Contact Center Solutions Featured Article

April 29, 2008

Performance Management is Key to Successful Contact Center Optimization

By Susan J. Campbell


In the contact center, performance can make the difference between operating as a pure cost center and delivering measurable value to the organization. Enkata, a provider of performance management software, announced the results of a first annual performance management (PM) survey.

The results of this survey reveals a growing adoption of contact center PM systems and that these solutions are significantly increasing the time and effectiveness of agent coaching. Commissioned by Enkata, the survey was conducted by Precision Marketing Group.

According to the survey, organizations that leverage PM solutions are able to improve customer satisfaction, service delivery and agent retention. In addition, the majority of large contact centers require agents to perform more sales outreach as a part of their responsibilities.

Agent training continues to be a challenge. Industry best practices recommend coaching as the most effective method for improving agent performance. As such, 91 percent of respondents set coaching targets for contact center supervisors. Of those, 63 percent expect supervisors to spend more than 25 percent of their time coaching.

To meet these set goals, more contact centers are adopting emerging PM solutions to drive agent effectiveness through dashboards, reporting and fact-based coaching tools. The survey found that these adopting companies can expect supervisors to accomplish considerably more coaching time with agents.

The survey also found that organizations using full-featured PM systems to pinpoint coaching topics and automate coaching best practices are able to expect 65 percent more coaching time from their supervisors than organizations without a PM system.

In addition, more than 70 percent of respondents plan to focus on initiatives to better measure and impact customer satisfaction. Large corporations are also moving more sales-service operations and of companies managing more than 1,000 agents in their operations, 80 percent expect agents to sell as well as provide service.

"The survey results underscore the need for PM systems at the contact center level to drive efficiency, meet aggressive coaching targets and improve the overall quality of an organization's customer service," said Ronald Hildebrandt, senior vice president of marketing and co-founder of Enkata, in a Tuesday statement.

"With most organizations attempting to track data coming in from a myriad of systems and technologies, this survey also uncovers the crucial need to integrate data into a single, comprehensive format. Armed with this kind of actionable data, organizations can more effectively train their Discover how Unified Communications can help you gain the competitive edge, with more efficient internal operations, increased productivity and improved customer service. Learn more, download free white paper.
agents on critical new responsibilities such as expanding their work beyond service to also include sales outreach in the contact center."

In order for the contact center to adequately benefit the organization, while also serving the customer base, agents must be able to perform their tasks quickly and effectively. By measuring performance within the center, supervisors can better measure overall impact that the agent’s performance has on customer service and executives can measure the benefit provided by the contact center.

Susan J. Campbell is a contributing editor for TMC (News - Alert) and has also written for eastbiz.com. To see more of her articles, please visit Susan J. Campbell’s columnist page.
 
 
 Don’t forget to check out TMCnet’s White Paper Library, which provides a selection of in-depth information on relevant topics affecting the IP Communications industry. The library offers white papers, case studies and other documents which are free to registered users. Today’s featured white paper is, Best Practices in Agent Retention brought to you by Enkata.
 


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