Posted by: Ian Mapp | 11.03.2010
One of our ‘truths’ is that customers and staff that interact directly with customers already know a lot about issues and problems … and often how to solve them. Listening to their stories is often inspiring. The following was inspired by a customer advisor on a recent client engagement.
View from the front
| We the unheeded, doing the unneeded. |
| Showing the unknowing. |
| Too much pressing, too many stressing. |
| The unneeded our undoing. |
| |
| Talk more, rest less. |
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| Always collecting, something new to show, |
| never reflecting, learning from what we know. |
| The knowing unheeded, bright new world unweeded. |
| Doing the unneeded, defection speeded. |
| |
| They talk, I squeeze. |
| They talk, I breeze. |
| I talk, they freeze. |
| I talk – on their knees! |
| |
| I hear them, they are my feed. |
| I hear them, know what they need. |
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| Now is the time to hear me speak. |
| Now is the time to heed the call. |
| Now is the time to follow my lead. |
| I’m undoing the unneeding, starting now. |
Voice of the Customer, agent experience, culture, customer experience, feedback, listening, process improvement, reduction in contacts | No Comments
Posted by: Ian Mapp | 18.09.2009
We talk a lot about the customer experience, but relatively little about the employee (or agent) experience. This is tightly wrapped up with that of the customer since often the two interact directly with each other.
More than simply sterile discussions and weasel words about employee engagement, a genuine shift of responsibility and leadership to the frontline employees leads to improved employee satisfaction – which will in turn be reflected in the levels of customer satisfaction. Dealing with an employee that can actually take responsibility for problems and get them solved is a refreshing experience!
Middle and senior management are often loathe to give up their power and perceived control – but wake up, those days are gone and there is a fundamental shift in the operating model and the way successful organisations are managing themselves.
Budd has long been a proponent of this culture of trust, through its WOCAS (What Our Customers Are Saying) processes and tools. So, it was good to read this article by Louise Druce at MyCustomer.com. Okay, it is only an introductory piece, trailing an event later in the year, but is a useful two minute introduction to the topic.
WOCAS, agent experience, customer experience, fast+simple | No Comments
Posted by: Peter Massey | 20.03.2007
Ever since being forced to sew 72 pairs of shorts in the first weeks that I joined the working population, I’ve advocated the practice of management going back to the floor. In a call centre that means taking calls, not just listening to them.
As per our earlier blog, the Budd team did its bit on Red Nose night at Kent CC. An amazing £150,000 went through just this one centre in one evening.
Apart from talking to some lovely people (apart from teh guy who rang to complain about Terry Wogan getting paid…derrrrr but he doesnt do Red Nose day), we also reminded ourselves of some things long forgotten, from this great back to the floor element.
So if any great call centres out there want us to go back to their floor, we’re up for some harder challenges…. get in touch
peter.massey@budd.uk.com . Here’s Jonathan Wilson’s comments below:
1. Having no calls is worse than having lots of calls
2. I am not a good typist and excellent typing skills really do help to save time and to enable differentiating service based on acute listening. We should encourage much higher standards of typing as a minimum for call centres.
3. I was interested to note how much time you can have to chat to people while you are putting data in or waiting for a response and how you can have good dialogues without delaying things.
4. I did find it quite tense making which made my neck and shoulders sore, which made me think how important it is to help people (i.e. me!) to learn about posture and relaxation techniques. The wireless key boards were helpful. I would have liked the screens at a different height (lower and tilted further up), I think. I would have liked wireless headphones too to allow more movement. None of this is complaining, I stress! I am just interested how important the ergonomics are in contact centres – even more than in offices, because the extra interaction of orally and aurally connecting has an even greater effect than I realised.
5. I also found my voice straining after a while which led to a difficulty talking clearly after a while even without wine!, I felt. The water helps.…
6. It took a lot of attention to hear/understand what people were saying, especially if it was at all noisy in the centre and/or if there was background noise at the caller’s end
7. I thought the input screens were well designed. with a fairly logical flow and I was pleased that you didn’t have to follow the input sequence in order so you could put the name in first if you wanted to. I suppose they were too busy, but I would have liked immediate feedback that the donation had been processed satisfactorily instead of just queued. I may have screwed up every one without knowing.
8. I even liked the screen script prompting, which I did not expect to.
9. People tend to look for evidence that confirms what they already believe, and I was encouraged to see that the mouse is a delay and hindrance when you have practice
10. I suppose to summarise, I regained serious respect for the agents’ work and skill and I doubly convinced of the value of all managers spending several consecutive hours a month or quarter, taking and processing calls as an agent (i.e. no special treatment). I am sure this would lead to better conditions for agents, slicker processes and much better overall service levels.
Red Nose Day, agent experience, back to the floor, usability | No Comments
