General Purpose of Role:

Ensure office hours operate smoothly and maintain a high quality of service for our students.

Before your shift:

Check Shift Overflow and verify you are the Shift Lead before your shift starts. As people swap in and out of shifts someone may have superseded you as the Shift Lead.

At the beginning of your shift:

• It is imperative as the Shift Lead you arrive on time if not a minute or two early.
• Check in with the Shift Lead for the previous hour to see if there are common student issues or any other topics that need to be addressed.
• Look around office hours and compare who is there with who is on the schedule. If it is 5 minutes past the hour, message any missing TAs on Slack to check-in. In cases of extreme lateness, try to encourage the TA to stay after their shift to make up the missed time.

During your shift:

If there is no queue in office hours, let others call tickets and remain available as a “floater”. TAs can come to you if they run into technical problems they get stuck on. Keep an eye on the general flow of office hours and have a sense of what are the common problems students come in with.

You should not hover over team members’ shoulders unless asked for help or mentorship directly.

When office hours are slow:

• Ensure tickets are being distributed equally across the TAs as they come into the queue. There should not be a single TA calling all of the tickets.
• Walk around and chat with the other TAs. Use this as a time to get to know the team and provide mentorship (check in on how things are going, give advice on classes, etc.).

When office hours are busy:

• Do call tickets! However, after you close a ticket, size up the current status of office hours and the queue. Perhaps take a quick stroll around the room and see if anyone grabs you in need of help.
• Keep an eye on how long fellow team members are spending with students when there is a queue. Keep an eye on appointments > 15 minutes and, if necessary, step in to help bring it to a close.

At the end of your shift:

• Fill out the following form at the end of each hour to record any concerns encountered during your shift: Shift Lead Form
• Bring any recurring problems to the attention of the next Shift Lead!