Jacada Blog

By the Numbers: Customer-Centric Metrics

Why is it important to measure and track customer service? A great customer experience can turn a customer into a "raving fan" for your brand or product as patrons are not just satisfied customers, they are loyal promoters. The end result is referrals, retention and profitable growth! In today's tough market, companies need to do more to understand how customers rate their customer experience and take action to improve it.

Best-in-class customer service operations understand the need to get the most out of each and every customer interaction in addition to reducing costs. How? By adopting customer-centric metrics that offer management quick, yet comprehensive views into organizational performance. These customer-centric companies, built around the ideal experience of the customer, are flooded by traditional data and statistics from every imaginable source. But, without the ability to fully analyze this information, it is of limited value in providing an optimum level of customer service.

For example, a couple of key effectiveness measures such as First Call Resolution (FCR) and CSR Solve-rate are essential for organizations to see how well their customer service reps (CSRs) are resolving customer issues. When a company is focused on improving real FCR, they are, in fact, improving quality, reducing operational costs and driving customer satisfaction to improved levels. This is a true source of improved profits for an organization without dramatic market changes (i.e. price changes, bundle offerings or even lay-offs). By understanding FCR, an organization can see strong benefits and surprising bottom line improvements.

New measures are only half the battle, though. Successful contact centers have achieved the most significant benefits by providing their CSRs with more targeted training and the mandate to make the most of their time on the phone with each customer. A customer service analytics suite like Jacada Insight collects the appropriate data in real-time and across contact channels, and enables organizations to have a more complete view of the customer's experience. In addition, with the robust and dynamic reporting capabilities, organizations can easily identify specific coaching and training opportunities for CSRs and pinpoint contact space processes that need improvement.

The decision to improve reporting and analytics will help drive call center operations more effectively and will be the "critical path" for the most successful performance improvement efforts.

Scott Norteman - Client Business Executive, Jacada Inc.

Measuring What Matters for Improved Call Center Performance

Some of the standard quotes related to measurements certainly apply in the call center world. Let's start with, "If you don't measure it, you can't manage it" as the obvious first choice. Without data and numerical evidence of performance, it would be awfully hard to identify what to reinforce and reward and what needs work.

However, in many call centers today, we've gotten a little carried away with the numbers, so here's another quote to live by – "Just because you can measure it doesn't mean you should." With ACDs and reporting tools that enable hundreds of reports in every imaginable format, it's easy to get information overload. It's important to weed through all the possibilities and settle on some reports that give you actionable information from which to make changes and reinforce behaviors.

Be careful which measures you choose and what gets fed back to the staff, because... ready for #3?... "You can expect what you inspect." The best example of this one is of course average handle time.  If the numbers you're feeding back to agents at the end of the month are their average handle time statistics with how they compare to the goal, the next time the staff are likely to give you a number that's closer to expectations. However, they may just exhibit undesirable behaviors in order to get there. If they know the handle time expectation is 300 seconds and you've been reporting numbers that show them at 330, then they'll look for ways to shave off the 30 seconds, which could include rushing the customer or not doing proper listening and discovery questions to uncover sales possibilities.  Coaching to the right behaviors, rather than showing them the numbers (like the coach pointing to the deficit on the scoreboard) will give better results than focusing on the numbers alone.

In terms of measurements, the reverse of the second truism is also true – "Just because you can measure it, doesn't mean you should. But just because you should measure it doesn't mean you can... at least easily." The best example of this may be the measure for first call resolution (FCR). It's the measure most closely correlated with customer satisfaction and loyalty, and yet it's one of the hardest things to measure. There's no single report that pops out this number and so it has to be pieced together from many sources.  It's a great number to know as it's a measure of customer satisfaction and also a measure of team and individual performance that points to relevant coaching opportunities, but it takes some work to get there.

Finally, remember that, "If you torture the numbers long enough, they will admit to anything." Schedule adherence statistics illustrate this one best. Some centers adjust the numbers so much to reflect schedule exceptions that adherence numbers are meaningless. In an effort to meet adherence goals, the numbers are manipulated past the point of providing coachable information. So watch out that in your quest to hit performance numbers, you're erasing the very information that can assist in actually making the performance better.

Penny Reynolds, Founding Partner of The Call Center School

Penny Reynolds has been retained by Jacada to participate in the "Customer Service 2.0: Access The Experts" speaker series. The opinions shared herein reflect the views of the author, and not necessarily Jacada or its employees. 

Contact Centers Are A Key Part Of Your Brand Mix

What's the purpose of your call centers? If your answer does not include some mention of your company's brand, then something is amiss. And your Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) needs to spend more time with the contact center.

In my previous post The Customer Experience Evolution Of Contact Centers, I defined four core customer experience competencies. These represent the key elements that contact centers need to master in order to evolve with the times. One of those competencies is something I call Compelling Brand Values.

Let's start with my definition of a brand: 

The set of promises that the company explicitly and implicitly makes to its customers about the products, service, and behavior of the company and its employees.

Whether it's TV commercials, radio spots, or email campaigns, marketing organizations spend a lot of money to create and reinforce their brand. But how credible are these promises if companies don't live up to them? If Staples, for instance, isn't easy to do business with, then how effective would they be with their "That Was Easy" campaign.

Is your contact center living up to your company's brand promises? My guess is that you don't really know. Most companies haven't really examined this question. 

Marketers hardly ever think of the contact center; they focus so much on making promises that they don't look at the other side of the equation. But contact centers (and other key touchpoints) represent a critical element for successful brand building. Every time you interact with a customer, you have the opportunity to reinforce your brand (keep your promises) or destroy it (renege on your promises). So one of the key purposes of a contact center is to live up to the promises of the brand. 

When I discuss the customer experience competency Compelling Brand Values, I also look at brands in another light. I often say that brands represent the fabric that aligns all employees with customers in the pursuit of a common cause. So a strong brand can be a powerful force for aligning the activities and behaviors of everyone in the contact center.

One of the critical ways to make your brand compelling is to translate it into behaviors that everyone in the contact center understands. JetBlue, for instance, translates their brand promise into five behaviors of its front-line employees:

• Be in Blue always
• Be personal
• Be the answer
• Be engaging
• Be thankful to every customer

Here are five steps to take if you want to make your contact centers part of your brand mix:

1. Redefine (or renew) your brand. Every company should go through at least a refreshing of their brand at least every other year; clarifying the promises that they are making to customers.
2. Build an internal brand campaign. CMOs need to take on the challenge of embedding the brand promises within the minds and hearts of employees.
3. Translate the promises into behaviors. Every front-line organization (including contact centers) should take the brand promises and define what they need to do to live up to those promises.
4. Establish brand quality measures. If brand promises are important, then contact centers need to embed them in their quality, coaching, and training activities.
5. Hire and promote based on brand fit. Agents should be screened on their ability to deliver on the brand promises and the path to success for everyone in the contact center needs to include some measure of how well they support the brand.

It's time to treat contact centers as a critical component of your brand mix.

Bruce Temkin - Customer Experience Transformist & Managing Partner, Temkin Group and author of the popular blog, Customer Experience Matters

Note: Bruce Temkin has been retained by Jacada to participate in the Customer Service 2.0: Access The Experts speakers series. The opinions shared herein reflect the views of the author, and not necessarily Jacada or its employees.

Call Center Motivation - Not a One Time or One Size Fits All Solution

October is just around the corner and we will soon hear the buzz as call centers prepare for Customer Service Week. Many devote special time and attention to showing appreciation to their frontline call center staff this month and use this time to implement new motivation programs to keep staff fired up and performing at their best.

Two things about these preparations concern me. First, many call centers only worry about this show of appreciation and attempt at motivation for this single week.  And while there may be great results from some of the short-term programs rolled out during Customer Service Week, many centers lose the Customer Service excitement by the time November rolls around. Zig Ziglar once said, "Some people say motivation doesn't last. Well, neither does bathing. That's why you have to do it often." Call centers should certainly know by now that keeping staff motivated to perform well on the phone is an ongoing strategy.  You can't expect a one-week promotion to encourage staff to perform at their peak for very long.

The other thing that worries me about some of these motivation promotions is that no matter how great or exciting the program is, it's not going to motivate everybody.  Creating a successful motivation program is not a "one size fits all" project. What excites Bob may actually irritate Sally. What makes Rachel want to give that extra effort may push Alex out the door. Everybody is motivated by something and it's each supervisor's job to figure out what the motivators are for each person.

There are generally six categories of motivators:  

1. Social reinforcement (guidance, support, time, attention, encouragement)
2. Recognition (acknowledgement of desirable behaviors)
3. Rewards (tangible rewards, trophies, cool stuff)
4. Development opportunities (career advancement, training, new skills)
5. Teamwork (feeling part of team, networking, social activities)
6. Fun (pleasurable activities in the workplace)

Rachel may just need lots of handholding and supervisor attention and will treasure simple recognition for work well done. Alex may prefer not to spend so much time with the boss, but values actual monetary compensation or tangible reward programs. Bob may like learning and will like attending a training class to acquire a new skill better than a gift card. Sally may be the people person that wants to head up the party planning committee or organize the holiday giving program.  

While some of the activities associated with Customer Service Week can address #6 on the list above, just having some fun is not enough to keep people motivated to perform. The more fun they're having the better they will perform, but at some point you have to figure out what the other triggers are. The most effective supervisors will spend time with each employee to determine what their biggest motivators are and will organize activities and plan recognition and rewards to fit the needs of each person.  

Penny Reynolds, Founding Partner of The Call Center School

Penny Reynolds has been retained by Jacada to participate in the "Customer Service 2.0: Access The Experts" speaker series. The opinions shared herein reflect the views of the author, and not necessarily Jacada or its employees. 

Don't miss this webcast!

I am very excited to be able to bring to you a complimentary webcast featuring Penny Reynolds, founding partner of The Call Center School. (yes, begin shameless promotion now). For those of you who are Penny Reynolds devotees, you know that along with developing and teaching courses at The Call Center School, Penny has spent over 20 years in the call center and telecom industry. She is known as an industry expert on topics such as workforce management, application of call center technologies, and call center operations and people management. She is also an author of many call center management books and was awarded the prestigious Call Center Pioneer Award by Call Center magazine.  (very fancy). 

Jacada is pleased to feature Penny in the first webcast in our "Customer Service 2.0: Access the Experts" series which includes blogs, webcasts and whitepapers from expert analysts in the field of call center ops, CRM, customer experience and social media. Register now for "From Transactions to Interactions: Five Essential Workforce Components to Make the Most of Each Call" to learn best practices and thought-provoking ideas about how to get your frontline staff to move the interaction from adequate to extraordinary. Check out the registration page for a complete overview. (go ahead, you know you want to)

I hope you will join us Thursday, Sept. 2, 2010 for Penny's webcast. Jacada is proud to be able to bring her knowledge and insights to our "Access the Experts" series and to you. What are you waiting for?  Register today!

Jen Childress, Director of Marketing, Jacada Inc.

Looking for Coaching Opportunities

Coaching is all about helping someone improve performance and when done right, it's an experience frontline staff will welcome and appreciate. However, for many call center supervisors, coaching is simply a meaningless presentation of numbers or pointing out of errors with no positive roadmap for improvement. It's much like the basketball coach who points out that the last three shots were missed and that the team needs to score ten points in the next three minutes to win the game. Telling someone that handle time is too high and they need to work on call control does not constitute an effective coaching session.

Part of the problem is that supervisors don't have enough time in their schedules to spend doing one-on-one coaching. In many centers, supervisors can be responsible for twenty or more people and finding devoted time to sit down to coach is nearly impossible. Therefore, when it's time for a coaching session, there is pressure to make the most of the time by describing "what went wrong" rather than looking for "coachable moments" and making the most of them.

Many call centers are missing out on these "coachable moments." We see many centers that pull four or five calls per month as coaching samples.  These calls are generally selected randomly, but this random selection often just means haphazard.  The calls selected for coaching rarely represent a true sample of call behavior and they don't always provide the right kind of coachable scenarios. Supervisors will sometimes just select the short calls so they can complete the requisite number of reviews, so the longer, harder calls probably don't get the attention they deserve.

One practice we've observed that works well to supply supervisors and quality analysts with coachable scenarios is to allow the agents to select some of their own calls for coaching. In one center they supply one great call to enter into the "Best Call of the Week" contest, providing a much-needed opportunity for positive reinforcement and recognition. The other call submitted is one where the agent needed help. Agents can provide these calls in a no-scoring format and get guidance on what to do better next time, but in a very supportive, non-judgmental way.  This practice helps to get agents more involved in the process and helps them view coaching as a way to improve rather than a "gotcha" that catches them doing something wrong.

In addition to planned call review time, it's critical that supervisors simply get out and walk the floor to look for coachable moments. This "walk-by coaching" is very effective as agents get comfortable with on-the-spot coaching and recognition.  The sooner that coaching can happen related to the positive or negative behavior it's meant to shape, the more effective the feedback will be.  Therefore, it's important to schedule "walk by" time each day out on the floor in addition to the planned one-on-one time for more formal feedback. 

Coaching is the single most important activity on the supervisor's list of job responsibilities. We need to make sure they're equipped with the right skills, manageable team sizes, and data in the form of coachable moments to make the most of their valuable coaching time.

Penny Reynolds, Founding Partner of The Call Center School

Penny Reynolds has been retained by Jacada to participate in the "Customer Service 2.0: Access The Experts" speaker series. The opinions shared herein reflect the views of the author, and not necessarily Jacada or its employees. 

Mentoring High Performance Teams

High Performing Teams as a topic is a timely one, with the new fall seasons of professional football getting started around the world – both "football" in Europe and "football" in the US – and this gets me thinking about what it takes to keep a team, any team, operating on a championship level year-to-year. In the American NFL, the past fifteen years have seen the New England Patriots and Pittsburgh Steelers make five and three appearances in the championship game, respectively, while it has become almost a given that the same four teams will generally occupy the top four spots in the English Premier League each year, in one order or another.  What characteristics do such consistent, high performing teams (HPTs) share to keep them at or near the top?

Much has been written about how to build HPTs – building tight-knit groups with long-term team relationships, empowerment of the group, team vs. individual goals, capabilities to learn from each other and adapt processes to consistently and efficiently deliver, etc.  But the other thing HPTs and the teams mentioned above share is great organizational leadership to focus such teams on the greatest collective outcome. Leaders of these HPTs focus their teams on a strong group identity, establish standards of individual commitment and accountability (to the team), and look to their teams to monitor its own performance and change work practices accordingly.

The recent, high profile exploits of the Steelers' star quarterback are an excellent example of this leadership ethic.  Many teams' ownership might have been inclined to make excuses for, help defend, or even completely ignore the off-field behavior of one of their key players to avoid impacting their chances of winning. However, the Steelers showed (and have shown in the past) a consistent commitment to standards and self-policing that led to support of a relatively harsh suspension penalty for the player, and even discussion of removal from the team completely if such standards are not observed in the future.   This type of leadership, along with other key HPT characteristics discussed above, have made this organization one of the NFL's most successful.

What do you need to do to keep your "team" on top? 

Jeff Strnad, Senior Vice President - Global Customer Solutions, Jacada Inc.

The Customer Experience Evolution of Contact Centers

Are contact centers becoming extinct like dinosaurs or typewriters?

Based on the hype in the general media, it seems pretty clear that contact centers are a dying breed; getting replaced by more modern interaction channels like the Web, mobile, and social media.

But the data tells a different story. I've done a lot of consumer research over the years, and it continues to show that customers very often want to speak to someone on the phone. Whether it's to verify a piece of information, get help, or place an order, some people still want to interact with an agent. And when it comes to getting customer service, the phone often remains the preferred channel – across all generations of consumers.

While contact centers may not be quickly fading into obsolescence, they are not evolving fast enough to guarantee their ongoing relevance. As Charles Darwin said: "In the long history of humankind (and animal kind, too) those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed."

So what do "collaborate" and "improvise" mean for contact centers?

Collaborate means that contact centers need to connect with other channels. They need to augment and support Web, store, branches, mobile, and social media interactions. It's no longer viable to think of phone interactions as standalone experiences. Therefore, contact centers can no longer remain an isolated organization. For contact centers to thrive, they will need to become an integral component of multi-channel experiences.

Improvise means that contact centers need to redefine their purpose; their raison d'être. For many years, contact centers have been considered cost–centers; companies did everything they could do squeeze every last penny out of the cost of every last phone interaction. This pushed many interactions to offshore call centers and gave rise to purely cost-focused metrics like average handle time (AHT).

Contact centers need to evolve from cost-centers to loyalty drivers. The biggest financial impact of a phone interaction often has nothing to do with the cost of the call; it's the resulting behavior of the customer on the other end of the phone. Companies obsess about cutting $0.50 from the cost of a call without recognizing that the phone experience might generate a $1,000 difference in the lifetime value of that customer.

So how can contact centers learn to collaborate and improvise? By mastering what the Temkin Group has defined as the four core customer experience competencies:

1. Purposeful Leadership: Operate consistently with a clear set of values.
2. Employee Engagement: Align employees with the goals of the organization.
3. Compelling Brand Values: Deliver on your brand promises to customers.
4. Customer Connectedness: Infuse customer insight across the organization.

Over the next five blog posts in this series, I will explore how companies can apply these competencies to their contact centers. We'll dedicate one post to each of the four competencies and then use the final post to examine the metrics and measurements that you need to support the effort.

Let me circle around to the original question: Are contact centers becoming extinct like dinosaurs or typewriters?

Not yet. But the ones that don't evolve will definitely not survive. 

Bruce Temkin - Customer Experience Transformist & Managing Partner, Temkin Group and author of the popular blog, Customer Experience Matters

Bruce Temkin has been retained by Jacada to participate in the Customer Service 2.0: Access The Experts speakers series. The opinions shared herein reflect the views of the author, and not necessarily Jacada or its employees.

Training for Customer Interactions, Not Just Transactions

There are two components that contribute to customer perceptions of a call and their resulting attitude about your company, including overall loyalty, likelihood of future business, and willingness to recommend to others.  One critical part is obviously the transaction part of the call and its basic resolution.  Did the customer get his problem solved or question answered in an effective, efficient manner? 

The other component contributing to customer satisfaction is the "softer side" of the call. Not only do customers want their problems resolved and questions answered, but they want to be treated well during the process. They want to hear enthusiasm about the new product they ordered, empathy about an order lost in the mail, and patience during a complicated returns process. Every single call represents an opportunity to deliver great service, show an interest in the customer, and present a caring, professional voice of the company. 

However, when you look at most call centers' new-hire training programs, the focus of the program is all about the transaction with very little time or content devoted to the interaction aspect of the call. There are weeks of training to cover products, company procedures, system navigation, order entry, etc., but sometimes only an hour or two set aside to fine-tune telephone manners, listening skills, vocal capabilities, or techniques for handling difficult calls. And it's these little nuances that can make a difference in establishing trust and confidence and building rapport with the customer.

Particularly with a younger workforce that has fewer life experiences and customer service background, it's really critical to allot some time to the basics of phone manners and how to address some common service and difficult call scenarios. Providing this kind of training helps to ensure they're equipped for that next complaint call. Give them some tools to turn that raging mad customer ready to post his negative comments throughout social media land into a satisfied customer who is even more loyal than one without an original problem.

Customer service basics should be weaved throughout the training class as well as into everyday training and coaching in the center.  Frontline staff usually find this training as much more enjoyable than the system training, so it will be a welcome part of the day.  And they'll appreciate learning something that's not pertinent just to the current job, but also a valuable life skill.

Penny Reynolds, Founding Partner of The Call Center School

Penny Reynolds has been retained by Jacada to participate in the "Customer Service 2.0: Access The Experts" speaker series. The opinions shared herein reflect the views of the author, and not necessarily Jacada or its employees. 

Getting the message across

The world around us is changing rapidly and we have to change to keep pace. This means rethinking how we disseminate information. People no longer have the time, money or inclination to sit in a classroom for a week or more being trained in the latest and greatest technology; especially when that technology might well be replaced in the near future.

So training has to change to meet the challenges of the new world order. However, there are still some basic truths that will withstand the onrush of progress. One of these is effective communication, surely the bedrock of any training program. Research has shown that to communicate effectively you must consider both the verbal and non-verbal. In fact, over 90% of a message is transferred successfully to the recipient based not on the actual spoken content but on such things as demeanor, body language, intonation, vocal variety, etc.

When considering effective formal training, where you push information, think about how to present the information as much as the words used to convey your message. For example, crossing your arms or legs signals insecurity and to some extent apathy with the subject; being open generates enthusiasm in the classroom, which leads to better and more effective training. Lean forward or sit up straight when talking – interested and engaged people always pay attention and lean forward.  Leaning backwards demonstrates aloofness or rejection and can signify an unwillingness to listen.

As we move to an age where social media is taking over, when more and more people use social media tools such as LinkedIn, Twitter or Facebook as their main means of communication, you have to adjust the way you present your training material. Use tools like Twitter to make people aware of quick tips and tricks; use Facebook and LinkedIn to announce new training courses, and use YouTube to present training videos where the information is then pulled by the trainee, rather than pushed by you. 

With so many new options available, trainers have to determine which traditional and/or social media outlets fit their training objectives and which options are best for engaging the audience.  These days a combination of both methods is ideal for reaching all types of learners.  With the main goal of turning a passive audience into an active audience, trainers need to employ any and all methods available.

Julian Weiss, Documentation & Training Manager, Jacada Inc.