Consistent Performance

If your organization is seeing call center workload patterns that are somewhat different than in similar historical months and years, you’re not alone. And the reasons – the economy, changes in customer behavior, etc. – are certainly no mystery.

Unfortunately, many managers rely on metrics that are summarized over overly-large blocks of time and lose visibility of problem areas. That can be especially problematic when underlying workload patterns are changing. Take, for example, service level… reporting and interpreting this enabling objective by day (let alone, by week or month) not only conceals problems, it can lead to bad management practices (e.g., if you have a tough morning, you will be inclined to keep more agents plugged in than necessary this afternoon in order to improve the "daily" number). Of course, that doesn’t do a thing for customers who called this morning, and it will keep your team from getting other things done this afternoon.

The good news is, you don’t have to get buried in data to report service level, forecast accuracy or other important operational metrics by interval. A simple alternative is to create a table with five or six rows and then input the number or percent of increments that were within, say, 2.5 percent of your target (first row), 5 percent (second row) and so on. You determine the thresholds—and you can tighten them down the road as performance becomes more precise.

Consistent performance, interval by interval, is one of the standout characteristics of a well-run call center. Teach your team to think, plan, report and manage in terms of what’s happening interval by interval—that’s the key to consistent performance. And it's expecially important in this season of change.

Brad Cleveland
Senior Advisor and Former President & CEO
ICMI
bcleveland@icmi.com

And Now for Some... ahem… Breaking News...

Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal ran a piece that concludes that “companies are trying harder to please customers amid the recession – and it appears to be working.” (“Companies Strive Harder to Please Customers,” Michael Sanserino and Cari Tuna, Wall Street Journal, July 27, 2009). The authors rightly point out that the American Customer Satisfaction Index is at a record high, an unexpected result given that customer satisfaction has declined in most prior recessions as companies cut back on service.

One example Mr. Sanserino and Ms. Tuna cite is Sprint Nextel Corp, which has in the past emphasized keeping call times short, but is now focused on first call resolution. According to the article, Sprint’s ACSI score is up 12.5% and the average subscriber called service four times last year, down from eight in 2007.

I am (very!) delighted to see good customer service – and sensible call center practices in particular – get this kind of positive press. And this article is just one example of many similar stories breaking across the business and popular press, recently. Kudos to the authors and especially to Sprint who seems committed to this direction (they announced this morning that they are acquiring Virgin Mobile USA, which has built a great reputation for service.)

But heck… do you ever wonder why this theme seems to be such a revelation to so many, now? Why did it have to take a severe downturn to prod so many companies to revisit and refocus their service efforts? Yep, build and equip your call center to provide solid service, allow it to do its thing – and good things happen. Not new stuff, folks. But if your company is not fully on board yet… better now than never.

Brad Cleveland
Senior Advisor and Former President & CEO
ICMI
bcleveland@icmi.com

Is Your Strategy Working?

Given the current economic challenges, it's an important time to revisit your customer access strategy, and ensure that it is finely tuned to support your organization’s brand and your customers’ needs. All nine components should be up for discussion:

Customers: How your customers are segmented and served according to their unique needs.
Contact types: The major types of interactions that will occur.
Access alternatives: The communication channels available to your customers, e.g., telephone, Web, email, retail, social media alternatives, etc.
Hours of operation: The days and hours each access alternative is available.
Service level and response time objectives: How quickly you will respond to customer contacts.
Routing methodology: How each contact will be routed and distributed.
Person/technology resources required: The agents and systems required to handle different kinds of interactions.
Information required: The information required for each contact, as well as what should be captured during interactions.
Tracking and analysis: How the information captured and produced during contacts will be used across the organization to better understand customers and to improve products, services and processes.

And the benefits? From a customer's perspective, a good strategy leads to simplified access, consistent services, ease of use and a high degree of convenience and satisfaction. From the organization's perspective, common benefits often include lower overall costs, increased capacity and higher customer retention. There is a silver lining to an uncooperative economy: you’ve got the chance – the mandate, really – to adjust direction, hone your operations, and differentiate services.

Brad Cleveland
Senior Advisor and Former President & CEO
ICMI
bcleveland@icmi.com

P.S.

Only hours after I posted the blog below, I received an email from Derek Flores, a member of Zappos' Customer Loyalty Team. As you can see, I asked his permission to post the exchange we had here... - Brad

________________________________________
From: Derek Flores
To: Brad Cleveland
Sent: Fri Jun 12 15:46:43 2009
Subject: Re: Your most recent blog positn.
Brad,

You are more than welcome to share what I wrote. I would have posted it directly but I felt this would be more personal. I'm glad you appreciated the comment.

Let me know when it is up and I will share with everyone here!

Thanks so much!

Derek

Brad Cleveland wrote:
Hi Derek,

You're welcome... and with your permission I'd like to post part or all of your email. Reason: Keeping an eye on the blog world (good, bad and otherwise) is so important and something we're encouraging companies to do systematically. You just provided a great example! Ok with you?

Brad

________________________________________
From: Derek Flores
To: Brad Cleveland
Sent: Fri Jun 12 14:33:12 2009
Subject: Your most recent blog positn.

Hello Brad,

I just read your most recent blog about "History's Most Powerful Consumer Movement", and I wanted to let you know that what you said about Zappos is great. It is great to see people recognizing us for the service we provide our customers. Zappos has always been about the very best customer service and customer experience as well as our focus on company culture! Our unique company culture allows for our Customer Loyalty Team to be happy at work and deliver that great customer service we focus so much on! An unhappy employee would never be able to deliver that kind of service!

I have shared your blog with some of my colleagues and we look forward to more Brad! Thanks again and have a great weekend!

Derek Flores
Tony's Team
Zappos.com
http://www.zappos.com

Take a look inside Zappos!
http://blogs.zappos.com/blogs

Follow Tony on Twitter!
http://twitter.com/zappos

History's Most Powerful Consumer Movement?

Some believe we are seeing the emergence of the greatest consumer movement in history. I agree. Studies suggest that the vast majority of consumers now use search engines and sites such as the http://www.consumerist.com/ to review the comments of other customers before making brand or product decisions. And bad customer experiences – even if they are one in many thousands of interactions from an internal perspective – end up on blogs, twitter, YouTube and sometimes even the morning news. (This is not just a business-to-consumer phenomenon; the trend towards providing and searching out customer feedback, albeit with somewhat better etiquette as a rule, is similar in B2B environments.)

All of this is just fine with Zappos.com, the online shoe retailer that’s getting oodles of positive press for their great customer service. Sales have grown from $1.6 million in 2000 to about $1 billion in 2008. In an interview with Success magazine (Success, November 2008), CEO Tony Hsieh, referring to their “customer loyalty team” (the 24x7 call center), says, “Most call centers have this concept of average handling time, which is all about how many customers a day each agent can talk to – and the more the better. But that ends up translating into, ‘how quickly can we get the customer off the phone?’ which we don’t think is great customer service.” On company culture, Hsieh says every person – accountants, lawyers, everybody – goes through the same training that call center representatives get. “If we want our brand to be about customer service, then customer service needs to be the whole company, not just a department.”

Some business execs believe these kinds of customer-first strategies apply only to… well, entrepreneurial startups like Zappos.com. But tell that to USAA, FedEx or even American Express (who is putting the customer experience at the center of their strategy). The call center can and should be a powerful loyalizing tool – these are not new principles. They are being “rediscovered” by companies in virtually every sector who know they’ve got to get service right. For those in call center management who really “get it” this is a powerful window of opportunity to make a difference.

Brad Cleveland

Senior Advisor and Former President & CEO

ICMI

bcleveland@icmi.com

The Power of Good Questions

By Brad Cleveland

Are we headed in the right direction? Do our priorities make sense? What would you do if you were in our shoes?

At ICMI, we are often asked these and related questions (they usually come up in the context of working on specific projects or issues with clients). They are good. They are important.

Questions establish context, and the best questions compel decisions and solutions that have far-reaching, positive impact. When it comes to strategy and direction, there’s never been a more important time to ask good questions.

Here are some of the most important questions I believe those leading customer contact services should be asking now:

Do we have a comprehensive and up-to-date customer access strategy that includes all forms of customer access, including new social media channels?

Does our mission reflect the call center’s role not only in efficiently meeting customer demands, but also in contributing intelligence (captured during contacts) to other business units?

How do others across the organization perceive the value of customer contact services, and how can that continually be improved?

Do we have appropriate performance standards for individuals and the call center, and do they align with the organization’s direction and changing customer expectations?

Have we applied disciplined planning and management methodologies to all types of activities, e.g., does our process encompass all contact types and channels, as well as all other types of work related to operations?

Do we have an effective process for training and cultivating upcoming managers and leaders (an important key to success in coming months)?

Do we have a supporting culture that is candid, consistent in values, and establishes the right objectives and opportunities for people to grow and contribute?

Have we envisioned where customer expectations are heading, how we will meet them and what we need to do now to prepare?

Many of the answers to these questions will be interrelated, and some assume (necessitate) the involvement of the broader organization (e.g., marketing, finance, operations, etc.). Effective answers require leadership, persistence and collaboration. But, given the fundamental changes taking place in our economy and the growing importance of customer contact services, asking good questions – then building solid answers – has never been more important.

Brad Cleveland
Senior Advisor and Former President & CEO
ICMI
bradc@icmi.com

Call Center Supervisors Not Getting Adequate Training, According to Study

Though much of the ‘90s, many industry pundits were predicting that supervisors would become less needed in call centers, and that their numbers would begin to drop proportionally. The conventional rationale – usually couched in discussions of flattened hierarchies and team-oriented structures – was that agents and teams were becoming more empowered, and the need for a layer between management and the front line would decline.

Just the opposite is happening, and in fact supervisor ratios of 10:1 to 12:1 ratios are fairly common today, whereas 15:1 or higher was more typical a decade ago. (Note, significant differences by type of call center remain; e.g., technical support centers may have as few as four or five staff per supervisor, while some order taking environments do fine with 20:1.)

The predictions were wrong primarily and perhaps predictably due to the growing complexity of customer contact workloads. But there are other reasons – e.g., call center supervisors are more involved in process improvement projects, liaison roles, and planning activities. In one sense, agents are increasingly enabled to do what supervisors used to do, and supervisors are spending more of their time in what used to be the realm of management.

It’s surprising, then, that according to ICMI’s recently released Contact Center Operations Report, nearly two in three centers (63.7%) do not provide any formal training for new supervisors before they assume their responsibilities. More than half of respondents feel that new supervisors do not receive enough training in their contact center, and more than two thirds feel that existing supervisors do not receive enough ongoing training.

This is an opportunity for improvement! Supervisors are more critical than ever to running successful operations. Giving them the skills and knowledge they need to face an increasingly challenging set of responsibilities just makes sense.

Brad Cleveland
Senior Advisor and Former President & CEO,
ICMI
bcleveland@think-services.com

Call Centers Missing Opportunities to Boost Business

There’s far more to handling customer contacts than improving the satisfaction and loyalty of those customers – as important as that is. As a primary customer touchpoint, the call center has significant potential to provide other business units with invaluable intelligence and support – e.g., it can help operations pinpoint quality problems, marketing develop more focused campaigns, IT design better systems, and serve as an early warning of competitive developments.

Unfortunately, far too many organizations seem to be missing this opportunity. In its recently released landmark benchmarking study, the Contact Center Operations Report, ICMI found that only 54.8% of call centers are sharing key customer data and feedback gleaned from monitoring with other departments and upper management. “This results in many missed opportunities to improve products and services, marketing, interdepartmental relationships and executive support,” says ICMI’s Greg Levin, one of the report’s authors.

While monitoring is not the only way to capture customer input, it’s a primary source, and when it is missing, that’s usually an indication that other means aren’t optimized either. With the right approach, any organization can better leverage this input to improve performance – which is especially important when the economy is so difficult.

Brad Cleveland
Senior Advisor and Former President & CEO,
ICMI
bcleveland@think-services.com

Job Roles Are a Changin'

One of the recurring themes at the recent ICMI Call Center Demo conference in Miami (which, by the way, was terrific) is that job roles continue to evolve quickly. At the agent level, job requirements are becoming more generalized in most call centers. Agents must increasingly understand the access channels customers use, the interrelated nature of services the organization provides, and the breadth of needs and expectations that customers have. The growth of social media and the enormous capabilities consumers have to access and use information is accelerating this trend.

At the management level, many job roles are becoming increasingly specialized. For example, workforce management is seeing the emergence of forecasting, scheduling and real-time management expertise. Similarly, quality monitoring depends on monitoring and coaching, program design, calibration and data analysis. Technology can also lead to specialization; e.g., individuals specifically assigned to support speech, desktops, networks, quality monitoring systems or workforce management applications. If you manage or support a small call center, you may wear many of these hats—but they are more specialized hats, nonetheless.

The most successful organizations are cultivating development programs at all levels that deliver specific skills and knowledge while reinforcing the call center’s (and organization’s) most important overall objectives. And the best leaders are encouraging collaboration and an appreciation for the diverse responsibilities the call center requires—while keeping everyone focused on the business results that matter most.

Brad Cleveland
Senior Advisor and Former President & CEO,
ICMI
bcleveland@think-services.com

What Your CFO Needs to Know About Staffing Tradeoffs

It’s a pretty safe guess that you’re engaged in some soul-searching discussions – and making tough decisions – on resources and budgets. This is your (hopefully) helpful and timely reminder: be absolutely sure that those making key decisions have an understanding of staff tradeoffs in a call center (read: real-time) environment.

The table is an example of what you might want to create(using your own numbers) to illustrate key tradeoffs. In this example, 34 agents produce a “middle of the road” service level of just over 80 percent of calls being answered in 20 seconds, with an average speed of answer (ASA) of just over 12 seconds. If you have 30 agents, fewer than a quarter of all calls are answered in 20 seconds, and ASA is over 200 seconds. Occupancy is way high, at 97%. And the load on your telecom network has grown significantly (reason: your ACD has to put all of those queued calls somewhere – kind of like putting aircraft in a holding pattern over Chicago O’Hare).

Your objective in budgeting – and in day-to-day management – should be to get just the right number of people in place at the right times, doing the right things for the business. No more, no fewer. That is fundamental in an environment that requires handling the work as it arrives.

Brad Cleveland

Senior Advisor and Former President & CEO,

ICMI

bcleveland@think-services.com

Tough Economies Force Critical Thinking

For all their downsides, bad economies have a way of forcing useful critical thinking across organizations. Common questions begin to surface: How are we really doing? What’s the value we’re creating for our organization and customers? What can we do differently? What should our workload look like? How well are we leveraging resources?

The answers can help you get through a heck of a rough patch in the economy. They can also position your organization for quick and strong recovery.

Making the right decisions requires both intuition and discipline. Although you can’t boil leadership – that’s of course what we’re really talking about – down to a simple checklist, there is something powerful about focusing on the things that matter most. So… what to do now? Here are some suggestions on high-level priorities:

· Develop a global view of your organization’s mission and principles. Then take steps to ensure that every person understands the “why” behind what they are doing.

· Recognize that “best efforts” or trying harder isn’t enough. Instead, look for true innovation opportunities – processes are where the most leverage will be.

· Analyze and understand every facet of your role and responsibilities. Then do the same for every position in the call center.

· Don’t make decisions based on assumptions — insist on having and using accurate and timely data. Use performance measurements, monitoring and coaching as a means of learning and improvement at the process level.

· Remember that those who know processes and customers best are those closest to the work – continually seek their ideas and input, and create an atmosphere of trust and open communication.

· Don’t sacrifice training – that will come back in the form of more expensive problems later. Training people to do their jobs is an enabler to sustainability and growth.

· Communicate openly, candidly, and often the value of call center services to customers, and in sharing customer intelligence that helps improve products, processes and services across the board. This just may be the time to invest in call center services – not cut them.


Brad Cleveland,
Senior Advisor; Former President/CEO ICMI
bcleveland@think-services.com

My New Year's Resolutions for 2009

I’m continually looking for ways to improve my credibility and reputation as a contact center journalist and researcher, and not just because of the court order to do so. I enjoy setting ambitious goals for myself, working toward them, and then blaming the fact that I didn’t achieve them on global warming and the economy.

What better time of year to set personal and professional goals than right now – when all the alcohol from holiday parties makes me feel brave and invincible. So, here are my career-related New Year’s resolutions for 2009:

1) I will only quote actual people in my articles. It’s inevitable that, as a contact center journalist, you start to develop some strong opinions and ideas about what are the best practices in customer care. The trouble is that it can be challenging to find respected sources who support the opinions and ideas that you want to espouse in your articles. To overcome this challenge, I’ve become very adept at making up fictitious experts and quoting them in my feature stories.

While this practice makes for better reading and helps to drive home my brilliant points, I realize it might be considered a tad unethical, even if only by people with a pulse. So, from this point forward, I vow to stop citing fictitious sources and, instead, will pay real sources to let me attribute my groundbreaking ideas and suggestions to them.


2) I will learn how to tie a tie. Having worked from my home since 1994, and being obnoxious enough to not get invited to any weddings, I have lost all tie-tying capabilities. This, I have found, has hindered my ability to garner the level of respect I feel I deserve in the contact center industry. Regardless of how much insight and wisdom I provide while presenting on expert panels at conferences, being seated next to peers who are dressed to the nines while I’m wearing my flannel robe and Winnie the Pooh slippers sometimes costs me in terms of positive recognition.

I wish people could just see past my pajama bottoms (well, not literally) and rate me based on the sharpness of my mind and full understanding of all things related to contact centers. However, if all it takes is for me to put on a collared shirt, a non-clip-on tie and some pants without a drawstring to earn a place among the customer contact elite, then I’m willing to go to Target today.


3) I will stop hurting people who are in search of “industry standards” for everything. If I had a dime for every manager who has asked me for the (non-existent) industry standard for service level, abandonment, handle time, cost per call, or (insert the name of any other metric you can think of), I’d have enough money to finish building the dungeon I’m currently constructing to house all such managers.

Am I proud of my aggressive and often violent treatment of these well-meaning professionals who are under the impression that complex performance objectives can be reduced to a simple, universal figure or formula? Well, I don’t know if proud is the word, but it does feel good to go ballistic on an unsuspecting soul who is looking for me to tell him what his and every other contact center’s email response time objective should be. Nonetheless, I acknowledge that verbally and physically abusing relatively innocent managers and supervisors is not only wrong, but ineffective, too; most continue their futile search once they recover from the insults and/or injuries.

So, I promise to stop taking it upon myself to teach these poor contact center novices a lesson through violence. Instead I’ll have a trained and certified goon from Chicago’s South Side deliver the lumps that have for years left my hands swollen, thus hindering my typing efficiency.


Publisher’s Note: Greg is of course exaggerating in this article for entertainment purposes. He is not building a dungeon to house inexperienced nor incompetent contact center professionals – it’s more of a large cage.