5 Things Your Contact Center Employees Won’t Tell You

Written by KOVA Corp

You know how critical your contact center staff is to your success. As the front line of your business, they touch your customers’ lives and leave an indelible impression on your bottom line. What motivates them? What makes them try harder and work smarter? Here are five concerns your staff faces and strategies you can use to make the most of this vital relationship.

1. They need recognition.

Working in a contact center day after day feels like a thankless job on their side of the telephone. Does anyone know if your staff member goes the extra mile for a customer? Who even cares if an agent takes special interest in the needs of the caller? Regular recognition and feedback reinforce those critical habits that make the difference between stale and stellar service. Develop a strategy and hold supervisors accountable for every level of agent feedback – verbal affirmation, public recognition, and monetary rewards. Happy staff members make happy customers!

2. They appreciate good training.

Your staff takes pride in a job done well, but sometimes agents don’t know how to take their service to the next level. Regular one-on-one coaching (call monitoring), done in a positive manner, motivates staff to make each call stellar. Department training and skills coaching help them practice and learn in a non-threatening environment alongside their peers. Even the most seasoned agents appreciate learning new tools and strategies to keep their customers happy.

3. They want more flexibility.

Contact center staff can easily fall into a rut, experiencing the same-old questions and the same-old conversations every day. Help them stay creative and motivated by encouraging flexibility in as many areas of their job as possible. Give them more control over their work schedules, seating arrangements, work space, dress codes, and more, then watch morale and productivity increase.

4. They need help balancing work and family life.

Your staff are not only contact center agents. They are also spouses, parents, friends, and community volunteers. They are juggling several roles, and sometimes it all feels like it’s crashing around them. Find meaningful ways to show your company cares, whether it’s with benefits, flex-time, or vacation time. When you demonstrate tangibly that you value each agent individually, your staff will then give that same care and commitment to your customers. Your bottom line starts with your employees.

5. They want to make a difference.

You know that your contact center staff makes the world of difference for your brand. How they answer your customers, the level of care they give each issue, determines the satisfaction of your customers and will make-or-break your long-term relationships. Your agents, however, can easily lose sight of the importance of their role. It gets lost in the daily grind, as the monotony of the job takes its toll. Keep the departmental vision before them. Remind them of call center success stories customer testimonials. Post visual reminders of personal and departmental achievements prominently. Never stop reminding your agents of the lasting contribution each one makes to your customers and to your company as a whole.

Your contact center staff is the lifeblood of your business. They are the faces and the voices of your brand for your customers. Keep in close touch with them by remembering these five needs. Continual recognition, meaningful training, workplace flexibility, tangible family support, and values reminders all play an integral part in growing your center’s morale and increasing your bottom line.

Our Workforce Management scheduling, Performance Management, Coaching + e-Learning, and Customer Feedback solutions help foster an environment that employees want to work in.

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