Call Center Morale Boosting Strategies

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Call Center Morale Boosting Strategies
By Michael Russell

Morale is deceptively important in the running of an efficient call center. The reason it is deceptive is because while most bosses acknowledge the relationship between morale and productivity, few call center bosses are able to accurately pin down a decrease in productivity as being directly related to a lowered morale. The reason it is important is the same; namely that a higher morale means happier workers, which in turn leads to an overall increase in call center productivity.

What does it mean to have high productivity in a call center? Well for starters it means a higher level of customer focus, as call center agents with higher morale are going to sound more pleasant over the phone. It is human nature to unconsciously let feelings show through and in a job that involves a large amount of telephone conversation, it becomes easy to see how an unhappy worker can result in customer complaints and unnecessary headache further on down the road.

More than just customer focus, high morale in a specific worker can lead to that worker contributing to a more relaxed working environment, which in turn can have a positive morale effect on another worker. This worker then contributes to an even more relaxed working environment and so forth. Morale boosting can create a positive feedback cycle that benefits the whole staff of a call center, thereby making things easier for everyone involved.

So how can one increase the morale of their call center staff? The first step is in understanding what causes morale drops in the first place. Call center employment, as far as front line services go, is the ultimate emotional roller coaster ride. A worker can receive a compliment from one customer that makes them feel great and thirty seconds later be in tears from an angry client using harsh words against them. While it is impossible to avoid angry clients, attentive bosses can take steps that diminish the impact angry clients and other potential obstacles have on the morale of their staff.

The best morale boosters are ones that understand how humans work and think. Incentives are a good way to start; a bonus for achieving a milestone (such as working a certain number of hours without receiving a complaint) is something that will make a worker feel special, as well as let them know that their boss is looking after them directly.

Recognition is another important form of morale boosting that is frequently overlooked by call center administrators. Human nature is such that even a simple thank you can last a long time. Call center staff that have been working the phones a long time develop a confirmation bias that magnifies one type of call and diminishes another in their memory. If their bias is toward positive phone calls, then half the battle if done. If however it turns out to be toward negative phone calls, they will need help to keep their morale high.

And that is where recognition comes in. Finding a way to recognize workers on a regular basis for a job well done can really keep them in high spirits, allowing them to get through that next bad day with less effort than otherwise. Remember what I said above about the positive feedback high morale can generate? Recognition is a simple way to start that loop.

In conclusion, a good way to view call center morale is to think of it as a tool of the trade that is used to increase worker productivity. Call center administrators need to be savvy enough to realize the important relationship between worker morale and worker productivity. High morale is one of the most important aspects of a good call center and with it the sky is truly the limit to what workers can accomplish.

Michael Russell
Your Independent guide to Call Centers

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Michael_Russell
http://EzineArticles.com/?Call-Center-Morale-Boosting-Strategies&id=456718

 

Selecting the Best Call Center Applicants

Drive performance witht he right tools.  Performance management that works:  Call Center Best Practices

Selecting the Best Call Center Applicants
By Roberto Bacasong

Choosing the best applicants to fit in your call center company will take certain considerations. The survival of your outsourcing company against strong competition in the market will depend on how competent your employees in catering to the concerns of your clients.

Selecting the potential applicants to be trained and employed should undergo strict process. If you want for the best then help yourself in hunting for persons who will qualify in handling your account. Human resource personnel are mostly in charge in interviewing the walk-in applicants who wish to get employed in your company. As the chief operating officer or simply hired as country manager of the company you work for proper documentation of the volume of applicants your office received should be recorded.

The fastest way to be employed easily is applying at any contact center industry. Every outsourcing company is accommodating applicants to fill in their vacant position. The applicants can browse jobs opening through online job companies offering services like this. A job advertised online is the convenient approach when applying for a job. Jobseekers can save time and money because companies are going to respond with their application within only few working days. Another way of searching job is viewing the listing under the classified ads of the national daily newspapers. Big contact center companies allocated budget in paying the commercial rates when posting for their jobs opening. Outsourcing companies spent huge amount of money in letting the public informed about available jobs.

When receiving volumes of bio data, resume, and curriculum vitae from the applicants, the personnel from the Human Resource Department will start selecting the potential jobseekers to schedule for interview. There'll be stages to be done to in hiring new employees.

As an interviewee, you need to pinpoint the strength and weaknesses of the applicants. If you have big companies catering inbound and outbound services, chat support, web content writing, and technical support, ask first the applicant what position he or she applying for. If from the beginning of the interview, if the applicants answer your questions directly and clearly then they might be eligible to proceed to the next level. The interviewee should watch out the grammar and sentence construction of a particular applicant. The accent is not much under priority because the applicants will learn it during training period.

The interviewee should also observe the behavior of the applicant. If you see undesirable attitude from the beginning then it's an indication not to precede the application to avoid problem in the near future. However, as an interviewee you need to say it in a nice way. The hardest part of being in-charge for the selection process is turning down the applicants. However, you should not be affected with this because you are just doing your job in maintaining the company's policy in choosing for the competent employees.

In call center companies, attrition rate is one of the most concerns because people come and go. If you want your center to achieve its goal, the skills, aptitude tests, and abilities of every people employed are very important. There are so many challenges in call center industry today. Maintaining people and choosing the right one are serious matter.

At the beginning of the interview, you may notice that most of the applicants are showing their interests such as politeness, enthusiastic, and very responsive to the questions. However, once get hired these people often found out slacking off the floor and showing undesirable traits. This is the reason why contact centers often give competitive tests to have more access to the applicant's performance. For instance, from 10 applicants usually one or two were able to make it because of the stringent selection process.

The best way to select potential jobseekers are forming strategies, which could be used in the hiring process. At the end of the day, your company have selected new batch of people to be scheduled for training and placed under probationary status.*

Roberto L. Bacasong, 27, works as company writer for Call Center Philippines Unique Interaction

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Roberto_Bacasong
http://EzineArticles.com/?Selecting-the-Best-Call-Center-Applicants&id=978677

 

Call Center Best Practices, Work Smarter

As you know by now, I like to work smart and not too hard.

You can achieve call center performance with this philosophy if you adopt best practices from many of the top performing call centers in our industry.  Why re-invent the wheel?

Call centers require discipline and using proven performance systems you saves you many hours of frustration.  That is why I put together CallCenterBestPractices.com.

Many call center leaders fail to understand that a solid performance process comes down to two things:

1.  Consistency and

2. Adherence to your choosen process.

Do you have a process in place?

I decided to share some of the tools that I have used over the years as a call center consultant.  So, I put them on a site and packaged the information by providng two free downloads.  Basically, you sign up (it's free) and you get two free downloads that have worked wonders for me when it has come to performance management and call center goal attainment.

In addition, I share the details around 4 key processes I follow:

• Leadership is a Contact Sport - This complete leadership development program has 15 modules that hit the critical leadership skills necessary to be successful.  Use this highly acclaimed program to improve the results for your organization.  This program is great for developing your leadership team.
• Imagine Having a Software Program That Takes You Less Than 5 Minutes to Create a Highly Effective Goal Worksheet For Your Employees, Utilizing the Most Effective Goals Setting Format Available: SMART Goals.
• High Performance Management Process - This eBook defines clear steps for coaching and employee discipline.  The material is adaptable to any work environment and focuses on performance improvement.  Two paths provide ample options for the success of your employees and your management performance.
• Monthly Review Software - This simple software program produces one page reviews for your employees.  Simply answer questions in the wizard and the software helps you build a review that can be delivered each month.  This type of up to date feedback will motivate your workforce as well as offer directions for individuals not meeting their goals.  And your Human Resources Department will love it! 

These systems are known to drive call center performance and they can for you too.  Especially if you're willing to work smart and not so hard!

Remember sign-up is free!

Go To:  CallCenterBestPractices.com to get your free information.  Oh yeah, I have a 50% discount available for the upgrade if your interested.  I'm doing this to help me with my tax bill otherwise

Call Center Agent Performance Now Possible

I am pleased to announce that Call Center Games has been updated and released at CallCenterGames.com

Call Center Agent performance is a reality with this tool. 

The basic premise is that using fun competition you can drive performance to new levels.  This is a fact and I have personally used these tools to do just that.  If you're a call center leader then you'll want to learn more.

Head on over to CallCenterGames.com and get your free samples.  Test out our system and before you know it, your team'sw performance will be soaring.  The best part about it is that they will drive it and be happy to do so.

Call center performance can be a difficult  task to accomplish.  Why make it harder than it needs to be.  Work smart and achieve more.

Call Center Games is the answer

Tags:  [call center], [call center management], [call center performance], [call center outsourcing]