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The ChannelFor Industrynformation
As we move toward fall its time to think about your acapital budget requests. Don
another cycle go by wherewishes dont come true. Youto build the case for technolog
responds to business needs, cr
value by improving processe
workflow,and engen-
ders sup-port from
your entireorganiza-
tion. For anend gamethat results in approval and fun
start by choosing the right pro
including the right people on
project team, and considenhancements to existing tec
ogy, as well as new technolopossible solutions.
Choose theRight Projects
The right projects are thosgain approval from decision
ers and drive organi-
What is going onhere? They say bad
luck comes in threes,so maybe I am just
on a losing streak.Whatever the case,the last three interac-tions I have had as a
customer with a contact center
have been just awful. Not justgarden variety bad, but awful.And while I know that my job
tends to make me more critical
than most, it would be difficult
for even the hopelessly upbeat
to find any good in any of thesetransactions. (You are welcome
to try, thoughIoutlined them in the
sidebar on page 9.)Poor service tends
to get me a bit edgy,and in one of thetirades I threw after a
frustrating interaction,I found myself using a term that
comes up occasionally in ourconsulting work: blocking and
tackling. We generally use it to
refer to foundational activitiesthat need to take place in just
about any contact centermanaging phone coverage,
monitoring
Employee Engagement
July 2010
Sell Leadership Smart Technolo
Create an emotionalconnection todrive the behaviorshat contribute to
customer loyalty andbusiness success.
www.ContactCenterPipeline.com
BY SUSAN HASH
Share CCP with your staff.Find out how.
Call 443-909-6951
Brian Hinto
Blocking and Tackling
Jay Minnucci
What is it that makes the employees in
ertain companies especially enthusias-
c about their jobs and more committed
o delivering a high-quality customer
xperience on call after call? Higher
ay alone wont produce passionateoncern for the companys well-being
nd dedication to helping it achieve itsision or goals.
Employee engagement has been
widely discussed in recent years as a key
ontributor to customer satisfaction and
etention. There has been a great deal ofesearch into the correlation between an
ngaged workforce and positive opera-onal results, including higher profitabil-
ity, improved performance and lowercosts. It seems like employee engage-
ment has become the new corporate
brass ringbut its impossible to grab
if the companys leadership fails todemonstrate a sincere interest in their
employees well-being and growth.What exactly is employee engage-
ment? Definitions differ from study
to study and company to company,
although there are overlappingthemes. A few years ago,
PUBLISHING GROUP
IN THE PIPELIN
Performance Matte
The Three Phasesof Performance
ManagementPage 6
Inside ViewLegal Intake
ProfessionalsPage 10
Management ROI
Proving QualityPage 16
Forecast FocusSchedule Adherenc
A Fun Exercise for YAgentsPage 18
Leading Thoughts
The Contact CenterDevelopment ModePage 20
pa
page 3
page 8Linda HardenPublisher, Contact Center Pipeline
LinkedIn Group: Contact Center Pipeline
Join us for more discussion on LinkedIn.
What's Happening in Your Center?Rolling out a new monitoring program,
incentive program, hosting an open house?
Please share your story/project with us.
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Copyright 2010 Verint Systems Inc. All rights reserved worldwide.
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helped a leading communications provider identify and correct process
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Analytics
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Performance Management
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Workforce Management
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JUL 2010www.ContactCenterPipeline.com
The Conference Board took a look at 12 major
studies on employee engagementeach of
which had a different definition and varyingkey drivers of engagement. It came up with the
following composite definition of employeeengagement: a heightened emotional con-
nection that an employee feels for his or her
organization, which influences him or her to exertgreater discretionary effort to his or her work.
According to HR consulting firm HewittAssociates, employee engagement can be
measured by three primary behaviorssay,stayand strive:
Sayconsistently speaking positivelyabout the organization to coworkers
and referring potential employees andcustomers
Stayan intense desire to be a member
of the organization, despite opportunitiesto work elsewhere
Striveexerting extra effort andexhibiting behaviors that contribute to
business success
Impact on Profitability,Customer Experience
How much impact does employee engage-
ment have on a companys bottom line? A recent
Gallup study estimated that disengaged employ-
ees wasted more than $300 billion in productiv-ity in U.S. firms; however, organizations with an
engaged workforce have 2.6 times the earningsper share growth rate compared to others in the
same industry with a less-engaged workforce.Focusing on employee engagement and
measuring the impact of company decisions onthat engagement has shown a direct correla-
tion in customer engagement and profitabilityat Nicor National, a provider of turnkey energy
efficiency and warranty solutions for utilitiesnationwide. The organization, which measures
both employee and customer
engagement on a monthlybasis, has found that the results
are very closely aligned, says
Barbara Porter, vice president
of business development and
customer service.Employee engagement
in any organization is very
dynamicit trends positivelyat a pretty steady rate, and then you mightsee a dip in one month; for example, due to a
reorganization that might not have been com-municated properly, she says. When we see a
dip in employee engagement, we see a similardip in our customer engagementand when
we fix our employee engagement, our customer
engagement goes up. (See the graphic on page 4
of Nicors Engagement Index, which illustrates the
month-to-month correlation between employee
and customer engagement.)
Weve been able to demonstrate that cor-relation pretty directly, adds Nancy Korman,
senior manager of call center operations. Whenwe address employee issues upfront and take
action to make things better, we will see analmost immediate and dramatic improvement in
employee engagement, and therefore, customer
engagement.In some organizations, a 30- or 60-day lag
time is typical before customer engagement is
impacted, Porter says, but Nicor Nationals results
have been more real-time due to its comprehen-
sive employee feedback program.
Ask Employees for TheirFeedbackFrequently
Companies with high engagement typically
place a high priority on employee input, and they
tend to solicit their feedback more frequently
than others. At Nicor National, managementfirmly believes that employee feedback is the
cornerstone to creating a positive, open culture.
The environment that you create for youremployees is the environment that your cus-
tomers will experience, stresses Porter. To keep
a pulse on the workplace mood and the impactof management decisions on the culture, Nicor
National implemented Allegiances Voice ofEmployee (VOE) program. The call center uses the
VOE tools to collect unsolicited questions, sug-gestions and concerns from employees online.Employees can log into the tool whenever they
want to ask a question, make a suggestion, offera comment or bring up a concern. They can also
take an online survey that asks for their feedback
to statements like: Nicor National values my rela-
tionship; the company really cares about me; and
the company invests in my success.
On a monthly basis, the company also con-ducts a benchmarking survey using the VOE tool.
In addition, culture surveys, or pulse checks,are sent out to random groups of employees
on a regular basis. Their responses make up anemployee engagement index, which is tracked on
a weekly and monthly basis to help management
to identify trends.
Face-to-face time with employees is alsoimportant. Another method that management
uses to collect employee feedback
PUBLISHER
Linda [email protected]
EDITOR
Susan [email protected]
EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD
Lori Bocklund Strategic Contact
Jay Minnucci Service Agility
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS
Rebecca Gibson
Susan Hash
Brian Hinton
Jon Pratz
Dan Rickwalder
Lesley Vereen
Jay Minnucci
DESIGN DIRECTOR
Mark [email protected]
TECHNOLOGY DIRECTOR
Steve [email protected]
PIPELINE PUBLISHING GROUP, INCPO Box 3467, Annapolis, MD 21403
(443) 909-6951
Contact Center Pipelineis published
12 times a year by Pipeline Publishing Group.
Subscription fee is $240 per year.
To subscribe or renew subscription, go to
www.contactcenterpipeline.com.
Publisher is not responsible for the editorial cont
of Contact Center Pipeline. Views expressed her
are those of the authors and sponsors and do n
necessarily reflect the opinion of the ownership
or management of the newsletter.
Copyright 2010,
Pipeline Publishing Group, Inc.
All rights reserved.
Reproduction of Contact Center Pipelinein whole
in part is expressly prohibited without prior writte
permission from the publisher.
Print and Online Advertising Inquiries:
[email protected](443) 909-6951
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Employee Engagement
Follow Contact Center Pipeline on:
TWITTER
@ twitter.com/SusanHash
LINKED-IN
@tinyurl.com/ccpLinkedin
page 1
page 4
BARBARA PORTER
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JUL 2010www.ContactCenterPipeline.com
product development professionals are teamed with
customer support reps for new product releases. As[product development] is going through the process
of designing and developing new features, they get
feedback from customer support on how customers
might view the functionality, or to identify any gapsthat might cause issues with particular customer
configurations or the way that they use the applica-
tion, Woody explains.
Customer support reps also participate in Kaizenevents to improve support processes, like time to
close tickets or to prevent issues and problemsaltogether. Customer support drives the process,
pulling together crossfunctional teams that consistof representatives from product development, profes-
sional services and customer support. The group isbrought together for two or three days to go through
a segment of customer tickets to identify the root
cause and to come up with a list of action items toimprove the process.
Customer support reps are encouraged to attendSciQuests user group meetings that take place several
times a year, and each rep visits a customers siteat least once a year with a colleague from accountmanagement or professional services. We want them
to understand how the customer runs their business
and how theyre using our application or products to
do it, as well as what impact theyre having on thatwhen theyre assisting them, Woody says.
Create a Culture of Respect
In The Conference Boards review of employeeengagement research, the one key driver that all
of the studies agreed to be the strongest was the
employees relationship with his or her manager.As weve seen with Nicor National and SciQuest,
leaders who can establish a high level of trust andrespect are able to create the type of positive culture
that, in turn, generates passion for the workplace.Where do you start?Managers need to truly care about the people
who theyre responsible for, and look at them aspeople vs. metrics, says Porter. You need to care
about their success in your organization, more so
than your own success.
The most important people in our organizationare the people who communicate with and take care
of our customersand thats our contact centerrepresentatives and our technicians in the field. Andso our job is to support the people who take care of
our customers.
Editors Note: Learn more about SciQuests award-winning
customer service initiatives in next months Inside View column.
The process of measuring employee engagement can range from very simple
to very complex. Measuring your employees passion about work and the
work environment can be as simple as issuing a survey with a few scaled
questions around the ideas of:
Job satisfaction
Productivity
Quality of peers
Likelihood to change jobs
Likelihood to recommend company products or services
Likelihood to recommend as a great place to work
Satisfaction with compensation & benefits
Susan Hashis the Editor of Contact
Center [email protected]
(206) 552-8831
Measuring Employee Engagement
USE A LIKERT SCALE
Using a scale of agreement (or Likert Scale), a survey can express
quantitative measurements of your employee engagement. Often times,
gathering open-ended comments along with numerical, scale data yields arich source of inexpensive opportunities to make employees happy.
A Likert scale (pronounced lick-urt) is a type of psychometric response
scale often used in questionnaires, and is the most widely used scale in
survey research. For example:
I will look for another job in the next 12 months
By gathering compliments in addition to concerns, companies can find out if their engagement
efforts make a meaningful, lasting contribution to employees.
Consider the following anonymous compliment and complaint printed verbatim:
My manager is very proactive in discussing my abilities and goals with me and we
arrive at a goal together; one that is realistic and achievable.
It bothers me that our customers get better benefits with their accounts than we
do as employees. Everybody makes a mistake once in a while with their accounts; itsunbelievable that an employee gets two overdraft reversals in a lifetime.
These two feedback items helped a business confirm the effectiveness of its management
program and work on moral boosters for its employees. Engagement is most effectively measured
both quantitatively through scaled questions, and qualitatively through open-ended comments.
Source: Kyle LaMalfa, Allegiance Best Practices Manager and Loyalty Expert; excerpted from The Top 11
Ways to Increase Your Employee Loyalty, Engagement: Winning the Battle for Customer and Employee
Hearts & Minds,www.allegiance.com
GATHER COMPLIMENTS
1. Strongly disagree
2. Disagree
3. Neither agree nor disagree
4. Agree5. Strongly agree
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Contact Center Pipeline6 JUL 2010
When was yourlast performance
review? Was itcompleted on time?
Was it truly reflec-tive of your overall
performance? Howspecific, fair andvaluable was the
feedback? Did youtrack your progress
and milestones against your goals throughout the
year, leading you to a thoughtful self-evaluation?
Most companies have some type of annual
performance evaluation process in which each
employees performance is evaluated accordingto a standard performance evaluation template.Organizations that take formal performance
management (PM) more seriously include aperiod for annual goal-setting, in which individual
employee performance goals are established that
align with and support cascading corporate and
departmental goals. Throughout the year, then,the expectation is that managers are monitoring
and coaching employee performance toward
these goals.With all this time devoted to PM and the
thousands of dollars poured into Web-basedperformance management systems, how manyemployees cite the annual performance manage-
ment process as motivator, a major contributor
to satisfaction or a reason they stay with thecompany? In too many companies, performance
management is a checklist activity that many
managers and employees dont spend much time
thinking about, except when goals or evaluations
are due.
A Three-Phased Approach
Whats the solution? A PM process that sharesaccountability equally between employees andmanagers, and devotes the time necessary to
allow all employees to reflect meaningfully on
the goals and behaviors that matter most.Each phase of the PM process is equally impor-
tant and dependent on the next to be successful.
If you shortchange one, the next step will suffer.
Logically then, good planning sets the stage forperformance management success.
PHASE 1: PLANNING
The planning phase includes individual
employee performance goal setting andanticipating the demands and challenges of the
upcoming year. This phase may be daunting toa manager with many employees, especially if
every employee has customized goals. However,
there are many ways to simplify and streamline
the individual employee goal process. Try toincorporate some of these ideas in the planningphase:
1. Document individual performance goals that
align with and support department and organi-zational goals. To streamline this step, provide
your employees with your departmental goals
and ask them to develop the first draft of theirperformance goals. What better way to familiarize
employees with the departmental goals and their
role in achieving them? Alternately, you may pair
employees in like jobs and ask them to work
collaboratively to develop their goals together.What about your frontline employees? Considerimplementing a collaborative, social networking-
style Web interface, posting the contact center
goals and asking agents for input about mosteffective best agent goals.
2. Set development goals. Developmentgoals are related to an employees skill devel-
opment and career aspirations, often separate
from the requirements of their current position.Development goals are developed in collabora-
tion with the employee and are meant to benefit
both the employee and the company, albeit inless direct ways than performance goals. Help
employees develop their own developmentgoals during coaching conversations. You are
asking employees about their future aspirations
professional interests and long-term goals, right
You can easily build a few of these questions into
your regular employee feedback and prompt
employees to keep track of them for annuadevelopment planning.
3. Identify the resources needed to meeperformance goals and anticipate performance
barriers. An important component of planning is
asking the employee to anticipate the resourcerequired to meet the goal (e.g., training, time, you
involvement), the barriers that might get in theway and how you or the employee will address
them if they do.Performance planning is really a series of teach
able moments: Youre teaching your employeehow to set professional goals, how to think strategically and proactively, and demonstrating the
importance of career planning.
PHASE 2: OBSERVATIONAfter the performance and development goal
are set and documented, the employee beginworking on his goals, fine-tuning his work, moni
toring his or her progress and marking milestones
The manager, of course, observes performanceand provides feedback, too. Although this phase
is commonly identified as the observation phase
that doesnt mean that its all on the managershoulders. Dont move from planning to observa
tion without clearly communicating to employ
ees their accountability for self-evaluation and fotracking their own progress toward their goalsSet specific expectations around how and how
often you want to see a progress update on thei
goals (e.g., during performance feedback meetings, through email, using a report template)
then hold them accountable for tracking thei
own performance, as much as possible.
The observation phase blends in with much o
the daily work of the contact center. Employee
do their work, which leads them closer to theigoals, and you observe and provide feedback on
The Three Phasesof Performance ManagementA better approach to performance management: Share accountabilityfor planning, observation and evaluation phases with your agents.
Performance MattersView Available CCP Training Resources at:
http://tinyurl.com/CCPTraining
Rebecca GibsonLearning Currents
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JUL 2010www.ContactCenterPipeline.com
their work, which is part of a managers
responsibility. Dont forget, though, that
you need to continually tie that per-
formance and observation back to the
goals that were set at the beginning ofthe PM process. You can easily build this
into your regular one-on-one meetings:
1. Discuss progress and results. Pull
out the complete goal plan (perfor-
mance and development goals) atregular intervals throughout the year
and discuss progress, barriers and suc-cesses. Praise progress and encouragethe employee every step of the way
toward goal achievement.
2. Review and refine goals. Dont be afraidto revise or refine goals, if necessary. In todaysbusiness environment, corporate goals or even
our strategy can change quickly and employeegoals should flex with those changes.
PHASE 3: EVALUATION
Your employees have been tracking their prog-ress toward their goals and providing you withregular status updates. Youve been observing,
coaching and encouraging throughout the year.Now youre ready to complete your employee
evaluations:1. Review your documentation and create
an overview performance and progress againstgoals. Now is the time to gather all your employee
progress report and status updates. If bothemployees and managers kept up with their
documentation and communication throughout
the year, then the end-of the year evaluationshould be much easier. This why I advocate
employee self-evaluation and tracking. It makeslife much easier for the manager, who has many
employees to track.2. Complete self-evaluation (employee) and
evaluation (manager). Self-evaluations are a
valuable component of the evaluation process.They provide employees with the opportunity
to reflect on their performance, help managersunderstand employees perspective of their own
performance, and fill you in on accomplishments
you may not have noted. Review the employees
self-evaluation before you begin the performanceevaluation and refer to it as you would othersources of performance data. As you prepare forthe evaluation conversation, be prepared to share
with the employee areas of the self-evaluation
where you agreed or disagreed.3. Transition seamlessly from Phase 3 to Phase
1. Devote a portion of your evaluation meeting to
planning for next year. The employee should leave
their performance evaluation meeting with an
assignment to start thinking about what he or she
wants to accomplish in the next year. That way,
when you distribute next years departmental
goals, the employee is ready to get down to thework of planning their goals for the next year.
Three Performance ManagementPitfalls
The pitfalls associated with performance man-
agement programs can be traced to not spend-ing enough time on the process. Managers whofollow these three guidelines will vastly improve
the quality of their performance management
process:
1. The process should be collaborative.Some managers and employees interpret the
performance management process as one inwhich managers set expectations and evalu-
ate employees against those expectations. Thisapproach casts the employee in the role of passive
observer rather than active participant. Involving
employees in goal setting, monitoring and track-
ing, and evaluation eases the manager workload,
encourages ownership and
increases the likelihood that
your employees will find thePM program relevant andvaluable.
2. The process should be
fair. Its no surprise that many
employees dont feel the PMprocess is fair. Some of this
will be remedied through col-
laboration and involvement,
as well as ongoing com-munication throughout the
year. There are several steps
you can take to ensure thefairness and validity of your
PM process. HR departments
or department heads shouldconsider analyzing manager
scores across teams to verifymanagers arent unjustly rat-ing their teams higher than
others. Ask employees opin-
ions about the PM process in employee
evaluations. Have HR review a sampleof goals and evaluations each year and
make the quality of goal setting andannual evaluations part of every man-agers scorecard.
3. The process should be meaning
ful. Employees and managers need thetimemental time and clock timeto
reflect on what they want and how theyfeel as much as the realities of meetingmilestones and deadlines. Employee
should feel that their manager values
them enough to take the time to set
individual goals (not just cookie-cutte
ones), observe daily performance and achievements, and write reflective, meaningful evaluations that seamlessly integrate employee goals
performance, dreams and aspirations.Your performance management process can
be meaningful and relevant. It can bring out thebest in your employees and demonstrate you
commitment to the companys success and theemployees professional growth. Dont miss out on
the opportunity to implement a PM process tha
improves the future prospects of the companyyour employees and you.
Rebecca Gibsonis a workplacelearning and performance consultantand Principal of Learning Currents.
(443) 255-9387
Phase 1:
Planning
Phase 3:
Evaluation
Phase 2:
Observation
ADVERTISEMENT
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Contact Center Pipeline8 JUL 2010
calls, measuring performance, coaching staff,etc. During an assessment, these are the tacticalactivities we evaluate to ensure that at least a
basic level of service is provided.
The Customer Perspectiveon Basics
Having been on the short side of these last
three transactions, though, I found myself think-
ing about basic blocking and tackling from adifferent perspective. While consultants may think
in terms of inputs, a customer really only cares
about the output. When a customer makes a call,
for example, the expectation is that there will
be someone there to answer it in a reasonableamount of time. The processes that make that
happen are of no concern. And while there aremany things that might wow a customer, block-
ing and tackling is really only about the basics.While in the throes of my frustration, I came upwith this very short list of what those basics are:
Acknowledge me and my request. Answer my questions correctly.
Follow through as stated/expected.
That is a pretty simple list. Let us not confuse
it with any list of what customers want, or whatimpresses them, or what builds loyalty. This listis about the bare minimum. Think of it as the
customers version of food, water and shelter. The
last two basics in the list above are pretty obvious,
while the first changes a bit based on the channel
selected (see the table below).
Inside the CenterIf you are thinking that this blocking-and-
tackling definition sets the bar pretty low, you
get no argument from me. Yet, if the bar is set
this low, why is it that multibillion dollars com-
panies are sometimes unable to clear it? It would
be easy to say that they usually do and that my
experience was just bad luck. When I relate thestories to someone else, though, I always find
myself listening to an in-kind response of asimilar experience every bit as egregious as theones I encountered. While no one is suggestingthat such service is always the case, the sheer
number of these stories, coupled with key pieces
of evidence from some of them (note Case #2 on
page 9, for example, where they explained, it is
not our policy to notify you if we are not goingto show up), make it clear that way too many
interactions fail to meet the minimum.Inside the contact center, the surfacing of
one of these complaints from a VIP often fuels
a blame gamethe CSR should not have saidthat, the knowledge management system
wasnt updated properly, etc. Finding fault andlaying blame might be natural, but it is not veryproductive when the problem is systemic. We
need to take a more proactive approach with our
blocking-and-tackling issues. As an industry, the
stakes are certainly high enough. Review all thecriticisms we receive from the mainstream media,
and before long it becomes clear that the issuesthat rankle our customer most are those that are
squarely in the blocking-and-tackling category.
Clearing the HurdleThe nice part about a low bar is that we dont
need to make a herculean effort to cross it. In
fact, we do not need anything close to a 12-step
program to bring about positive change. Threewill work just fine:
1. Recognize and accept that every contact
center has to perfect blocking and tackling before
going on to the fancy things like voice analytics
social media and whatever else may come next2. Empower the frontline with whatever is nec
essary to avoid or immediately correct a situationwhere a block or tackle is missed.
3. Test vigorously. We can never assume that a
is going well, so you should have test accountavailable where you can model different service
scenarios (like, say, a customer having problemwith an out-of-warranty product that has a
known defect) and call in to make sure the righprocesses are in place and are followed by al
staff on all channels.The three items above should be within the
grasp of everyone running a contact center. Nohuge investments are required, and no specia
expertise is needed to make it happen.
A Consistent Approach
Yes, blocking and tackling may seem boringcompared to all the other things that we can
accomplish with a service or sales transaction
Yet the ability to deliver the basics time and time
again is a powerful way to build an image and
create loyalty. Just ask the TV manufacturer profiled in Case #2. With a quick, accurate response
I would have decided to remain a customer. Now
I have my eye on one of their competitors fla
screens which will fit perfectly in the spot thathe old TV is about to vacate.
Create a winning contact center by executing well on the servicefundamentals. By Jay Minnucci, Service Agility
page 1
Agility Factor
Blocking and Tackling
Customer Basics by Channel
Basic Expectation In-Person Service Phone Call Text Chat Email
Acknowledge me and my
request.
Make eye contact, indicate
that you will be with me soon.
Get to me within a couple of
minutes.
Provide some messaging,
get me to an agent in a
reasonable amount of time.
Acknowledge my text quickly,
even if just to let me know you
will be with me soon. Respond
consistently throughout the
chat session.
Send an acknowledgement
immediately. Answer me in
two days or less.
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JUL 2010www.ContactCenterPipeline.com
Jay Minnucci is Founder and President
of the independent consulting firm
Service Agility.
(215) 679-5250
We are going to
leave the companynames out of this
but other than that,the details are all
accurate. Here arethe three cases thatled to this article:
THREE CASESIllustrate the Impactof Poor Service
1Case #
2Case #
3Case #
Service Requested
Situation
Outcome
Service Requested
Situation
Outcome
Service Requested
Situation
Outcome
Tired of my landline phone
bill going up (yes, I still havea landline phone), I decided
to check out a packagedoffer from a local cablecompany (phone, internet
and TV for one low price).
I checked the informationout online, then sent anemail (initiated from the
companys website) to getinformation and request acall.
None. Its been threemonths, and I still havenot heard a thing.
Still paying for
the landline.Would have gladly
switched over bynow had someonecontacted me.
Called to set up phoneservice for my wifesnew business. Provided
all information exceptfor the company EIN
(tax number), which Idid not have with me. I
was assured this wasnot a problem, and thetechnician would get
it at turn-on. I verifiedtwice at the end of the
call that the companyhad everything they
needed, and thatthey would be on sitebetween 8 a.m. and
noon the following
Thursday.
Its the only phone
company in the areaif you want a land
line. Complaintswere made and the
issue was finallyaddressed. Ofcourse, a technician
was not needed. Theywere able to turn on
service remotely.
An out-of-warranty big-screen TV stoppedworking. Got a replacement part fromthe retailer, who indicated that the
simple solution would probably not work.There was a known defect, and the fix
would likely cost hundreds more thanthe replacement part. The retailer kindly
provided information on how to contactthe manufacturer and what to provide,since they may be willing to assist in
paying for the fix.
Manufacturer contacted, with originalreceipt and cost estimate for the fix
scanned in an email to the contact, as perinstructions. Acknowledgement received
indicating that a response would becoming in two days. Fourteen days later, I
have not heard anything. They finally call(even though I specifically request emailcommunication) and seem unable to come
to resolution. After one month, they finallycall (again) and leave a voicemail indicating
that they think the problem can be fixedwith the simple solution (the one I originally
told them we tried and it did not work), andI can order the part from them.
After great effort, I finally get a supervisor
to call me back. An offer is made that Ican get a brand new TV for the moneythat it would cost to fix the oldless than
half of the retail price, and far lower thanI would spend for a comparable TV from a
competitor. It is a good deal, but it feelstoo much like I am making it with the devil.
Product quality is questionable, and theservice has been awful. In the end, I decide
to spend the extra money for a product froma competitor.
Thursday comes,
and no one showsup. Shocking. Call
made to the phonecompany, and weare told that the
technician cannotcome out because
we did not supply
the EIN. We askedwhy no one calledus to request theinformation so that
the appointmentcould be kept, and
were told that it isnot company policy
to make calls tonotify customerswhen information is
missing.
MONTH
01
MONTH
02
MONTH
03
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In too many organizations, leadership effective-ness has been impaired by constantly shifting priori-
ties and flavor-of-the-month strategies. When thecompanys vision is not aligned with its policies,
procedures and management style, its hard on the
employees and morale suffers.
Good leadership requires a consistent approach,
says Mike Harris, executive director of Legal Intake
Professionals, a 24-hour legal intake and attorneyanswering service for injury lawyers. The trick is to
maintain a uniform management style during goodtimes and bad, and even when the organization
is undergoing considerable change, like extreme
growth. Legal Intake Professionals is currently more
than tripling its capacity, and is in the process of
moving to a larger center this fall, but the changehasnt had a negative impact on its current staff.
Keeping a Fingeron the Morale Pulse
Employee morale is high at Legal IntakeProfessionals. Thats because the management
team places a high priority on job satisfaction andmakes the time to listen to employee feedback
and concerns. Employees are surveyed about their
satisfaction on a quarterly basis. All of their com-
mentspositive and negativeare posted onthe company intranet, along with managementsresponses. In addition to quarterly surveys, staff
can offer more timely feedback and suggestions
through postings on the intranet, which is checked
on a weekly basis. Harris and the operations man-
ager take the time to review and respond publiclyto all comments every single Friday.
Employee morale is thoroughly discussed in
the companys quarterly staff meetings, as wellas in the contact centers weekly team meetings.
We set aside the last hour of each staff meetingto discuss morale, Harris says. We try to encour-
age employees to talk about the things that are
bothering them in a group environment, which
allows everyone to build on each others ideas,and hopefully, we can define issues for improve-
ment from those discussions.
Inside ViewDownload more Inside View articles on our website at:
http://tinyurl.com/CCP-InsideView
AT-A-
GLANCELOCATION(S):
Nashville, Tenn.
CONTACT CENTER SIZE:
45 intake specialists
OPERATING HOURS:
24x7
CUSTOMERS:
120 injury law firms
SERVICES PROVIDED:
Handling new case calls forlaw firms; outbound calls forweb forms
CHANNELS:
Phone and email
VOLUME:
Approximately 17,000 calls/week (about 5,000 of whichare new case calls)
TOP CHALLENGE:
Coordinating a move to alarger center that will more
than triple capacity, alongwith new phone and software
systems.
KEY STRENGTHS:
Consistency in call qualityand driving internal values ofrespect, growth, confidence
and a supportive culture.
Legal IntakeProfessionalsConsistency in leadership, rewards, discipline and call qualityis the key to employee engagement and high morale.
By Susan Hash, Contact Center Pipeline
PHOTOS,FROMLEFT:LEGALINTAKESTAFF
ATANASHVILLECHARITYEVENT;MANAGERJERS
EYDAY;EXECUTIVEDIRECTORMIKEHARRIS
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Leaders Work to Ensurea Consistent Approach
Harris attributes the contact centers lowturnover (well under 20%) in part to a consis-
tent management approach in both rewardsand discipline. You have to be consistent with
your praise, as well as the corrective actionprocess, he says. If not, you may have a high-
performing employee who sees someone else
constantly underperforming and getting awaywith it. That will ultimately affect your high per-
former adversely.Harris credits Operations Manager Netcha
Rodriguez with establishing uniformity in the
centers policies and procedures, which has
increased staff productivity. To ensure align-ment in vision and goals, Harris and Rodriguez
have scheduled twice-weekly meetings to
review long-term planning, upcoming pri-orities and ways to improve call efficiency,
productivity and staff appreciation. Contactcenter managers also schedule weekly one-
on-ones with each of the intake specialists todiscuss performance. Managements goal inthese conversations is to focus on the positive
by giving more praise than discipline, and tomake specialists feel appreciated for the work
that theyre doing.You have to schedule the time to do the
things that you promise youre going to do for
your managers and specialists, and you have to
follow up, Harris says. Sometimes it takes extrawork and energy, but you owe it to your staff.
Show Daily Appreciation withSmall Rewards and Fun Activities
Employee appreciation is another keycontributor to high morale at Legal Intake
Professionals. The company has an Employee ofthe Year award, for which winners receive a gift
card for $500
and extrapersonal days
off. However,Harris points
out that youdont have
to offer bigrewards tomake them
meaningful.Its more the
little thingsthat you do
on a daily basis and being consistent in how
you show that you appreciate the job that youremployees are doing, he says.
In the contact center, each month, the spe-
cialists with top scores in quality and call audits
are recognized, and are taken out to lunch by
management. On a daily basis, top performers
receive emails or letters of recognition.In addition to recognition for performance,
a spirit team plans regular celebrations andentertaining activities to provide an enjoyable
atmosphere. Those include monthly potlucks
and semimonthly events, such as an ice creamday, best baby picture day and silly hat day, to
name a few.The company intranet provides another
channel to lighten the atmosphere. It contains
fun bios and pictures of staff members, as wellas industry information and definitions to help
keep employees knowledge up to date. Also,
recent law cases are posted to illustrate the
importance of the work that the intake special-ists do. The company also participates in local
charity events twice a year, and encouragesvolunteer work.
Transparency in Policies,Performance and Feedback
Look inside any company that has high attrition
and youll likely find internal barriers to informa-tion and managers who dole out details on a
need to know basis. But thats not the case atLegal Intake Professionals, where the frontline
staff has access to all of the centers metrics and
reports. Intake specialists can also retrieve theirpast call audits at any time, listen to the calls, and
view their scores and feedback.
There is nothing hidden in any way, saysHarris. You cant fix something unless everyone
knows what is going on and when we havean opportunity for improvement, we look toour specialists for answers.
Besides making information and feedbackreadily available for contact center staff, man-
agement also takes the time to communicate tostaff the underlying reasons for any decisions or
policies. We always tell them the why behind the
process, so they will understand why we need to
do things a certain way. They may not agree with
it, but at least they will know the reason for it.
People Helping PeopleLegal Intake Professionals customer-centric
culture is based on its values of respectgrowth, confidence and maintaining a fun
environment, says Harris.Our purpose as an organization is helping
helping injured people connect with an attorney
who can help them, as well as helping each other
he says. We try to instill in our specialists the
confidence that theyre the right person to helpthe caller. While they dont give legal advice
theyre there to take care of the caller by askingthe right questions, providing an appropriate
amount of empathy, and making the callers feelike they have the process started with a law firm
that truly cares about their needs.
MIKEHARRIS
ContactCenter
TrainingCheck out our ever-growing
training resources at:
http://tinyurl.com/CCPTraining
We look forward to being your
new training partner in 2010
New in the Pipeline
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Contact Center Pipeline12 JUL 2010
zational support. To identify which projects areright, you have to get clear on your corporations
strategy and the role the contact center plays
within that strategy. Then focus on projects that
link to the strategyprojects that really matterto the contact center and the corporation.
When your CxOs, board members and otherstakeholders make decisions about project fund-
ing, they demand a strategic link. Most of them
have scar tissue from bad technology choicesthat proved costly to the organization. Becausemoney is tight, theyll be especially careful to
find the synergy between the overall corporate
strategy and your proposal for new technology.Without a strategic link, they risk making isolated
tactical decisions that dont fill the highest priority
strategic gaps.As you define a project strategically, ask your-
self: Whats our goal? What pain are we trying
to alleviate? What roadblocks to achieving busi-
ness goals are we trying to tear down? Use thestrategic triumvirate to guide project definition:
Business Strategy. Define the businessdrivers that create the need for
technology. Identify the corporate goalsthat the contact center will not achievewithout project funding.
Operations Strategy. Relate thetechnology requirement to the contact
center functions and operationalinitiatives that support the business
strategy. Identify the changes that thetechnology facilitates and relate the
changes to achieving corporate goals.
Technology Strategy. Show how therequired technology fits within the overall
IT Strategy and technology roadmap,and how that strategy aligns with and
supports the operational and businessgoals.
The goal of the strategic synergy is to move
beyond generic contact center staff efficiency.
Instead, take a penetrating look at the opera-
tional barriers that impede your centers ability to
contribute to the business strategy. For example,
your business goals may include aggressive rev-enue increases that require the contact center
to step up the direct or indirect impact on sales,
thus requiring cross-sell and upsell tools. Or youmay find yourself in a situation where aggres-
sive corporate growth goals did not prompt a
commensurate budget increase for the contactcenter. Your project definition should identify
these barriers and the means through which the
project breaks them down.It is important for credibility to move a step
past the strategic level by defining the project at
a tactical level. State the project in terms of howyour operations will change to allow the con-
tact center to contribute more fully to corporate
goals. For instance, to increase the contact centeimpact on revenue, your project might be toimplement a dialer to make outbound sales calls
during low inbound periods. Or, to do more with
less, you might propose web or IVR self-service
to offload agent-assisted contacts.This discussion might leave you with the
impression that if you define your roadblocks
and gain approval for projects that break theroadblocks down, you can rest easy knowing that
youve fulfilled your end of the strategic equation
Unfortunately, that is not the contact center real-
ity. As shown in Figure 1 on page 13, continuouschange drives new requirements. These changes
come through internal and external businessdrivers, ever-changing operational plans and
possibilities created by new technology.
Include the Right PeopleFigure 1 reveals that drivers for change can
come from varied sources and impact parts of
the organization outside the contact center. Fothe credibility of your project requests, you should
acknowledge the crossfunctional impact of tech-
nology projects. Engage other organizationa
stakeholders during the project definition phaseto sow the seeds of your future project team.
The IT department is a key collaborator onany technology project. As shown in Figure 2
they work with operations to see whether or not
existing technology can meet near-term needsIf new technologies are explored, IT establishesparameters that are aligned with the corporate
infrastructure. IT needs to be engaged to reviewbudget proposals to ensure that all costs arereflected and to assist with building the busi-
ness case.
Budget season is coming upits time to start building a solid case to getyour technology projects approved and funded.By Brian Hinton, Strategic Contact
Tech Line
Sell Leadership
on Smart Technology Investments
page 1
Table 1: Cost categories of a TCO calculation
Cost Categories Initial Ongoing
External HardwareSoftware
Installation
Implementation professional services
(vendor, consultant, contractor)
MaintenanceAdditional phases
Expansion, upgrades, new features/
functions
Additional professional services
Internal Process design
Training
Change management
Project management
Development/integration
Operations
Administration
New roles for administration and
management
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IT isnt the only stakeholder that might
need to be involved. Last months Tech Linearticle, Technology Bridges Organizational Silos,
detailed some technology categories that requirecrossfunctional planning and project teams.
VoIP: an enterprise implementation
and virtualized staff including otherdepartments as backup
Unified communication: cross-departmental collaboration to reach
subject matter experts
Business process optimization: process
flows throughout the organization
Social media: marketing crafts the
messages and drives the strategy
Analytics: enterprise learnings foroptimization opportunities
Customer relationship management andknowledge management: intrinsicallyenterprise applications
Review Current Technologyfor Optimization Opportunities
Most contact center technology is highly unde-
rutilized so you might find your solution alreadyexists without capital investment. Considering
all options prior to requesting capital dollars fora technology investment lends credibility and
may accelerate your timetable.
Technology investments alone dont delive
business value. Technology enables operationaimprovements that drive the value. Companies
often implement new applications that are func
tionally identical to what they are replacing andnever get around to the operational improve
ments that would drive value creation. You may
want to look at past investments that fell shor
and invest in achieving the originally projectedpotential.
You can facilitate driving additional value from
current technology by creating new support role
to apply the technology in current processesor by adding responsibilities to existing roles
You may need to take on the difficult task oredesigning processes that may have been more
readily changed when the technology was firsimplemented. To get full value from current tech
nology, you may need upgrades, added modulesor integration. With the reduced investment of the
past couple of years, you may need to invest in
current revisions to mitigate the risk of unstableor unsupported products. These suggestionsemphasize that getting more value from curren
technology is not free, so make sure you build the
people, internal process effort and upgrades into
your project planning.
Build the Case for New TechnologyBuilding a business case for new technology
can be a challenge, but by following a formal pro
cess you can get your projects approved. Figure3 on page 14 shows the four steps in building
credible business cases that result in project fund
ing: Build a baseline, quantify the costs, quantify
the benefit, and create success metrics.
Build a Baseline
You cant build a credible business case unles
you start with a baseline model that shows how
current processes drive the need for resources
staff, technology, facilities and budget dollars
As you consider technology investments andtheir impact on business processes, youll adjusthe baseline model to reflect future processe
and the requirements for resources they drive
The required investment, the change in youexpenses, plus the projected impact on revenue(if applicable) will impact the baseline and con
tribute to your ROI calculation. This exercise mayseem like a lot of work, but your detailed under
standing of contact center economics speaks alanguage that senior management understands
and lends credence to your capital requests.
Quantify the Costs
Quantifying the costs of a technology projecis not easy (see the sidebar). For page 14
Figure 1: Forces of change impacting strategy and contact center operations
Figure 2: Technology project approval path to success
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Tech Line |Sell Leadership on Smart Technology Investments
Figure 3: Fours steps to building a credible business case
a credible business case it is important to include
a complete accounting of costs, not just vendor
quotes. You must approach the costs from a Total
Cost of Ownership (TCO) perspective. Consider
internal and external costs driven by the projectand include initial investment costs and costs
you will incur over time as a result of the project.
Table 1 on page 12 details the cost categories toconsider in a TCO calculation.
Quantify the BenefitsBy definition, the benefits associated with a
technology project are assumptionsyou cant
predict the future. Benefit calculations are there-
fore much less exact and open to challenges. The
key to success is to define and clearly state your
assumptions. Decision makers may choose to
challenge your assumptions, but youll have the
benefit of a reasoned defense for your position.And as long as you can show how the assump-tions drove the projected benefit calculations, you
can keep the debate focused on assumptions.
If youve built a robust model, youll be able to
tell quickly whether or not a change in assump-tions makes a material difference on the benefits
calculation and ROI. That will focus the discussion
around judgment calls that really matter.
To quantify the benefit, we need to alter thebaseline understanding of our current resource
requirements and drivers that we developed ear-
lier. The following is a partial list of assumptionsor variables that you can change as a result of a
technology project.
Decrease process volume
Shift process volume to an alternate
(ideally lower cost) resource
Eliminate or automate processes
Eliminate, automate or combine processsteps
Reduce process step duration
Once you have identified the variables toalter, remember to project the assumptionsor the value of the variable through the entire
planning period. If you base your business caseon five-year cash flow analysis, then you should
page 13
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project the changes in the variables throughthat entire period. You may need to phase in the
benefit over time until it reaches the value thatyou project as the maximum improvement. Thislends a great deal of credibility to your calculation.
By determining how processes will change with
your new technology, you can specifically define
the source of the benefit and add credibility tothe result.
Labor savings is obviously going to be a bighitter in driving a positive ROI as that is the largest
part of a contact center budget. However, dontforget to consider possible ways that revenue
will increase based on the technology project.
Revenue increases can drive extremely appealing
ROI calculations.
Create Success MetricsAny variable or assumption that you changed to
quantify the benefit of the project now becomes a
metric to monitor once the project is completed.Success metrics created in a business case do not
assure success, but they do ensure very credible
reports stating success or progress toward success
and enable action to mitigate a lack of progress.This approach to post-project success analysis
removes any skepticism caused by past failures to
achieve projected ROI. Make sure the metrics that
you choose align with strategic goalsbringing
us full circle to the strategic alignment discussed
at the beginning of this article.
Proving project success using strategic metrics
isnt the end of the process. Credibility buildson itself. Once you have proven that decision
makers can trust your business cases, gaining
funding approval for each project becomes lesschallenging.
Put the Technology Investmentin the Right Context
Technology and its operation are a relatively
small part of the cost of contact center operations.
Your business case should carry the key message
that a reasonable investment can have a huge
impact on your primary budget categorylabor.
Figure 4 (below), taken from the white paper,
Cost Structure and Distribution in Todays Contact
Centers (Strategic Contact, March 2008, www.
strategiccontact.com), shows that technology
costs, while they may seem large when faced with
an investment decision, are a relatively small slice
of the pie (2.65.9%). Investing in technology tomake the workforce more efficient can have a
profound and lasting impact.
Tech Line |Sell Leadership on Smart Technology Investment
Brian Hintonis a SeniorConsultant at Strategic Contact.
(706) 310-0544
Figure 4: Contact center cost distribution
Challenges in GainingProject Approval withCredible Business Cases
Chances are, you can relate to thesetypical challenges in gaining projectapproval.
Tighter budgets
Decision authority at higher levels in
the organization
Credibility problems with decision
makers due to unrealized benefitsfrom past projects, an inventory of
shelf ware, and past purchases basedon vendor generated excitementrather than actual business need
Difficulty in measuring project benefits
Clearly, youll need to produce highly
credible business cases, but credibilityis easier said than achieved. There aretwo components of any business casecost and benefitseach having specificchallenges.
Typically, on the cost side, a contactcenter business case is built around avendor bid. The bid is usually fixed pricebased on assumptions about variablecosts. Those assumptions may not becorrect. Also, the bid does not includeall internal costs, external costs, currentinvestments and ongoing expenses thatneed to be addressed. Sharpen your
penciland your thinkingto make surethat your cost estimates are reasonableand comprehensive. If you habitually goback to the well for unplanned expenses,youll have trouble gaining project
approval down the line.
The typical approach in determining thebenefits starts with reducing headcount.Since labor is the largest part of mostcontact center budgets, most, if notall, contact center projects impact thelabor budget. However, the problem isthe approach that planners often use to
quantify this labor reduction. The properway to estimate staff reduction is towork through the potential operationalimpact of the new technology andthen determine the impact on labor.
Unfortunately, most folks decide on thelabor savings up front and then force-fitthe implementation into that framework.
They ignore the key variables that drivethe benefit. That approach is neitherreasonable nor effective, and risks areduction in headcount that surpasses thebenefits truly gained.
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Contact Center Pipeline16 JUL 2010
Someone onceasked me to choosebetween a workforce
management system
and a quality tool.
As a self-proclaimedworkforce manage-
ment guy, my answershould be obvious.After all, I believe thatall the savings in the
center are aroundstaffing and efficiency. If anything, shouldnt I
want to cut handle time so we can answer more
calls?Without hesitation, I chose the quality system.
There is no doubt that workforce management
(WFM) systems can help you save money by staff-
ing more effectively. The return on investment for
WFM is very real. Scheduling improvements often
provide short-term savings that quality systems
do not realize. Because of this, WFM is easier tosell to executives. But the effective application of a
quality process can drive dramatic changes in the
way agents handle calls. These changes produce
better service, resulting in fewer interactions and
less overall workload. In the long run, this lowerworkload can save more than staffing correctly
to a higher workload.The value of decreasing overall workload pres-
ents both an easy argument and a challenge to a
manager who oversees a quality monitoring (QM)
program. On one hand, the math is simple: Lessworkload equals fewer agents. However, the easy
math gets complicated by inconsistent handle
times, seasonal forecasts and sudden increases in
volume, like from new business. As a result, quality
managers often turn their attention to the thingthat they can controldelivering effective quality
coaching. Over time, this focal point causes the
purpose of quality monitoring to devolve fromeffectively decreasing workload to being the
people who listen to calls.Quality monitoring programs can go through
several stages in their life cycle. They begin as
performance management programs targeted at
process consistency. Over time, the focus shifts to
improving processes within the center. Ultimately,
they can evolve into a companys voice of the
customeraiming to improve organizational
processes. Organizational improvements result
in an excellent return through improved first-callresolution and eliminating organizational issuesthat cause customer dissatisfaction. The key to
successfully moving to the next stage is provingthe value of the current program and demonstrat-
ing the potential of investing in the next steps.
The Value of ProcessStandardization
When an organization begins a QM program,managers initially concentrate on developing
forms and guidelines, and implementing the pro-
cess. During this time, the managers are usuallybogged down with startup details, and they often
overlook the need to prove the value of the QMprogramwhich is necessary to move the pro-gram past the initial stages. Yet quality programs
often do not deliver typical cost improvementsin the initial stages. New QM programs focus on
two main areas:1. Service consistency: delivering the same
service every time2. Compliance: ensuring that all rules and
regulations are followed correctlyThe primary goal at the beginning is standard-
izing processesmaking sure that all agentshandle interactions the same way. Removing vari-
ability in a process is a necessary precursor to real
process improvement. Unfortunately, consistent
performance will not result in immediate savings
that will justify the initial costs. As calls becomemore consistent, they do not necessarily translate
into fewer or shorter calls.At this stage, QM can generate savings through
call control. Making call control skills a key ele-ment of the quality scorecard helps agents under-
stand how to move a customer through the call
in a friendly and effective way, which decreasehandle time without affecting customer service
These changes often are not apparent in overa
results due to other fluctuations in handle timeQuality managers can also show value by
capturing critical call type data. A quality form isan excellent tool for identifying which call types
come into the center, and even the handle timeby type. Whereas agents label call types as an
afterthought and system definitions tend to
be too generic, quality monitors can do a moreaccurate job. They have the time and training to
correctly determine the call type and provide the
level of detail that system parameters cannot
They can also tie actual handle times to those
detailed call types through the quality system
While this method is a great start to collectingcall type data, it does have some limitationsUnlike system tags, which label every call, only
a relatively small proportion of calls are reviewed
(i.e., a sample of calls).
There are two factors related to sample datathat you need to understand to use it effec-
tivelysample bias and how many calls arerequired to make up a sample that represents
all of a centers calls. The goal when collecting
sample data is to draw from a completely random
group of calls. When certain calls are excluded, the
analyst introduces sample bias into the resultsThis often happens during the QM process when
short calls, long calls or calls meeting certaincriteria are not evaluated. For instance, to ge
meaningful data at the agent level, a team mayexclude short transfer calls from the individua
scores. This practice can then bias the call type
sample by not reporting any short transfers.The second goal of sampling data is to ensure
a representative samplea group of results tha
looks just like the whole data set of calls. Whilea system can tag every call that comes in, QM
representatives can only evaluate so many calls in
a month. Therefore, cost increases as the numbe
of monitored calls (and, therefore, quality monitors) increases. Obtaining a representative sample
By Dan RickwalderProactive PlanningGroup
Management ROI
Proving QualityDemonstrate the value of your quality program:Take it from employee-centric to enterprisewide process improvements.
Email Us!
Share your suggestions, questions and story ideas.
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balances the accuracy of the results with the
cost. As a rule of thumb, reviewing as few as 230randomly selected calls will provide a representa-
tive sample for analysisregardless of the queue
size. This also means that reviewing thousandsof calls will not provide dramatically different
results. The key is to remove bias to ensure a truly
random sample.
While capturing call type data may not reflect
direct cost or revenue, it is often seen as a criticalpiece of business intelligence. In that light, it is
a quick and effective win for proving the valueof a quality program. In addition, it prepares the
center for the next stage of qualityprocessimprovement.
The Value of Process ImprovementAfter standardizing processes, organizations
begin to see the value in improving the way calls
are handled. Next, they look to eliminate steps,remove confusion and speed up transactions
through process improvements. At this stage,
the value of a quality program becomes moreapparent, but the additional costs begin to addup, as well. Improvements that are identified often
have development or training costs that, if noteffectively balanced against future benefits, will
not be approved. To prove the value, managersmust implement an effective methodology for
comparing improvement values and costs.There are a number of process improvement
methodologies, including Six Sigma and itsvariants, TQM, ISO and Deming. While they all
have strengths and weaknesses, there are also
several commonalities that are critical for effec-tively placing a value on a process improvement.
First, an organization must understand its current
statehow things are really done now. Second,
the benefits must outweigh the solution cost.
And finally, a methodology must be in place toreview the effectiveness of the solution.
The init ial phase of quality monitoring sets
the stage for understanding the current state.
By focusing on consistent processes, the centerhas prepared itself to identify how calls are actu-ally handled and to benchmark those results.
Benchmarks are the defined metrics that describe
the starting performance for a process that willbe improved. For example, an after-call worktime of 300 seconds to manually fax a docu-ment would be the benchmark to improve upon.
Benchmarks ensure that improvements can beevaluated against prior performance. They should
include both direct and indirect measures. In our
example, a savings in ACW is a direct benefit to
improving the fax process, but an increase incustomer satisfaction may be in indirect benefit.
Without setting benchmarks, it is impossible toplace a dollar value on improvements.
Once benchmarks are set, savings can be esti-
mated and compared to the solution costs using
standard ROI methods that determine how long
an improvement will take to pay for itself. In ourfax example, we may be able to eliminate 270 sec-
onds of ACW from all fax calls by implementing
electronic document distribution (PC faxing and
emailing documents). If fax calls make up 10% of
all calls, then the time savings is roughly 27 sec-
onds over all calls (270 seconds times 10% of calls=27 seconds). This savings, when converted into
payroll dollars, can clearly demonstrate the value
of the improvement. Say, for example, it equals
a total 5% decrease in payroll when adjusted forshrinkage. A 100-seat contact center with anannual payroll of $4 million can save $200,000
a year. If a new electronic document deliverysystem costs $300,000, then the improvement
will pay for itself in a year and a half. In general,improvements that pay for themselves in less
than three years are great investments; however,
your corporate tolerance may vary.
There are two common pitfalls at the processimprovement stage. The first is the tendency tooveranalyze low-hanging fruit. All centers recog-
nize that some things need to change. They either
cost too much or are
simply too dissatisfy-ing to customers. In
these cases, a qualityteam bent on proving
their worth may force
a detailed analysis ofan issue when none
is needed. The endresult leaves the
organization feelingbloated by the excess
work for somethingthey knew neededto be fixed.
The second pit-fall is beginning
improvements toosoon. Faced with
pressure to makeimprovements, teams
often grasp for a bigchange without first
setting benchmarks,
identifying what isbest to change or
even understand-ing the root cause
of an issue. The endresult is a haphazard
approach that imple-
ments changes, butcannot validate them.
As organizations find success improving calcenter processes, they often begin to look at how
to spread process improvement to the rest of the
company. For example, our fax opportunity mayevolve into a paperless company initiative. At this
point, it is critical to implement an official proces
improvement methodology and gain executivesupport for the effort. This will ensure buy infrom the rest of the company, help to remove
roadblocks and silos, and create a crossfunctiona
view of issues facing the company.
Its a challenge to prove the value of a qualityprogram. But by taking the appropriate initia
stepsbenchmarking, focusing on standardization and then process improvement, and identify
ing call driversyour team can quantify benefits
of the improvements they recommend.
Dan Rickwalderis the Owner of theindependent consulting firmProactive Planning Group, whichspecializes in workforce planning andcall center analytics.
(443) 451-4301
ADVERTISEMENT
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Contact Center Pipeline18 JUL 2010
Customer-centriccompanies invest a
substantial amountof time and money
toward the develop-ment and success of
their contact centers.
Most centers have atleast one workforce
manager to helpguarantee that suc-cess. Along with the
workforce manager, there are generally other
expenses, such as workforce management soft-ware and/or forecasting and scheduling person-
nel. Yet all of these resources are wasted when
agents fail to adhere to their schedules.One of the most important lessons that
managers can provide to their frontline staff is
the impact that a single agent can have on the
centers performance by going to lunch a littleearlier than scheduled, running out for a quickbreak, or returning from lunch or break late.
In the workforce management world, there isone widely known exercise that is used to dem-
onstrate the importance of schedule adherence.
We are staunch advocates of this exercise, and
we try to incorporate it into seminars as often aspossible. It seems obvious, but we all need to be
reminded once in awhile of the impact that wehave on our environment.
This simple exercise can be conducted cheaply
and is easy to set up. After multiple demonstra-tions of the exercise, weve found some different
variations and additional props to be helpful in
getting the point across to agents. The following
are the basic items that you can use, and what
they represent.
REQUIREMENTS
Eight balls (inbound customer calls) that
are soft and easy to toss from customer toagent (tennis balls work well)
A container for the balls (the queue)
Table or chair for the container
(Optional) Props such as hats, headsets orbadges to designate the agents
To begin the exercise, ask for 12 volunteers.
You can adjust the amount of participants based
on the size of the room youre in, the number
of people in the audience and the amount of
time you have to conduct the exercise. If you
have trouble getting the audiences involvement
(which is common), simply pick a certain group,side of the room, or a specific row or two toparticipate.
Assign six people to be agents, and the rest to
be the customers. Have the agents l ine up arms-
length from each other, preferably perpendicular
to the seats of your audience.
Place the container (the queue) on a table orchair, centered, about six to eight feet across from
the line of agents.Have the customers form a single line behind
the container of balls. Customers will stand in the
line across from the agents when they have a ball
and are looking for an available agent. When allagents are on a call, you should have a row of
agents with a row of customers facing themany other customers must wait in line behind the
container. A customer must wait across from thei
agent until their call is finished (ball is back in
the container), at which point they will return tothe back of the queue line.
Get the rest of the audience involved by asking
them to keep track of the customers wait timesin line.
Write a different number on each of the ballsto indicate different handle times. When an agent
catches a ball, he must toss the ball up in the airor pass it around his back the number of times
printed on the ball. One variation used to dem-onstrate the effectiveness of having multiskilledagents is to write transfer on one of the balls. This
will simulate an agent receiving a call that he isunable to complete without the help of anothe
agent, department, supervisors assistance, etcAgents who receive the transfer ball must wait
for another agent to be available, throw it tothem, and then take the next call.
Round 1To start the first round, each customer acquires
a ball and then proceeds to a spot across from an
available agent. The customer then passes the bal
to their agent, who handles it for the amount ofseconds written on the ball, and then returns to
the queue line when their call is over.When an agent has finished his call, he wil
throw the ball back into the container from where
he is standing in line. The agents standing farthest
from the container may have a hard time making
the shot. If they miss, they will have to leave their
desk to retrieve the ball, which now representsafter-call work. You may have agents either try
the shot again, or simply drop the ball into thecontainer after they pick it up.
Stop the round after a few minutes or whenthe first customer has cycled through a few times
Jon PratzHuman Numbers
Forecast Focus
Schedule Adherence:
In the best-run centers, agents understand the importance of theirindividual contributions to the operations success.
A Fun Exercise for Your Agents
This exercise is easy to put together, fun to facilitate and reallygets the point across to agents about the impact that everyindividual can make on the level of service customers receive.
You can download this exercise from our website,
@ http://tinyurl.com/CCPscheduleEx
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JUL 2010www.ContactCenterPipeline.com
Discuss with everyone how the flow of
calls went. Was there a lot of waiting? Was
there much frustration?
Round 2For the second round, start the process
over again. After one minute, demonstrate
the effect of losing a single agent by
removing one from the group. Some fun
props to use as a reason for the agentleaving could be a bathroom key pass, a
candy bar or bottled water. Toss the propto the agent and tell him that he decided
it was a good time for him to take a break.
After another minute, have another agent
take a break while the first is still out.
Debrief
Stop the exercise after a few moreminutes and discuss what everyone wit-
nessed. Ask the customers about theirlevel of service. Ask the agents how they
felt when their peers went on their breaks.Get feedback from the audience on whatthey observed, and ask: What difference
did one person make in this exercise?The ultimate goal is to try to get agentsto explain why they should adhere to their
schedule.
Everyone who has worked in a call cen-
ter knows how stressful it can be to havecalls backing up in the queue, and knows
the frustration you will hear from the call-
ers when you finally do get to them. This
exercise is easy to put together, fun tofacilitate and really gets the point across
to agents about the impact that everyindividual can make on the level of service
customers receive. It is also a simple way to
demonstrate that the purpose of creating
efficient schedules is to provide the best
possible service to the customers.
Editors Note: You can download this exercise
from our website,
http://tinyurl.com/CCPscheduleEx
Jon Pratzis an independentWorkforce Manager at Human
Numbers, a firm that provides
contracted forecasting and
scheduling services.
(678) 494-1506
Create knowledge and awareness of the impor tance of schedule adherence by effectively communicating the
impact that a single agent can have on customer service and resource utilization. The exercise will effectively
illustrate how individual agents fit into the overall goal.
Schedule Adherence Exercise
Objective
Requirements
Round 1
Round 2
Debrief
Six people to assume the role of agent
Six people to assume the role of customer
Remaining audience members are observers
Eight tennis balls (the calls)
One container to hold the balls (the queue)
Adequate space for the agents to be standing across from the customers
Ask for 12 volunteers to act as agents and customers.
Select six volunteers to be your agents, and ask them to stand in a row, a few feet apart from each other.
Instruct them that they will be receiving calls from customers. They will handle each call for 57 seconds(give each agent a different time). They should count the seconds out to themselves (one, one-thousand, two,
one-thousand three, etc.), then return it to the container by throwing the ball from their position. Agents who
are farther from the box have farther to throw the ball. Any call that doesnt go into the box has to be picked
up by the agent and counted as after-call work before taking a new call.
Line up the remaining six volunteersyour customersbehind the container (call queue), which should be
placed about 68 feet across from the agents, centered. Instruct your customers to pick up a ball from the
box, find an available agent to stand across from, and toss the call to their agent. Any customer waiting in line
for an available agent should count their hold time. A new call cant be taken until the old call is released.
Start the call exchange and let it run for about 3 minutes. Stop and review delay times with customers. Ask the
agents how they feel. Ask observers what they noticed.
Remove one agent from the line to go on break. Begin the call exchange again.
After 2 minutes, remove another agent (because they saw their friend go on break and decided to leave, too)
and continue the exchange. Make sure customers are counting delay times. Stop after 1 minute.
Review delay times with customers. How different did agents feel about their ability to handle inbound calls
after someone was missing?
Review the differences in delay time based on various agent situations. Include observers in discussion.
What was the effect on customer service?
What was the effect on agents?
What happened when a call was dropped outside of the box and went into ACW?Ask the group: What difference did one person make in this exercise? (Try to get them to explain why they
should adhere to their schedule.)
Point out that THEY are that one powerful person in their own call center. When you do something that is
not scheduled, it has a direct impact on utilization and adherence, which, in turn, has a direct effect on the
customer.
Ask for additional questions, and close.
Source: Human Numbers, www.HumanNumbers.com. Questions about this exercise? Contact us at (678)
494-1506; [email protected] (Tiffany LaReau) or [email protected] (Jon Pratz).
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Maturity modelsare nothing new.
They are productsof quality initiatives,
and are commonlyused to assess andimprove processes
related to manu-facturing, software
implementations,project manage-
ment, risk management and information tech-
nology. But they can also be used to identify
phases or developmental levels of numerousother types of processes, such as contact centerdevelopment.
The inherent value of the maturity model is
that it provides a proven set of practices, proce-dures and process improvement to compare with
your centers current level of development, which
sets the stage for establishing process improve-ment strategies. While most maturity modelshave five or six levels, or stages of development,
weve developed a simplified, four-level Contact
Center Development Model, which describes the
factors that differentiate high-performance con-
tact centers from those with lower performance(i.e., lower level of development). It represents
the critical practices and processes that drive
continuous improvement in key functional areasof contact center management.
There are three key benefits of using this
approach: 1) It is a place to start when you wantto assess and understand problems or obstacles
to attaining your desired contact center perfor-mance; 2) it identifies a continuum of success
factors at each level of development that helps
to communicate the strengths and weaknessesin the operation; and 3) it provides the roadmap
to ongoing improvements that ultimately con-tribute to the organizations success.
Four Developmental PhasesThe Contact Center Development Model has
four key phases, each with unique, identifiable
characteristics and practices that must be in
place to support further progress: 1) initial, 2)developing, 3) maturing, and 4) optimizing.
Organizations that achieve excellence have aparticular driving force associated with theirevolution and implementation of improvement
plans within each of the four levels. Each of these
forces, or factors, apply within the center, as wellas at the organizational level. They are like the
engine that drives management and employees
to achieve exceptional performance.