Assessment Tools
What they do and why you should be harnessing their power
by David Ostberg, PhD -
April 09, 2009
Call centers are attracting more attention, from customers to company executives - and deservedly so. Without question, the call center has a direct impact on a company's brand, reputation and customer experience. Just as front-line call center agents are highly influential in forming lasting, positive impressions of a company, high agent turnover rates significantly damage a company's ability to maintain service levels and create a positive customer experience. When the exorbitant costs of hiring, training, and lost productivity are added to the mix, it is easy to see why agent turnover is high on the priority list of many of today's customer-focused companies.
Two dominant - and highly visible - problems that hinder a call center's operation are (1) agent turnover and (2) suboptimal agent productivity. In most cases, the root causes of such challenges include poor job fit or a lack of skills that are critical success factors for specific agent positions. Selection assessments and screening tools can help address these issues by providing vital information about job applicants that directly relates to employee productivity and retention. A call center's selection and hiring process should address the root causes of turnover by answering key questions such as: Are the agents a good fit for the job? How well will they perform? How long will they stay?
In general, assessments are designed to capture information which relates to an individual's likelihood of behaving or performing in certain ways in the future. These tools do so by measuring three different kinds of candidate data:
1) What canthey do based on their personality, natural abilities, or aptitudes,
2) What havethey done in previous jobs, activities, and educational or training settings, and
3) What do they want todo in the future based on their interests, motivation, and preferences?
In regard to what applicants can do, assessments are designed to measure stable characteristics associated with job applicants' personalities and natural abilities. For example, some jobs may be more suitable for individuals who are extroverted and less risk-averse, while others may require that an employee be highly detail-oriented and task-focused. Although every human being is unique, our differences all land somewhere along a continuum of each of several personality and ability dimensions. Assessment experts can develop assessments to accurately measure where an individual falls on various job-relevant dimensions of personality or ability and can thus create valid predictions about how a person may behave in various situations. The unique benefit to these types of assessments is that predictions can be made about future behavior in roles in which the applicant has no previous experience. As a result, these "can do" measures are usually the most appropriate type of screening tool for hourly jobs and should comprise a significant part of the assessment solution.
In regard to what applicants have done, assessments are designed to measure applicants' previous experiences, past behavior, education or training, and accomplishments. Examples include resume scoring for education, relevant work history and skills training, behaviorally-oriented interview questions that focus on how an applicant handled a specific situation in the past, and job-specific knowledge or skills tests. These types of assessments are based on the principle that future performance is best predicted by past performance. For hourly jobs, the most appropriate "have done" tools include basic qualifications screening questions and behaviorally-oriented interviews.
Finally, in regard to what applicants want to do, assessments are designed to measure differences in applicants' motives, aspirations, preferences, and interests. These types of tools are less effective for predicting productivity but are well-suited to predicting job/culture fit, employee satisfaction, and retention. Realistic Job Previews fall into this category, as candidates can take a 'sneak peek' into the actual organization and job and opt out of the selection process if something looks particularly undesirable to or ill-suited with their interests and expectations. Measuring motivation and preferences is valuable for almost any level of job, but again, primarily relate to employee satisfaction and retention rather than productivity and performance.
Some common criticisms of selection assessments are that they don't work, they're not fair, and they're too 'fake-able'. However, research indicates that a well-designed set of assessments can predict performance and early retention more accurately and fairly than traditional subjective approaches. Assessments help remove bias that hiring managers and recruiters unintentionally bring to the process. Further, assessment item formats such as those utilizing a balance of appealing or "socially-desirable" response options have been developed which truly minimize applicants' ability to 'game' the assessments or figure out which answer is ideal. In fact, through the use of closed-loop analytics, assessment developers can identify which items are susceptible to faking and can subsequently modify or replace them with content that is more effective. Also, research demonstrates that low levels of faking in any part of the selection process (including face-to-face interviews) do not impact validity in a significant way.
Although a wide body of evidence demonstrates how powerful and accurate well-designed assessments can be, there are, unfortunately, many poorly-crafted, inappropriately-applied assessments on the market. As a result, and in accordance with the Uniform Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures and the Principles for the Validation and Use of Personnel Selection Procedures, organizations need to take the steps necessary to ensure that any assessment strategy they use is valid for their environment and jobs. In addition to reviewing relevant job analysis reports and test validation manuals, test administrators need to confirm that the assessments are effective within their organization by analytically evaluating the impact the selection tools and processes have on their performance outcomes.
Further, because so many unproven, poorly-designed assessments and selection "solutions" are available today, it is critical that organizations take time to investigate how and by whom the tests were developed. And although many vendors take a "one-size-fits-all" approach, no assessment is as effective and accurate as one that has been designed and validated by experts for specific positions within specific industries. Because previous experience is less critical in most hourly jobs, a call center selection system should typically focus more on screening for behaviors ("can do") and motivation levels ("likes to do") and less on cognitive abilities and technical skills ("has done"), as might be the case with higher-level, salaried jobs.
Conclusion
No single, "perfect" solution exists for every selection challenge, but a well-thought out, well-designed process that leverages selection science and incorporates multiple components such as a realistic job preview, qualifications screening, validated assessments, and behaviorally-oriented structured interviews can dramatically improve the quality of hiring decisions. As a result, organizations that choose to invest the time and resources into evolving their selection processes will see a significant improvement in the productivity of their workforce, while improving retention and reducing the burden on their hiring professionals.
Taking it one step further, organizations need to evaluate the impact that selection tools are having within their organization by harnessing the power of closed-loop analytics and on-demand reporting and should require that their selection solutions enable them to do so. By improving your call center agent selection and hiring, you can put the right pieces in place to drive measurable improvements throughout your organization and get ahead of your competition.
David Ostberg, Ph.D., is an Industrial and Organizational Psychologist with 10+ years experience designing and evaluating selection systems for companies in service industries. A member of the American Psychological Association and Society for Industrial & Organizational Psychology, Dr. Ostberg is currently the Vice President of Selection Science for Evolv On-Demand. For more information, visit www.evolvondemand.com or call (866) 971-4473.
Contact Centers and Self-Service Software: Working Together to Satisfy Customers
by Hope Schoenbacher
Call centers have a tough job in today's economy. While budgets are tightening, the demand for outstanding customer service continues to grow. With more than 200 billion calls placed to customer service centers around the world every year, call centers must find new ways to balance quality service while lowering costs in order to remain competitive.
Seeking to balance low costs and provide great service may seem like nothing new. But the current industry landscape and economic situation is pushing prices even lower and making this balance a necessity. Since it is always less expensive to retain a customer than to replace them, companies must focus on how to increase customer loyalty. At the same time, they need to lower overhead expenses to offset the budget constraints imposed by a less than favorable economy.
Customer retention is an important issue for every business that relies on contact centers. The companies that have contracts with these agencies depend upon them to ensure their customers have a positive experience. A recent study from the American Management Association says that 68 percent of all customers who stop doing business with a company cite a bad service experience as their primary reason for ending the relationship. To combat this trend, companies worldwide are expected to employ more than six million call center agents and spend more than $100 billion in customer care in 2008.
So what's the solution? For many companies, the answer to lowering costs and improving the customer experience is self-service software.
Higher call volumes have traditionally meant that contact centers hire more agents. This expensive solution is fast becoming outdated as companies are increasingly turning to self-service software as a cost-effective complement for the contact center. Self-service technologies encompass a broad array of services, each of which works to empower customers and lighten the burden on contact centers through:
- Comprehensive self-help sections on Web sites
- Self-service options on mobile handsets
- Intuitive, efficient call routing methods
The trend for self-service has already appeared with most companies updating their Web sites to include specific answers to common customer inquiries. All-inclusive, step-by-step instructions are archived in an easy-to-use format which empowers customers to confidently address issues and questions. This method of self-service reduces the number of tier-one calls to contact centers so that agents can focus on questions which demand more attention.
Improved Web sites are one valuable way to improve customer satisfaction, but they do not always serve the needs of customers on the go. According to recent statistics, an estimated one-third of calls to customer service come from mobile phones, and this number is expected to grow to two-thirds before 2010. Improved handset technologies are helping to reach this audience as the Internet becomes available on mobile phones and users can work through questions online wherever they happen to be. By implementing self-service options on handsets, companies can harness the opportunity to support customers from their mobile phones. This leverages the economical Web-based self-service options to reach a growing number of mobile users.
To better illustrate how self-service technology can work, we can look to the example of customers trying to contact their mobile operators. Often times, mobile phone issues are related to devices and service plans. Self-service software enables customers to resolve many of these problems on their handsets, and detects common problems before users notice they exist, proactively solving them to increase efficiency and customer satisfaction. Other settings, such as those required for roaming, messaging or data networking can be automatically updated. The software can also help customers to pay bills, check remaining minutes and obtain information about their accounts on the handset.
Customers are looking for immediate answers and solutions to their questions and problems and this type of approach enhances the customer's experience and ability to achieve this. Call center efficiency is also greatly increased because self-service software can automatically place a call to the correct customer support department, allow operators to categorize customers into groups to present each caller with personalized tools and direct calls to the most appropriate department. The software also sends data already gathered on the product or service directly to the correct customer care representative so that the customer doesn't need to repeat information.
This type of self-service software for wireless operators is only one example of the growing trend to help customers help themselves. As technology improves and more businesses seek to gain a competitive edge, self-service software will become a crucial tool to increase customer satisfaction and lower costs.
Statistics demonstrate the efficiency of self-service software. Trials and pilots by Bellevue, Washington-based SNAPin Software have shown that self-service software has successfully solved 60 percent of customer issues.
An important benefit of self-service software for any industry is that it helps contact centers focus more of their time on complicated problems that require human intervention. Call center agents are kept from being overwhelmed by a high volume of unnecessary calls. While self-service software is important, ensuring that there is an alternative avenue for the customer to contact an employee at a call center is vital to maintain a positive customer experience. Customers are then still able to speak with a call center representative if their issue is not resolved or if they prefer this approach to problem solving.
The trend toward tightening budgets will likely continue to affect call centers and the companies that rely on them. As companies work to increase customer loyalty, they want to provide a consistent, positive experience at every customer touch point. To achieve this goal, it is imperative that call centers gain a competitive edge over their competition by adopting new self-service technologies that satisfy customers, lighten the burden for call centers and their employees and ultimately lower costs.
About Hope Schoenbacher, Vice President- Delivery, SNAPin Software
Hope brings over 14 years of experience in the wireless industry to the SNAPin team. Prior to joining SNAPin, Hope was a consultant focused on planning and implementing programs targeted to the mobile operators that dramatically improved the customer experience and the company bottom line.
Before becoming a consultant Hope spent 5 years at Western Wireless. As Executive Director, Customer Experience & Retention for Western Wireless, she developed the customer segmentation, direct marketing, customer lifecycle management and customer retention. These programs impacted more than 1.3 million customers and resulted in 150 percent increase in customer renewals, resulting in over $12 million in increased revenue annually. Prior to this role, Hope was the Director, Customers Systems in the IT organization. In this role Hope had full production and application development responsibilities.
Prior to working at Western Wireless, Hope spent 8 years at Verizon Wireless in a variety of leadership roles focused on implementing customer facing technologies. Serving as the Associate Director for CRM - Front End Systems group she led the regional teams through the development of the CRM roadmap for front-end systems including Credit & Collections, Point of Sale, Activations and Trouble ticketing, which was utilized by more than 16,000 employees across the sales and customer contact organization.
Hope can be reached at hope@snapin.com
About SNAPin Software
SNAPin Software provides on-device self-service software to mobile operators that lets them interact with their subscribers in real-time and in the context of their current mobile behavior. The company's handset-based SelfService product suite enables the delivery of interactive promotions, the resolution of most customer support problems, and allows operators to deliver a branded service experience to their subscribers. For more information, visit www.snapin.com.
Moving from Workforce Manager to Call Center Leader
By Ric Kosiba, Ph. D.
Introduction
If you were to Google "managers versus leaders" you would get well over 500,000 hits. There are many, many business consultants and experts selling books and seminars, each promising to "turn" us from managers into leaders.
Those of us in the workforce management field know that a good portion of our job is pure management in nature: managing the chaos inherent in large people-intensive operations, managing and monitoring performance to hit strict performance goals, and managing the expectations of the operations executives whose bonuses depend on us to hit these performance goals. Our organizations need both managers and leaders, and the best leaders are good managers and vice versa. So how do we become both good managers and good leaders?
Becoming a Leader
Many workforce managers are already there. In a general sense, there are many paths to organizational leadership. But the most common paths (not associated with nepotism, etc.) include becoming a trusted advisor to those in current leadership roles. The folks who step into leadership are those who help the big boss do well. When I got my first real job my father gave me simple advice: make your boss look good. As workforce managers, we are in a unique position in the call center- our executives absolutely must lean on us to keep the operation running smoothly. We are responsible for making our company's most expensive resource- its people- work efficiently. If we do our job competently, we will have a significant bottom-line impact. We are also leaned on for our analytic abilities. We are often called on to present staff plans and to perform "what happened" analysis. Through these types of analyses, we can shape company policy. We're in a great spot. Another quality prized among leaders is the ability to "see the future" and help steer the organization to meet it. Again, as workforce managers, we're poised to help the current call center executives see this future- it is usually our job to put together call forecasts and plans to meet these forecasts. And we have a special advantage on the road to call center leadership- we are the owners of much of the data that drives the organization and many of the important strategic decisions.
Why Aren't We a CEO Yet?
So why aren't all CEO's former workforce management professionals? My experience suggests that there are quite a few top executives that have spent a stint doing workforce management and related jobs. But what do we have to do in order to become thought leaders in the organization?
I believe that we have to harness the power of analytics and spend more time doing strategic planning and analysis. We need to be the person who answers the tough, but important what-ifs. We need to proactively perform analyses that challenge the basic assumptions and goals of our organization. We need to make a difference for our execs and for the company by truly improving the profit picture of our enterprise.
Colin Powell once said, "Experts often possess more data than judgment." It is our job to provide our execs with both data and judgment.
The good news is that this should be relatively easy and straightforward. The catch is, and you probably have guessed it already, we must get out from under the piles of day-to-day tactical work that fills our time. If there is anything truly holding us back, it is the amount of chaos we have to manage. We simply cannot find the time to do important strategic analysis or to create the tools necessary to allow us to do important and far-reaching analysis quickly and accurately.
For now, let's leave how you find that extra time to do strategic planning to you. Let us instead focus on some of the big picture items that we can help improve for our companies.
Determining Your Optimal Center Configuration
There has been a lot of this going around lately- how do I configure my call center network to allow me to:
- Take advantage of cheaper labor pools: This is almost THE question of 2004, that with the kerfuffle over outsourcing during this election year. I don't know of many contact center groups who haven't looked into outsourcing.
- Reshuffle the contact center network to gain efficiencies through skills-based and network routing: Opening and closing contact centers is almost a national pastime. Skills based routing has been implemented or un-implemented across industries. Skills based routing certainly is still a hot topic, and configuring it well is not always easy to achieve.
- Reduce capital and other costs: The whole point of workforce management is to squeeze costs by efficiently allocating resources.
- Increase profit: We have begun to see industry thought leaders implement sophisticated and very targeted cross-sell programs- with considerable success. These programs cannot be successfully implemented without serious workforce management and planning analysis.
What should we do to make center configuration wins happen? For us to lead, it requires us to proactively propose alternatives to our executives. Look for the opportunity, analyze it, and pitch the idea to our bosses and their bosses.
All this is much easier if you've developed or purchased the analytic infrastructure (e.g. discrete-event simulation models) to help crank through alternative scenarios.
Service, Revenue, and Profit Goals
Determining the appropriate service, revenue, profit goals, and the related staffing should be a periodic and seasonal exercise.
Last month, I visited a CenterBridge customer and was working through several advanced what-ifs. Our client decided to do an analysis of their optimal service goal and compare the analytically derived goal to the service goal that had been in place for years at his company. Lo and behold, the mathematically optimal service goal was much higher than that the enterprise had been employing, and the "dollars left on the table" were significant. This extra analysis performed by my friend is sure to change the thinking of the center as only a cost, and focus his executives to think of the center primarily as a source of revenue. And they'll likely change their service philosophy and make the company some serious money.
Hiring, Termination Plans and Budget Scenarios
In a sense, any analysis that we perform should manifest itself into a budget plan. If we reconfigure the call center network, change our service goal philosophy, or perform any other significant what-if analysis, the idea will result in a change, for the better, to our overall plan.
Any new big picture idea should be run through the plan to determine the change to customer service, revenues, costs, and the number of service failures. It is the best way to determine and present the overall value of our ideas. It is a good idea to automate the staff planning and budget planning process.
Moreover, we have the ability, and with some investment in time and technology, to make the plans themselves more efficient. By focusing on the timing of new hires and/or terminations, you can reduce costs significantly. Linear and integer programming technologies can produce mathematically optimal plans, considering seasonality, employee attrition, learning curves of new employees, etc. There is real money here.
Getting the Message Out
While it may be straightforward, given our focus on analytics, to perform important what-ifs, it is not always easy to get the word out. Often, because we may have been tagged as someone who manages very tactical things, we may be looked as someone who does not see the big picture. We need to break out of that mode.
It is important that we stick out our necks to make the attempt. We cannot expect that each analysis we do will always lead to implementation or even a hearing- but if we do our homework and propose noteworthy change- we'll be leaned on for the next exercise.
Once we develop a reputation for our ability to perform strategic analysis and see the big picture, we will get to do more of it. My bet is that a promotion is in our future- if only to provide us more time to do this important analysis! Over time we will certainly become known as a leader.
PLEASE ENTER YOUR 16 DIGIT ACCOUNT NUMBER!
By Fred Summer
Wait a minute; didn't I just give you that information?
How many times has this happened to you? You enter your account information, listen to several other prompts, finally reach a live agent, and then you are asked for your account information again. This customer experience is starting badly!
After being in the call center industry for 25 years, I thought this was just a pet peeve of mine. However, recently I went to work for a software company (IntraNext Systems) and everyone I talk to seems to have the same poor customer experience story. No sooner would I get the words out of my mouth - "You know when you are prompted to enter your account number and then you finally get to a live agent" - and boom! - I am interrupted right then with "They ask you for your Account Number again", followed by "And when I ask the CSR why they do that I get one answer or another that never makes any sense. I know the technology is available for this. Good companies seem to have this information at their fingertips!"
Not only does this transaction provide a poor customer experience, it is a double waste of time-and money-when the CSR not only has to enter the information, but also explain why they are asking for it a second time. You can solve most of this problem with a simple "Screen Pop", but you shouldn't stop there.
The Importance of Your Customer's Experience
Here are some interesting perspectives on why we should be concerned about the customer's experience. Recently I ran across these insights:
To create a new and lasting source of competitive advantage, businesses must manage the customer experience.
-IBM Study in 2005 quoted in CEM: The Value of 'Moments of Truth' 2006
95% of senior business leaders believe that the next competitive differentiator is customer experience.
-Revolutionalize Your Customer Experience; Colin Shaw; 2005.
Eighty percent of companies believe they deliver a superior customer experience. But only eight percent of their customers agree.
-Bain & Company, Harvard Management Update.
The bottom line is customer experience is recognized at the highest levels as being critical to business success. And . most companies think they're delivering a quality customer experience while most of their customers do not! Where does your organization fall? When the first interaction your customer has starts with "didn't I just give you that?" followed by "and why do you need to ask me again?" . I'd say the customer experience is impacting your business. And not in a good way!
CTI and Screen Pops
I admit that a screen pop is pretty blasé these days. A lot of companies have done this basic level of Computer Telephony Integration. That's good, but there is a lot more that can be done to efficiently route calls to the most effective resource and to present timely customer specific data that can be acted upon at the point of contact. It's a form of Advanced CTI called "EVENT INTELLIGENCE®".
Event Intelligence®
Event Intelligence goes beyond a simple screen pop using data from the switch such as DNIS, ANI or other Variable Data or Caller Entered Digits (CED) from the IVR and then looks at data in your CRM/Billing System and then based on pre-defined rules "Intelligently" routes calls to the proper resource or delivers a timely and appropriate "Intelligent Script or Offer" to the desk top with the call.
Even more powerful is "Multidimensional" Event Intelligence - Again, going way beyond routing based on a specific DNIS (Dialed Number), ANI (Caller ID) or CED (Caller Entered Digits), to a specific group based on this one dimension of information; Event Intelligence can route based on as many criteria as you feel will significantly differentiate the call flow, the offer or the way the offer is presented.
What if . ?
 What if you have a caller that is delinquent?
What if this caller is also a VIP customer?
What if they are not?
Do you want to treat them different or the same?
What if a caller is responding to a special offer, but you know they are not with in the area your company provides service? Would it be better to know this before you answer the phone, or do you even want to answer the phone?
What if they are in your service area, would it be helpful to know a little about them before you answer the phone?
What if you knew what the caller was doing on your Web Site just before they called you, or maybe it was a couple of days ago, but when they call, you know they were all ready to check out and they were going to purchase XYZ, but for some reason changed their mind.
What if a caller has basic cable and you know they spend $21.95 a month on their Block Buster membership. Wouldn't it be nice to pop up a premium channel offer that is very compelling? OK, we can't do this, at least not without permission and cooperation from Block Buster, but I think you get the picture. Whatever data is available, we can help you quickly access it and make it actionable at the point of contact - that's when it will have the most benefit and the most financial impact which is very good for all of us.
Better Experience. Lower Cost.
Advanced CTI starts the moment a customer-or prospect-makes the decision to contact the company. It customizes call routing and caller treatment, provides seamless transition from self-service to assisted service, supports blended multimedia routing, and more. Advanced CTI enhances the customer experience and reduces operational costs for the Contact Center. How you ask?
The customer benefits:
- Convenient self-service alternatives 24/7
- Less time on hold when contacting a live Agent
- Improved response time once callers get through
- Instant access to database information, often on a 24/7 basis
- Callback options for callers who don't want to stay on hold
- Better-informed customer service representatives who are able to understand the caller's past relationship with the company
- Greater opportunity for one-call resolution to their issues
- Access to service reps who, when freed from routine functions, have more time to research and answer complicated questions
- No need to repeat identification information and reason for calling when transferred to another agent or department
The business benefits:
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Cost savings from operational efficiency
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Increased revenue opportunity
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More prompt and accurate response to inquiries, orders and requests
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Personalized attention and efficient problem resolution
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Improved customer and prospects access to information about new products and services
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Increased number of services available and extended hours of operation
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Higher levels of referral and repeat business
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Fewer data entry keystroke errors
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Shorter transaction time, increased employee productivity
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Improved employee morale
Leverage your existing technology!
When was the last time you heard that?
IntraNext solutions take full advantage of the traditional PSTN environment and support IP-Network capabilities as well. They let you leverage the investment you have already made in your network.
IntraNext Systems makes what seems to be extremely complex, very simple. We will even give your organization the tools needed to make changes and new script or routing decisions on your own.
So, why completely rebuild when you can add features and flexibility using your existing infrastructure?
You Control the Customer Experience
The only enduring strategy you can control is delivering the ultimate customer experience each and every time. Well-integrated CTI brings together customer and company information with minimal manual intervention and makes it possible to provide the ultimate experience-fast, accurate and personalized-for both the customer and the company. CTI enables enhanced customer experience, reduced operations cost, and greater revenue opportunities within today's businesses.
About IntraNext Systems:
IntraNext Systems is at the forefront of providing industry-wide Event Intelligence® for contact centers based on open standards CTI technology that is compatible with the major telecommunication systems.
Since 1996 IntraNext has delivered advanced CTI applications and capabilities which enable contact centers to deliver a better customer experience at lower cost. NextSys® applications include the sophisticated NextSys® Softphone, the NextCaster® multi-channel desktop reader board, and the unique new NextSys® Wireless Supervisor for un-tethered call monitoring, NextSys® Event Intelligence®, and the companion product NextSys® Event Intelligence Window®.
If you want to be in complete control of your call flow processes, increase revenue, reduce expenses or all three, give us a call it will just take a few minutes to see if we are a good match for your needs.
Contact:
Fred Sumner
Vice President of Business Development
IntraNext Systems
391 Inverness Parkway, Suite 111
Englewood, CO 80112
(720) 873-6559
Fred.Sumner@IntraNext.com
Cross-sell and Upsell: Transform Your Call Center to a Win-Win-Win Culture
by Joel Linchitz, President, Phone for Sucess
It's easy to understand why upselling and cross-selling have a bad reputation. From a customer’s viewpoint, it’s annoying to have someone push a product or service at you that you don’t want. Knowing that, many reps avoid cross-selling or upselling because they don’t want to alienate their customers. But ironically, by not upselling or cross-selling, reps lose out on achieving dramatic results from one of the most powerful tools for generating sales, retaining customers and creating employee satisfaction. In short, they’re preventing themselves, their company and their customers from participating in a Win-Win-Win environment that lifts morale, promotes motivation, and increases sales.
Upselling and cross-selling are usually focused on the idea of selling something, not on what the customer wants or needs. This is why it is often perceived as someone trying to sell us something we don't want. In many cases that's exactly what it is! To be effective, cross and up-selling must be directed to customers’ needs. For instance, if a customer calls your service center to complain about having to pay an overdraft charge, selling them an overdraft-protection account is doing them a favor. In fact, not doing this is a disservice to the customer. But trying to sell them a new mortgage, say, while a rep has them on the phone is almost ridiculous.
Focusing on customer needs is actually a process, not a frame of mind. It means building a relationship with the customer, creating rapport, and asking the kind of probing questions that uncover how customers are thinking, what they might be overlooking, and how your products/services might make their lives easier or better.
It means upselling and cross-selling as a natural outgrowth of a consulting process. It means uncovering needs and then offering solutions, not throwing options at customers in hopes they will want them.
Training Adjustments
CSRs can be taught to pursue this process proactively. Instead of just reacting to what customers request, CSRs can learn to participate in the process of responding to and helping their customers beyond the predictable. Three elements should be folded into traditional training to shift to a Win-Win-Win paradigm.
• how to develop rapport
• how to ask questions
• how to use active listening skills
Establishing Rapport
Include developing rapport as a separate topic in your CSR training. Rapport is not just a matter of personality, which can’t be taught, but a matter of focus, which can be taught. Focus on the customer by using a pleasant and clear voice, by being interested and enthusiastic in what the customer says, by reassuring customers that you’re there to answer their questions, find the right solution, and send them away happy. Getting into rapport is being sensitive to another person’s viewpoint and allowing them to express it.
Asking Questions
Learning how to ask questions is part of understanding your company’s products and services and how they’re used. Naturally, CSRs should have genuine respect for and thorough knowledge of the products/services customers are buying. Once that knowledge is there, time in training can be beneficially spent teaching CSRs to practice coming up with typical questions customers might ask, depending on how the products/services might be used. A little practice goes a long way in reassuring CSRsthat asking questions is not prying, but actually providing customers with valuable service.
For example, a customer may ask for the cheapest checking account. That's what he or she says, but the underlying meaning may be more involved. After a little probing, the CSR learns that s/he typically uses an ATM that's close to the office, thereby adding a service charge three or four times a week to the cost of the "cheapest" account. The answer to "What's the cheapest checking account you have?" becomes:
"I'd be happy to give you that information. But I wonder if you'd just give me a little background first so we can give you the best service. Could you tell me more about how you like to do your banking? How often do you plan to write checks? What are the three features you would consider most important for your checking account to have? About how many checks will you be writing each month? Do you think you'll be keeping a relatively high balance? Will you be linking your account to a savings account? Or a credit card? Do you use ATMs?"
Active Listening
Listening is definitely a teachable skill. There are traditionally three key steps to listening actively. First, whatever the customer says should be acknowledged, “I see, orI’m glad you’ve called because I can help you with that.” Second, CSRs should ask customers to elaborate on what they’ve just said, as in “would you tell me more about what you’re looking for, or could you give me a little more information?” Third, after customers reveal what’s on their mind, train CSRs to paraphrase. “Just to be sure I understand what you’re saying, let me repeat back to you what I heard you say.” The paraphrase is not meant to just parrot back to customers the same thing they just said to you. Its simple brilliance is that when it’s done properly, it tends to uncover those slight ‘mishearings’ or misunderstandings that can cause missed opportunities to provide superior service to customers. There’s a fourth active listening skill. It’s called Reflect, and it’s a bit more complicated because it involves CSRs having the confidence to interpret what customers may not be expressing with words, but are definitely expressing with attitude (tone of voice, volume of speech, and inflection). It requires CSRs to say something like, “You sound very upset, and I would really like to help figure this out (whatever the issue is).” Saying that can be a little scary, but is definitely teachable given that the CSR understands clearly how to not take an upset customer’s tone personally. One way to help CSRs learn to defuse irate customers is to work with their manager/supervisor coaches.
Coaching and On-going Training
Coaching should be added to your call center’s Win-Win-Win paradigm. Managers/supervisors should be trained to give continuous feedback to CSRs about the way they’re executing their skills. The feedback can be in immediate, as coaches walk around and overhear CSRs as they’re speaking with customers. Or it can be given to CSRs as a result of monitoring their calls. Or it can be given during a face-to-face, informal meeting during which coaches and CSRs actually discuss expectations and performance, and how to get to the change required, if any.
Conclusion
With CSRs perfecting the tools above, customer-focused upselling and cross-selling can create a Win-Win-Win environment in your call center. The customer gets more than he or she asked for and feels satisfied, not irritated. The CSR experiences new job satisfaction and motivation from contributing instead of just passively responding. And the company benefits from dramatically increased sales and happier customers (who also stick around).
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About the Author
Joel Linchitz is President of Phone for Success, a training and consulting firm that offers ‘the best training on the planet for sales and service reps.’ He teach reps to use tools and techniques that will dramatically increase their sales/service results. He can be reached at 212-431-6700 or by email at, info@phoneforsuccess.com
Are Voice-Based Call Center Outsourcing Contracts Moving Away from India?
by Nick Jiwa
Recently I asked a number of outsourcing industry veterans to provide a personal opinion on the longevity of voice call center services in India. I asked that everyone provide a "real world" assessment instead of referring to white papers and statistics from the myriad call center industry information services. The responses that I received were quite interesting and while some feel that certain types of voice call center services will continue to thrive in India, a great majority feels that voice is definitely declining in the largest and most prolific of all BPO outsourcing markets in the world.
In order to clearly understand why voice-based outsourcing contracts are moving away from India, let's go back a few years. India established itself as the world's go-to destination for contact center services for many reasons. One of the most important attractions was and still is, the incredibly large English speaking population. The talent pool of well educated English speakers enabled US, Canadian, UK, Australian and other English speaking countries to tap into India's most important resource-it's people. The onslaught of outsourcing contracts led to the dramatic expansion of the call center industry throughout India. Tens of thousands of call center seats sprouted, construction companies were busy building business parks, expatriates poured into the country, bandwidth had to be increased, infrastructure needed to be improved, mega-corporations and conglomerates jumped on the band-wagon, VC money poured in and the salespeople were let loose to get the message out:
Attention call center outsourcing decision makers! Enter India! We offer cost effective call center outsourcing services implemented by highly educated and articulate English speaking agents at a significant cost savings without sacrificing quality and productivity supported by robust technology, expert management and corporate resources.
It was a mantra heard over and over in umpteen sales pitches in every outsourcing media outlet and from every sales and marketing person that represented Indian call center firms including yours truly. The phenomenon was here, in action, happening live and I experienced it first hand. I went to India and I placed a lot of business there. In the beginning, the value proposition was actually being delivered. The "mavericks" that were among the first to move business to India, for the most part were benefiting from the initial wave of success. They established a foothold and created a success model and a vehicle to grab the very best labor resources available.
This period of boom went on for several years. A few years ago we started to see some signs that the Indian call center industry is facing challenges including quality issues, complaints, privacy and security breakdowns, re-deployment of call center contracts to alternative destinations and the mad dash of "me-too" start ups with very aggressive sales tactics. To this day we receive calls from ominous call center companies throughout India requesting a "process" to fill seats.
More recently, many Indian outsourcing companies have been expanding call center operations outside of India to the Philippines, Eastern Europe and Latin America. In the Philippines it's referred to as the "Indian Invasion." This is a telltale sign, confirming the fact that the quality of voice based call center services in India is definitely eroding and even Indian companies are looking outside of India to mitigate risk. The backlash against India based call centers is apparent. I spent a lot of time in the UK in 2007 and I was amazed by the sheer number of advertisements and media messages from corporations promoting "non-Indian call centers" for customer care as a way to lure new customers retain existing ones.
Through my informal research I did get responses from several indignant Indian outsourcers that refused to accept this fact. I respect everyone's opinion and I'm not suggesting that the industry will languish in India. India was primarily responsible for fueling the dramatic growth of the call center and BPO industry and no one can ever refute that. I am however stating a real-world fact, that India is becoming a less attractive option for companies that need to outsource voice services.
Recently we were involved in RFPs for several of the Fortune 500. The RFPs were for voice based customer care. In each case the client instructed us not to allow any India based call centers to bid. Furthermore, many of our existing clients have moved English language voice call center business away from Indian to the Philippines, South Africa, Mexico, Central America, re-deployed to home-shored sites and other offshore destinations. So why is this happening? Let's focus on the reasons behind the issues facing voice based call center delivery in India:
I'm going to provide a summary of reasons from my own personal experience and the collective experience of my colleagues at major companies that stopped outsourcing to India. I must state that this information is based on outsourcing contracts placed with the largest Indian outsourcing firms to the smaller and mid sized companies. I'm sure there are many more reasons so here are a few of the most common:
- The growth and availability of alternative, emerging outsourcing destinations that provide cost effective, scalable, high quality, technologically robust services with highly educated agents with a better cultural understanding combined with conversational skills, minus the accent issues.
- The over-building of call center seats in India has led to meteoric, above industry attrition levels that leads to a severe decline in performance and quality.
- The "robotic" and tightly scripted voice of the Indian agent and the ongoing backlash of anti-Indian call centers emphatically expressed by the average consumer that requires a positive customer interaction.
- The UK and US media and late night TV have satirized the Indian call center experience to levels that have created extreme negative and at times comedic perceptions. This coupled with real world negative customer experiences with Indian call centers makes for dangerous combination of public views on dealing with Indian agents.
- The cultural disconnect between the Indian agent and the average consumer in English speaking countries particularly the US.
- The cost associated with training and development of agents and managers to the outsourcer and client alike, with attrition through the roof.
- The real cost of outsourcing to India is much higher than the contracted rate. The travel expenses from frequent trips for ongoing training and troubleshooting, lost productivity, overall training costs from attrition, learning curve issues, the cost of declining service levels and performance and much more, all have to be factored into the real "savings."
- The increasingly young and inexperienced agents and front-line managers.
- The call for an improved customer experience in order to retain existing customers and reduce customer complaints.
- The lack of scalability without degradation in performance.
- First call resolution is a challenge given all of the above. This is driving decision makers to seek out alternative destinations.
I want to reiterate that I'm not suggesting India's call center industry will capitulate. Far from it. I'm simply shedding light on an industry trend that started a few years ago and all signs point to a continuing decline for the demand of voice services in India.
On the flip side, India's non-voice back office services are experiencing dramatic growth and will continue to do so. Indian outsourcers are turning to non-voice BPO business (back office, chat, development, transcription, etc.) to supplant voice based contracts because it's a better and more lucrative fit. It also appears that collections and receivables management along with level (3) technical support will more than likely continue to thrive in India. Voice customer care, telesales, and other types of customer interaction will continue on in India but I don't believe this part of the industry will see dramatic growth. I've interviewed many US corporations, decision makers, outsourcers, colleagues and friends and the consensus is to maintain current volumes in India while seeking out alternative destinations, move business out of India altogether or consider India for only certain types of voice services.
All of us are customers of corporate brands. Most of us use the telephone for customer care, transactions, reservations and much more. Each of us has a story to tell about our customer experience over the telephone with an agent sitting thousands of miles away, working away at his/her desk trying to resolve our issues. I've had good experiences in India with companies like Sage (contact management software). Every time I've called for assistance, the response from Sage has been top notch and the resolution expertise has been world class. However, for every 1 positive transaction, I've had 2-3 negative ones in Indian call centers and most of the time, the agent just didn't "get it." The agent wasn't rude, abrupt or unresponsive and I could tell that he/she genuinely wanted to help me but the knowledge base and the cultural disconnect were obstacles that the agent simply couldn't overcome. I'm not sure if training is an issue or simply put, perhaps the Indian agent doesn't stick with 1 call center job long enough to develop the necessary product knowledge and customer interaction skills reinforcement necessary to deliver a positive customer experience.
I've had some bad experiences with call centers in the Philippines too and most recently in Mauritius. I've had bad experiences with US, Canadian and Caribbean based call centers too. I'm not throwing a blanket of negativity on the Indian call center market. I'm sharing real world experiences from actual decision makers and people very close to the action.
India is the largest BPO outsourcing marketing in the world and some would contend that this is the reason why there's so much discussion about it. But we all know that being the largest doesn't always equate to being the best. Being the largest sometimes naturally exposes you to more scrutiny as well. However, I don't believe the scrutiny is unjustified in the case of India and I wouldn't support the notion of decreased voice volume in India if I didn't personally experience it. In all fairness to Indian based call centers I've encountered success stories as well for very specific types of engagements that don't require very high service levels. India's call center industry I believe is shifting to a different model. The call center voice based contracts will be become increasingly niche based. The customer experience and SLA threshold are key factors that will drive decision makers to or away from India.
The moral of the story is to take the time to evaluate all of your options because there are many available. Don't fall into the trap of defaulting to certain outsourcing destinations because it's fashionable to do so. Make sure that you select a location that will meet the tangible and intangible needs of your outsourcing initiatives. Geographic diversification can contribute to a positive customer experience and this could lead to the success of your call center outsourcing campaigns. There are many excellent labor markets for English language and multilingual agents available to you at a good price. Don't put all your eggs in one basket and don't turn to the 800 pound Gorilla because it's there.
By:
Nick Jiwa
CustomerServ, LTD
www.CustomerServLTD.com
What's Behind Benchmarking The Interactive Voice Response System?
by Maggie Boys, Senior Research Associate, E Source
It's no secret that most consumers hate interactive voice response systems (IVRs). These automated telephone menus have been around for 15 or 20 years. But it's only recently, with the recognition that customers of most major companies must navigate an IVR before they speak with a customer service representative, that companies have thought the IVR important enough to benchmark. The website www.gethuman.com, which helps consumers navigate corporate IVRs to reach a CSR, has focused the attention of consumers and customer service professionals alike on the IVR.
When looking at a listing of companies and their rankings on any benchmark study, it's important to ask some critical questions about what's behind those numbers.
Every benchmarking study has an immediate purpose. It might be to provide customer care managers with direction for future improvements by examining drivers of satisfaction and providing recommendations for improvement. Or this, from Benchmark Portal's web site a few years ago: "Our report points out gaps in your performance that may be costing you sales and earnings, and helps you navigate through the often stormy process of selecting the optimum improvement initiative involving technology, hiring, training and scheduling."
Underlying every benchmarking exercise is a strategy or philosophy of customer service. That customer service strategy or philosophy determines the benchmark standards and guides many other decisions in the process of benchmarking.
For example, everyone understands that getting some callers to use the IVR for self-service is cheaper than putting every caller through to a CSR. But what are good strategies for moving customers that direction? If the philosophy is, "What's good for the customer is good for the company," your standard for customer access to a CSR will make it easy and quick.
But if you believe that protecting the company's interests also should be taken into account, the standard will be different. The difficulty with this is deciding exactly where that balance should fall-how deep in the IVR should the CSR option be to encourage customers to try self-service first? How the prompt is phrased is another factor. Should it be called "To speak to a customer service representative?" Or is "All other questions" good enough?
In the end, every company makes this determination for itself, based on its own business case.
Here's another example. If you begin with the belief that the IVR channel is just like the company website, you might give a point for each customer service option that the IVR lists. A benchmark that began with this assumption would rank an IVR with 40 options higher than an IVR with only 5 or 6 options.But is an IVR that lists 40 options better than one that lists just the five or six most commonly-needed ones? It's easy to run your eye down a list of 20 possible options and make a selection on a website, but what's it like to listen to 40 options on an IVR?
A hundred decisions like these go into every benchmark study ranking. It should be obvious that no two benchmarking efforts will rank company IVRs in the same order. Everything from their beginning assumptions to the metrics they include, the people who evaluate the systems, the statistical methods used to calculate scores, and their final rankings will be different.
It's very unlikely that any call center manager will agree with every standard established for every metric within a given benchmark. But it's important to find out what went into a benchmark in order to understand what your company's ranking really means. It's important to make a distinction between what might be a wake-up call about your customer service technology, and what is just a philosophical disagreement. Is a third-quartile score something to put a customer service director on probation for? It may just be that the company's customer service strategy is vastly different from that of the benchmarking organization.
In any case, a benchmark is about standards. It's not an average. That said, it can be useful to know what average looks like, and if you buy access to the detailed results, also useful to know what the top quartile is doing to get to top quartile. Very often, the answer has more to do with focusing on customer service issues than with having the most money to spend.
Benchmarking helps customer service professionals think through these questions of customer service strategy, as well as how to put that strategy into action. That is much of its benefit.
Maggie Boys is Senior Research Associate at E Source. She recently led a benchmark of North American Utility IVRs.
Are You Teaching The Basics of Call Center Operations?
by Penny Reynolds, The Call Center School
Rachel has just finished your agent orientation program and is ready to hit the phones. She's passed the product knowledge test with flying colors and seems to have better than average communications skills. She's actively using the new soft-skills she learned in the final phase of orientation and you're sure she's going to be one of your stars.
But you have this nagging feeling that you've forgotten to teach her something. And you ask yourself, "Is there anything else Rachel should know before she begins her "tour of duty?" Is there any other training she needs that will make her more effective in handling customer contacts, as well as be a more satisfied call center employee?
The answer is "yes". There's one more piece. The missing link here is to equip Rachel with knowledge about the unique call center environment and how it operates. Let's face it - she's had to learn a lot in the last few weeks. And part of that training should have been an operational overview so Rachel can better understand the context in which she plays such an important role.
So what exactly do new employees need to learn about the call center? We asked agents and supervisors alike what the missing pieces were and below is their "Top 5" list. How many of these areas are you covering in your own training program?
1. The Profession and the Industry
How many of your staff understand the world of call centers? It's important for them to understand the vital role your own call center plays in the organization, as well as the bigger picture of call centers everywhere. Rachel should understand that this is more than "just answering the phones", but a mission-critical part of businesses everywhere - a bona fide profession, not just an in-between stop on the way to a "real" job.
Include information about industry demographics (types and sizes of centers, as well as the numbers of folks that work in the profession). And make them aware of the career opportunities and professional development options available to them in this industry. This type of awareness will help your retention efforts in the long run, as well as increase job satisfaction in the short term.
2. Performance Measurement
Do your staff understand what you're measuring every day in terms of the call center's overall performance as well as individual performance? It's useful for them to understand what the call center's performance goals are in terms of service and efficiency (and perhaps revenue) in support of the company's overall objectives. Perhaps the center gathers marketing data and focuses on customer input for future product and service offerings. Rachel should understand how these call center operational goals then translate down into measures of her own performance.
Include training on performance measures, with particular emphasis on all the items an agent will be measured on and why. Every person should understand how his/her performance will be evaluated and understand what they can do to affect those numbers and scores.
3. Workforce Management
Do your staff understand why management is so obsessed with everyone being in their seat and adhering to their work schedule? It's critical for them to understand the basics of the workforce management process and the impact on service and cost of getting the "just right" number of people in place to handle the calls. Rachel should understand the effect on service she has if she's not available when scheduled and what that also means in terms of how busy her co-workers will be.
Include training on how the forecasting and scheduling process works in your center. Every person should understand how workforce schedules are created, and the impact that just one person can make on service and cost.
4. Call Center Technology
Do your staff understand how the calls they're taking right now arrived at their desktop and what the customer has experienced to the point at which live conversation begins? It's helpful for them to understand the overall concept of how a call or contact arrives at their workstation, as well as what technologies enable them to handle calls more effectively once they arrive. Rachel should understand what her customer has experienced in terms of IVR self-service or sitting in the ACD queue before she picked up the call. She should also fully understand the capabilities of all the technology at her disposal in terms of terms of handling each call (such as CTI or contact management systems).
Include training on how a contact gets from the customer to the desktop, and what the communications process is like for customers. Every person should understand what technologies are available to them in handling the call more efficiently, as well as have a basic understanding of the other technologies at work "behind the scenes" in the call center in terms of workforce management system, quality monitoring, workflow management, and more.
5. Customer Relationships
Do your staff understand the value of each and every customer call? While we're not suggesting they whip out a calculator on every call, it is important for front-line staff to understand the concept of lifetime customer value so the proper emphasis on service is placed. Rachel should understand that while one single call might not seem that important, when the average value is multiplied over a "lifetime" of calls, every interaction can be significant in customer retention.
Include training on lifetime customer value and the critical role that each agent plays in customer retention and the bottom line. And if you have a CRM strategy and CRM technologies in place, it's important to help the front line staff understand how that strategy affects them in handling contacts. Will they follow different scripts for a "high value" customer, or will performance measures change as more focus is placed on the quality of the call handling process versus traditional efficiency measures such as speed of answer and average handle time.
Including these five components in your frontline staff's orientation program will go a long way in equipping them with the knowledge to better understand the context in which their role is performed. Without this background, staff like Rachel may never perform up to their potential.
Return on Investment
Benjamin Franklin perhaps said it best, "An investment in knowledge pays the biggest returns." Filling in gaps in your agent training and orientation program pays for itself many times over in terms of increased call center operational efficiency, improved service, and decreased staff turnover.
About the Author..
Penny Reynolds is a Founding Partner of The Call Center School, a Nashville, Tennessee based consulting and education company. The company provides a wide range of educational offerings for call center professionals, including traditional classroom courses, web-based seminars, and self-paced e-learning programs at the manager, supervisor, and front-line staff level. For more information, see www.thecallcenterschool.com or call 615-812
The Importance of Planning: Do We Have The Cart Before The Horse
by Ric Kosiba, Ph.D.
The Planning Life Cycle
In call centers, our planning cycle is very interesting and, for most of us, a tad convoluted. When speaking to workforce management professionals, we find that most workforce planning time is spent responding to plans gone awry or explaining why plans were not achieved rather than on real planning activities. We are, by and large, unplanned planners spending most of our time fixing unplanned events.
We generally spend our time answering three questions (and usually all at once):
What Happened?
When forecasts are not met, or performance is below goal, we must go back and determine what happened. It never matters whether the blip in call volumes was caused by an unknown marketing drop or some unexpected world event, the blame usually falls our way (or certainly feels that way).
This question generally consumes maybe fifteen to thirty percent of a workforce manager’s time and the research associated with this activity is both time consuming and very frustrating.
What is Happening?
The natural companion to the question “What Happened?” is the question “What is Happening?” When unusual or unplanned volume or handle time spikes (or valleys) rear their ugly head, this is our time to spring into action. It is our job to recommend overtime (or early release), recommend bringing additional resources to the phones, and possibly reorganizing the call routing or work flows.
This one question, and its corollary question, “How Do We Fix It?” consumes us. It is tied to our day-of monitoring and people management, and our short term scheduling. This part of our job can take about fifty to seventy percent of our time.
What if I told you some of this chaos is self-inflicted, based upon the modeling assumption of our workforce management system?
One fun fact that one of our engineers at Bay Bridge discovered (see D. Newhard) is that using average call arrival distributions leads to inaccurate forecasts. By averaging historical call volume intervals over time, you throw away all of the normal variability of the day. Each actual day’s data, with all its call volume ups and downs and handle time highs and lows, gets averaged together within workforce management software to give you forecasts that are, intraday, medium volumes and medium handle times. In other words, our workforce management tools tend to dampen the variability in our forecasts that are all too present in the real world. I’m hoping to elaborate on this in a future discussion.
What is Going to Happen?
I will argue that in our day and age, given the state of our organizations and our current technology infrastructure, this question is absolutely the most important of the three questions.
This question does not usually consume us - except during budget season. It gets put on the back burner while we spend our time managing and fixing the here and now. Because of its vague and futuristic character, its inter-office political nature, and because its repercussions can be put off into the future (and maybe hoisted onto some other group), it is given little analyst time. Like kicking the can down the road, kicking future contact center issues down the road is natural to contact center operations. Most of the workforce management folks say that this question takes between ten and twenty percent of their time.
And I believe this is the most important area to get right.
Do We Have The Cart Before The Horse?
Fifteen or twenty years ago, when workforce management software was in its infancy, contact center managers had a very complex and tactical problem to solve. They needed to know how to efficiently schedule their employees and they knew that that business problem was much too complex for them to solve using a pen and paper or using the early spreadsheets (remember scheduling using those long sheets of paper!?!). And so an industry was born. It was a great thing for all of us (as well as our company’s shareholders).
After improved scheduling came more business problems that workforce management software helped us solve (e.g. adherence monitoring and vacation planning).
Is there much value left to squeeze out of better scheduling? As is typical of all business problems, we nailed eighty percent of the value with twenty percent of the effort. We’ve spent the ensuing years attacking the last twenty percent of the value.
But are we spending our valuable time on the right business problem? When we first tackled the problem of putting together tighter employee schedules and tracking schedule adherence, we saw terrific incremental efficiency improvements. Are there more improvements to be made in workforce management?
The following graph represents the staffing distribution of a large and seasonal contact center group over three months. During those three months, the contact volume changed significantly. But notice this: the staffing distribution remains constant over time. I have looked at contact center data across all sorts of businesses, and this consistent staff distribution phenomenon is itself a call center truism. In the end, given all that we workforce management folks do (or maybe because of what we do), and given all that our call center managers do, these distributions remain constant over time.
But what does this tell us? We do a great job of using our current tools- or at least a consistent job of using our current tools. Given all the variability of call volumes and handle times, we consistently get a good match between when our calls come in and when we have folks available to answer them (which is apparent when you match the staffing distributions against call volume distributions). This is a huge achievement.
So what is left to do? The big business problem to solve is that of getting the right number of employees in the door in the first place. Much of the problems we see day-to-day are not associated with day-of issues, they are instead the issues associated with poor long-term planning. What keeps us busy now is time associated with managing the chaos of an earlier long-term planning mistake. By planning better in advance, there is less time spent on firefighting and more time and effort is focused on fire prevention. Improved long-term planning leads to less day-to-day troubles and a better managed call center.
Our experience also suggests that there are huge savings available to solving this problem well. Maybe it is time to get the eighty percent associated with answering that third question?
About the Author
Ric Kosiba is one of the founders of Bay Bridge Decision Technologies and serves as its President. He leads the development of the company’s simulation and optimization technologies used in call center applications.
He is expert in the field of call center management and modeling, call center strategy optimization (where he holds a patent), and the optimization of large-scale operational processes.
Ric received a Ph.D. in Operations Research from Purdue University, a M.S.C.E. and a B.S.C.E from Purdue’s School of Civil Engineering.
Ric’s contact information is:
Phone: 410.224.9883
Email: edk@baybridgetech.com
Address:
900 Bestgate Road
Suite 210
Annapolis, MD 21401
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