Train your front-desk staff in ten minutes

A new front-desk volunteer can be confident in about ten minutes, because almost everything they'll do all day is a version of one move: find the person, check them in. Teach that, plus a handful of what-ifs, and they're ready. This is the short list to walk through with them.

Teach this first: check someone in

This is the whole job, most of the time. A member walks up, they scan the badge or you type the name, and the check-in is recorded. Show them once and have them do the next few. The full walkthrough is Check in a member.

The five what-ifs they'll hit on day one

Everything else is just handling the exceptions. These five cover almost all of them — point your new teammate at each so they know it's not a big deal when it happens.

They forgot their badge

Type their name into the scan bar and check them in from the result. No badge required — see Check in a member.

Someone new walks in

Add them right at the desk without leaving the flow — Add a new member at the desk.

They lost their card

Hand over a new one and link it on the spot with Assign or replace a badge.

A whole family arrives

Bring everyone in together instead of one scan at a time — Check in a family together.

They checked in the wrong person

Every check-in reverses cleanly, and the fix is recorded — Undo a check-in or check-out.

Two things that make the desk calmer

Let members check themselves in

A kiosk lets people scan their own badge while your teammate handles everything else. See Launch the self check-in kiosk.

Leave notes for the next shift

A quick handoff note — who to watch for, what broke, what's low — keeps the desk running when they leave. See Read and post shift notes.

A ten-minute run-through you can do together

1. Have them check in a real member by badge, then by name.

   Doing it themselves, twice, is worth more than watching you do it ten times.

2. Add a test member, then undo the check-in you just made.

   Now they've seen that mistakes are easy to fix, which is the thing new people worry about most.

3. Walk through where the day's numbers live.

   A quick look at Read the desk stats so they know how to answer "how many today?" without asking you.

4. Point them at this Help Center and let them go.

   Tell them it's fine to look things up mid-shift — that's what it's here for.