Dhammika Kalapuge conducts inspirational seminar for Wijeya Newspapers Advertising Staff

The Senior Managers, Sales Executives and other employees from the Advertising Department of Wijeya Newspapers who interact with customers have been inspired by a training programme conducted at the Galadari Hotel recently.

The programme, which was titled as ‘Passion to Serve’, was conducted by Mr. Dhammika Kalapuge, Director and Principal Management Consultant of SIPCOM- 1 (Pvt) Ltd. Mr. Kalapuge is a leading educator whose name is synonymous with ‘Service Quality’ enhancement training both in Sri Lanka and the Region.

This training session was the first of its kind organised by the HR Department of Wijeya Newspapers in order to enhance the customer service standards of the organisation. The attendance rate was excellent, with nearly every employee from the advertising section and the customer service unit participated at the programme.

In today's market, to cater to the discerning customers, institutions require excellent customer service rendered from its employees. Mr. Kalapuge excels in educating institutes to best manage ' customer touch points' strategically, operationally and emotionally.

With the belief that ‘The messenger is as important as the message’, he strives to go that extra mile to give value to his audience.

The value additions of his programme included receiving a precise brief form the Divisional Heads, personally carrying out mystery customer survey by himself, studying the culture of the institution and tailoring the training to ideally suit the target audience of the Advertising Department.

This training programme conducted for the employees of the Advertising Department of the Wijeya Newspapers was received with encouraging comments from the audience, who attended from the Fort and Kandy branches. After the session, the employees commended on Mr. Kalapuge’s excellent communication skills, rare tal- ent in imparting knowledge of complex concepts in a simple manner and relating the learning to ‘day to day’ operation through true memorable experiences. Every participant commended Mr. Kalapuge for conducting the session in a manner where everyone could actively learn whilst enjoying this learning experiencesimultaneously.

Ms. Nipuli Weerathunga, Assistant General ManagerAdministration Advertising of Wijeya Newspapers commented on the programme saying that “It inspired the young marketers to be passionate about everything what they do. It was not confined to service excellence, the programme was done in such a professional manner it gave a full insight on how to become an excellent human being. The way Mr. Kalapuge conducted this ‘world class’ programme with a Sri Lankan touch made the employees to be fully engrossed throughout thus making it one of the best educational programmes done for Wijeya Newspaper’s employees so far.”

Mr. Kalapuge is a Chartered Marketer of the Chartered Institute of Marketing ( UK). He has held senior marketing positions in leading organisations and gathered vast experience, in services marketing for 20 years, prior to embarking as a full time professional in service training. For the past fifteen years, he has conducted over two thousand three hundred workshops covering over 425 public and private sector entities in Management, Entrepreneurial Development, Customer Care, Service Excellence, Relationship Marketing and Motivation both within the country and overseas. Dhammika Kalapuge’s programmes are organised by SIPCOM- 1( PVT) LTD – a company focusing on total people development. SIPCOM- 1 housed at Galadari Hotel organises and promotes in- house and public programmes mostly on ‘service quality’, exclusively designed and conducted by Dhammika Kalapuge.