that you know it's around making them feel at ease making them feel comfortable. Yeah from a from a client perspective job seeker perspective it's everything that has been set up to make it welcoming clean inviting sort of area and the fact that everything I mean I can I know I keep going back to the menswear but I was sort of blown away by that space everything is on a hangar yep everything it's it's styled like it is in a menswear but it's and even though you've got a lot of stock it's not jam-packed in like you just I mean I'm thinking of a particular store in in the suburb we're in at the moment that is so jam-packed with it's quite a high end store but it's so jam-packed with clothes that you walk in and you're kind of like I don't even know where to look where my eyes should be going what I should be taking in.

SPEAKER_00 32:48

Periodically they'll go through the racks and do a bit of an audit and say look this has been here for too long and it's probably past its date and so we'll all donate it to another charity.

SPEAKER_01 33:00

And has from sort of you know 2011 when you started has the process always been that that you meet with a a volunteer or a team member that will put together an outfit for you? Did it start in the early days that people just came in and looked at racks of clothes from the very beginning that's what that's been the setup.

SPEAKER_00 33:20

It's so perfectly curated isn't it some of the feedback that we get from job seekers is look I I walked away with an outfit that I in my myself I would never have thought of putting together. And that's kind of nice too isn't it is yes yeah where you you feel great but you think oh look I would never have thought of putting these things together but I it looks fantastic. So because look the the the volunteers who are well at least the stylists and the dressers are are women and they've got a real eye but they don't push people I mean I think that's the important thing too they're not imposing their own style on others so they know how to work with with people and and and if somebody they dress somebody in an outfit and the person says look I really don't like the style of this dress. Yes

Coaching Impact And Confidence Stories

SPEAKER_00 34:09

they'll say fine let's see let's find what what would you rather A line would you rather this would you rather that and they'll work with you know I think that's really important.

SPEAKER_01 34:16

Oh gosh yes and it it just when you talk about that sort of comment of I would never have thought of you know picking this outfit out for myself it's that point of the experience of how they feel when they come in how they feel during but how they feel when they leave too that confidence you know they must feel like this their identity is coming together.

SPEAKER_00 34:39

It's more than just threads you know it's more than just an outfit they're getting yeah and they they're also getting things that you know never in their wildest dress. I mean they were we get some lovely brands and I can still remember the reaction of a young girl that we were supporting she was probably about 15 or 16 and she said I can't believe I've actually been given a Marks suit and it still had the tags on me. And she said I would never be able to even consider buying something like this because it was just wasn't her price point. So yes there's also that excitement that you're getting and you're getting the matching sort of shoes and handbag and and as you say underwear it's not just it's every and part of the grooming we call it a grooming kit just a personal care kit with you know beautiful body wash and luxurious sort of you know if we can depending on what we've got in the in the in the warehouse but um makeup as well you know just yeah and beautifully packaged time from when the client walks in so they've had their appointment you know they've been referred by an agency they've had their appointment made they arrive at at the front door what's the time that the sort of process takes to when they walk out with their outfit and they're springing their step in the well it kind of depends what they need but let's say up to an hour for all the styling and dressing I mean more than that is necessary. Yes if we're you know ideally we'll combine that with a coaching session so they'll have an extra 45 minutes to an hour with the coach. Occasionally we'll have group booking so an agency will we we work with agencies that have specific groups whether they're young people from a school or women that they're supporting and so that might take a little bit longer because it's sort of you know they're all sort of hanging around and waiting and and so we also support another foundation and we have sort of you know makeup sort of stations and things like that. So but on average yeah it's anywhere between that 45 minutes up to sort of a couple of hours let's say you know and within your client base everyone's going to be very different and I imagine you sort of have segments so whether it's people going for their first job or you know if they're 15 or 16 or they might be 40 going for their first job who knows. But so you might have sort of young ones going for their first job you might have people that have hit hard times and experienced hardship and they're trying to get back into the workforce so they come with a different sense I'm how your volunteers you know what sort of training do you do around tailoring your approach to getting a sense of who the person is I think it goes back to sort of the induction and training that we do at the front end, you know, sort of giving insights into the kind of profile of our people but we also have we've got one coming up on the 20th of March we'll have uh what I call a volunteer it's not really a professional development day but it really is in a sense I mean it's an opportunity to bring all of the volunteers together because we operate on different days of the week and every day has a particular team. So sometimes there's no crossover. They don't really get to work together. So a volunteer day is a way of bringing them all together and you know it's an opportunity to talk about how the charity is going and what our vision is for the future strategy and all that sort of you know corporate stuff I guess. But also to invite guest speakers. So at the last one that we had and we're planning a similar sort of approach for the one on the 20th of March we invite guest speakers who come from our referring agencies who can speak about it from their perspective and give some context context about the you know the kind of people that are that are coming through their doors. The last one we also had somebody from the LGBTQI community talking about things why you know things like uh what they actually spoke about was the use of pronouns and how it's really important to get those right. Yes and the why of it and you know just a different perspective for our volunteers. We also had one of our former clients speaking and even though she was well known to some but she wasn't known to everybody and so it was really about her background as a a refugee from Nigeria and how she you know she was actually quite a you know articulate and and educated woman but had left her country with no paperwork no nothing and she was working as an accountant in her own country but had none of that recognized here and and she was the main breadwinner of the family with two small kids. And so just talking about her experience and how she found herself in a situation that could have gone a lot worse. You know we've worked with people who you know could be because they're emerging from a domestic violence situation or broken marriages have found themselves homeless you know and so she was sort of could have found herself in a situation like that despite the fact that she had an education etc but sort of the connection that she had with her career coach who really she had multiple sessions with him and it was really about getting her resume understanding the Australian workplace culture and and employ prospective employer expectations and it was the same everywhere getting her resume up to scratch practicing her sort of interview skills all of that anyway she spoke about how it just it changed her life and it changed the life of her children. Yes and I think powerful it's just it is powerful stuff and even though we work with these stories every day I think when you actually hear it from the person and sharing their very personal journeys it's really quite powerful.

SPEAKER_01 41:08

So and you understand the impact. So you don't under just understand the experience when they come in and and how they're feeling when they leave you're hearing and and being able to sort of report back to your volunteer team how they're feeling a year down the track, two years down the track, which is really important because once again it feeds back into that cycle as you say of then the volunteers you know the way they feel changes or is enhanced then you know the client's happier because they've got this great team you've got higher retention you're not losing IP each time. In customer experience your customer experience is only as good as how well you know your audience because each audience is different. So the fact that you're getting these very well rounded learnings about each of your audience and what they're coming through what they've been through what they're coming through how they you know how they found themselves here even more so than the profile that you get from the agency I just think all adds to why this is such a powerful experience. It's absolutely and I imagine your volunteers know they'll get they'll get a sense pretty quickly very quickly and and can tailor their service knowing how that person is going you know what is going to be a the best approach for them whether they're really chatty or they're not they're nervous they're excited. If someone wanted to find out more how they could support maybe how they could come to one of your sales what what can they do? What the website so our website is www.arready set or lowercase.org.au oh look it's it's so fantastic and I really thank you for your time and you if you simply want to sort of see how an organization does customer experience well and really understands their clients and their their stories not just how they're feeling when they come in or what they want out of them but actually really understanding their backstory and their future story as well. Hop on the website because I think it it's so well laid out in the language and the the representation on there. So a big thank you Cynthia

How To Support Ready Set

SPEAKER_01 43:27

big thank you for joining me. Yeah thank you