Pam WalkerDirector of OperationsUCLAWhy did you decide to implement Teamworks for UCLA Women's Basketball?Our softball program had been using Teamworks for a while and Kirk (UCLA Softball Assistant Coach) was impressed by the ease with which they were using it for scheduling primarily, so he put me in touch with you guys and from there it was a quick introduction and go.What were the parts of Teamworks you first used when getting started?For us, the first things from Teamworks are still the same things that we use consistently day-to-day now, which is really the Calendar and the Messaging. Calendar gives everybody who's involved with our program, whether it's a coach, whether it's our trainer, whether it's Academics staff, to see, at a glance, our players' schedules and be able to find and express their availability, get them messages, and add appointments. It has just been super easy to be able to get a timeline flowing for players, and it's more efficient for them so they don't have to get questions from different people asking them if they're free - we already know immediately by looking at who's available if they're free or not, and we can say: “Hey, it looks like you're available at 2 o' clock for an interview, is that still okay?" "Yes." And we add it in. So it has really kind of put it down to a one-text conversation instead of a back-and-forth trying to juggle a bunch of different departments trying to schedule things for the kids.Do you have an example of how Teamworks has helped you in a tight spot or when you needed a quick answer?Well, for me it's less about individual examples and more about day-to-day value. Yesterday we were in a meeting where we were talking about adding something for a team-building function in our second session of summer school and we were able to search who's available at what time, plug in a couple hours, and see who's open. So for us it's more on a day-to-day: "Who's available Friday at 3 for community service, let's look." We have our trainer, and our weights person, and our Academics people add stuff in, so we feel that their calendars serve as a complete picture, so when we do a search on whether someone's available, we have a pretty good idea if they are or are not available.How have your athletes responded to using Teamworks?I think early on it was just something different so we kind of had to train them to use Teamworks as their primary calendar. I think that was kind of a learning curve, not in a bad way, but it was just something different. We also use iPads as our team playbooks so we put Teamworks on that as well, so now I think it has become just part of their ritual of their day. We consistently tell them, "Hey, any schedule changes are going to be made through Teamworks." When we do have a schedule change, we'll also use an e-mail update so they're going to know right away about the change. So there really isn't ever a time that I can think of that they can say, "Hey, I didn't know about the fill-in-the-blank-here that's been changed," because now we are definitely letting them know on the front end. If anything changes, they're getting the notification so there really is no reason why they shouldn't be there.How would you rate Teamworks' implementation, training and overall customer service?I think the customer service has been really top-notch. I can always get to you guys if there's something I need, I'll just e-mail you or we'll call you. There hasn't been a time where I haven't gotten an answer – not just an answer, but a resolution. So whether I was adding a new person to the system or some kind of hiccup develops in terms of syncing, I've always gotten responses, and that has been consistent all-year long.What would you say to programs that haven't heard of Teamworks?It has put a lot of different information that we used to keep in different places in one place, and it has made things so much easier for our players and our staff - whether it's uploading a travel itinerary, whether it is having kids see our practice schedule for a month or a week, whether it's seeing how their academic schedules have changed as they are updated on a regular basis. I just think it takes all of the things that used to be in pieces and it puts it all in one place so it's seamless to see what's going on within your program. It has really been helpful.Would you recommend Teamworks to other programs?Yes, and I already have. It's not unusual for me to be in a gym where I'm having a conversation with people and have Teamworks as something that I'm very comfortable recommending to other teams because it has been so good for us. I wouldn't have known about it if Softball hadn't recommended it to me, and I'm just thankful that they told us about it, so I spread the word to other programs too.