The document discusses various incentive programs for contact centers, highlighting both challenges and successes. Key insights include the importance of employee motivation through prizes and the effectiveness of team competitions in driving performance. It suggests that improvements can be made by implementing a points-based system and focusing on communication and the relevance of rewards.

1. Survey of Incentive Programs

2. Incentive Programs – The bad newsShort livedPrior behaviors returnNo connection with agent score cardsHigh maintenanceTry to keep freshManual input & update resultsWhat prizes to buy

3. R+Incentive $“Want-to-do” curveDiscretionaryEffortR-Base $MINIMUM REQUIREMENTS“Have-to-do” curveThe good news - We all can do betterDr. Aubrey Daniels20% - 40%People will produce more to achieve something they want, than they will to avoid something they don’t want. B.F. Skinner

4. 30 Contact Centers from:USACanadaSouth AfricaColumbia

5. Industries:OTHER:One CallCredit MonitoringRoadside Assistance

6. Number of sites in your company:

7. What does your contact center do?OTHER:Locate request ticket processingLead GenerationTelemarketing

8. How do you communicate?OTHER:FaxSMSwalk-in serviceInternetfax

9. Types of Contact CentersInbound = 69%Home agents = 30%B to C = 76%Employee feedback = 60%Control at contract center = 46%Control at corporate level = 15%Combined control = 38%

10. Types of Contact CentersAll qualifiers are rewarded = 80%Minimum requirement = 88%Individual awards only = 19%Team awards only = 3%Both types = 77%

11. Who is eligible?OTHER:Coaches & trainers

12. How many agents (FTE)?

13. Agent attrition %?

14. Turnover Attack Zone“Attacking” and lowering turnover in the early days of employment will lower the overall rate

15. Incentives for new-hiresTenure Incentives for the first 90 daysDecrease in frequencyIncrease in $ value

16. Incentives for new-hiresEncourage “bonding”Learn names of fellow new hiresPeer mentoringLive observationsLearn names of other team membersPerformance tipsCar pooling

17. Prizes?OTHER:Tickets to Hockey, Concerts, Football

18. What kind of Prizes?ChoiceReal value

19. What do you reward?OTHER:Exceeding average handling timesticket qualityKey metrics: SPHBirthdaysProductivity

20. How long do programs run?OTHER:Annually for attendance

21. How much do you spend?(percent of payroll)

22. Is it worth the money?Spending:53% do not track the spendingROI:80% do not track the ROI

23. What has improved?OTHER:Better ticket quality

24. How often can rewards be earned?OTHER:Bi weeklywe only have weekly programs occasionallyOccasionally throughout the month for specific activities

25. How often can rewards be redeemed?OTHER:Annuallybi-weeklyRewards points are paid after $25.00 earned if they request the gift card at that time or they can let them build until December.

26. Drawings, games, randomized value?

27. Games are effective

28. How Games WorksAchievementPrizesGamePoints

29. Simple and proven waysto change behaviors.$ 50$ 20 x2$ 10 x 4$ 5 x 8$ 1 x 140

30. Who administers it?OTHER:VP of OperationsEvents & Communications CoordinatorA national team of 2-3, and one designated contact at each centerOperations

31. Internal or Outside help?Use outside help to:Create or run your program: 8%To provide rewards/prizes: 15%Internal FTE to manage: 1.65

32. What technology do you use?OTHER:Often manually

33. Most successful contest?Team competitions traditionally work best because it pushes teams to perform as there is something for the supervisor and top performing agents. Every month, we run a variety of team promotions on products depending on where we are on our budget and that has given us the best results of all our programs.Monthly draw that recognizes most improved agent (month-over-month)It was easy to understand & meet the requirements; you earn a ticket, a ticket is drawn & the winners get to choose a prizeAd hoc chance for all to winLarge gift programsChristmas theme run up in 2008 earning points in December towards trips, prizes, vouchers and time off.Awarding two points for each time a behavior was exhibited during a month (obtaining a 2-year contract extension).Co- values promotion

34. Most successful contest?We used a "star Trek" theme to promote a new service offering. Agents earned points for their team based on quality monitoring of their calls to see if service was offered. Team points were accumulated and both team and individual prizes were awarded. Individuals who achieved a specific target were entered into a draw from which the winners were chosen. Increased service offerings by 1000 percentOut contests for most improved - with having large items such as bikes as prizes. As well as a contest to drive Sales - with most average sales at the end of a quarter - prize was a paid trip for 2 to Mexico..... was to drive behavior change in the centerAnything team driven, when teams are selected at random.Carn-e-val electronic billing incentive. We rewarded staff for signing customers up to paperless billing. Each entry went into a draw, and we did multiple draw per day to play carnival style games. Incentive went for 6 weeks, budget was $2500, garnered more than 2000 signups. That drove a reduction in postal costs of roughly $20,000 annually.We have quarterly sales promotions that focus on specific products.Financial incentive based on personal performance over a specific threshold.

35. Least successful contest?Programs that reward single staff in a large group cause the poor and mid performing agents to loose focus as they know they will not get something and the overall effectiveness of the program is lost!Hard to understand-you meet certain goals & you "compete" with another group & the one with the highest number would win & move on to pay another team-Month long, only top performers are eligibleRequiring registration on external website, to then take training, which you had to pass with 100%, in order to even be eligible for the add-on contest that month. Saw only 30% participation from an audience that is normally 65-80%.Chili cook off. People just weren't interestedHaving a Contest for a Contest idea - this was a monthly contest to have the agents come up with contest ideas for the center to use.Money cage for top 3 performers - too little incentive to motivate the masses

36. Most effective part?Prizes/rewardsOffered performance trackingFlexibilityEase of administration, user friendliness & prizes offeredRecognizing effort and talent.Rewards offered, team work involved in implementing the programPay for PerformancePerformance tracking, user friendliness and tracking selection of prizes and automated shipping recognition and communicationPerformance tracking is the most effective. If agents do not reach the minimum target are not eligible for the big rewards prizes/rewardsAbility for associates to see money left on the tableOur reporting allows us to provide daily/weekly/monthly stats to agents for constant monitoring of their progressThe most effective part of all our incentive programs is the recognition that comes with it.Personal accountability and uncapped awards.

37. How could it be better?Have a budget to institute a points based system where agents accumulate points that can be used to purchase merchandise.Better prizes/rewardsHigher budget increased budget make it more fun & interestingMore employee level input Automate the full program Timeliness Individual based and not dept. basedNot much communication and having more people tasked with active involvement in cheering up and pumping adrenaline to the programs to gain more focus/attentionImproved communicationsTracking System

38. How could it be better?Make it more fun with immediacy of the pay out. Currently it takes almost a quarter to get the previous quarters results, tabulate them and then figure out who qualifies before they get paid out. The meaning of the reward is lost in the delay To make it more fair for all of the various teams within our centre. I would really really like to learn of more ideas. Having a forum to discuss and brainstorm different ideas would be great - we need "Change" some new ideas - as it gets stagnantAbility to impact all critical behaviors with one incentiveAbility to reward more on the fly rewards without the hassle of getting the extra dollars approved.They change all the time, so we'd like to be able to change the theme, but keep consistent back end processes.Easier reporting

39. Incentive programs best practices(especially with Generation Y & Generation X employees)Reward behaviors as they happenMicro-goalsProvide fun and excitementRandom intermittent reinforcementImmediate and separate from regular payrollGive choice of rewards

40. Resources:CCPF (ning)Forums, Events, Blogs, etc.Snowfly:Resources > White Papers & Research:Games, Work and Human MotivationKeeping Good People after you hire them15 Great Ways to improve your Incentive ProgramPaper or plastic? Learn how a grocery bag full of money can be used to improve KPIs in the contact center.Video educational materialOne-on-one demonstrationOn-line demonstrationLinkedInContact Center IncentivesContact Center Performance ForumWorld Wide Contact Center Professionals

41. Questions?Bob Cowen248-324-1161rcowen@snowfly.comTyler Mitchell307-745-7126tmitchell@snowfly.comKay Jackson609-788-3555kjackson@responselearning.com