Agent motivation is critical for call center success. Inconsistent staffing can hurt agent motivation through uneven workloads and a lack of flexibility, feedback, and perceived fairness. Two case studies show how improving agent motivation through flexible scheduling with Teleopti WFM led to benefits. At Webhelp UK, motivation increased through improved coaching, increasing call quality by 9% and realizing a $280,000 annual cost benefit. At CallUs, goals were initially only productivity and performance, but motivation increased through fairer schedules, reducing attrition by 20% and improving productivity and service levels by 16% and 15% respectively.
Sistema de encendido electrónico de efecto hallCelin Padilla
Este documento describe el sistema de encendido electrónico por efecto Hall. Explica que el sensor Hall envía señales a la unidad de control para calcular la velocidad del motor y posición de los pistones. También describe la estructura básica del sensor Hall y cómo funciona aprovechando el efecto Hall para generar impulsos eléctricos que sincronizan la chispa en las bujías. Finalmente, ofrece algunas anomalías comunes y procesos para corregirlas.
Ways to help your Call Center employees handle stress EffectivelyTentacle Cloud
Call center managers are often under pressure to get responsibilities completed within the deadlines, sometimes having to work with fewer resources than they would have wished for.
Burnout is an individual experience that is specific to the help des.pdfsooryasalini
Burnout is an individual experience that is specific to the help desk agent. Each help desk agent
may progress through the levels of burnout differently in response to certain stressors and report
a different experience with burnout. This is because burnout it is influenced by interwoven
interpersonal, organizational, and/or personality factors; thus the help desk agent’s experience
with burnout is unique to them. Below is a list of specific factors associated with burnout within
the call center: 1.Increasing job demands:Work overload has been found to be directly related to
emotional exhaustion. Within the call center, work overload often involves high frequency
customer contact, continually making or receiving calls, ambitious performance targets,
unrealistic time constraints, and pressure from management to reduce after-call work time.
Agents who feel overworked or aren’t allowed sufficient downtime due to strict call schedules.
So workload should be reduced.2.Insufficient resources:A lack of sufficient resources to
adequately perform their job can contribute to stress and frustration for the call center
agent.3.Lack of sufficient training:Agents who are not sufficiently trained to meet the needs of
their customers often feel underprepared and under-qualified. This can lead to stress when
companies expect excellent customer service interactions and call center agents feel as if they
don’t have the knowledge or experience to meet the demands of the customer and their
company.4.Strict call monitoring practices:Excessive call monitoring increases anxiety and
emotional exhaustion and is therefore highly associated with stress and burnout. Help desk
agents who feel as if they are under surveillance and their calls consistently scrutinized may feel
frustrated by strict call monitoring practices.5.Tedious work:Help desk agents often perform
highly routine job duties. Their work becomes even more monotonous when they are required to
adhere to a strict script. Agents who perform the same tasks day-in and day-out report higher
levels of burnout than those who have less routine work.6.Role ambiguity:When the help desk
agent’s role is not clear or they don’t have sufficient information to adequately perform their job,
they may struggle to find direction. This causes confusion, feelings of lack of effectiveness and
frustration.7.Lack of appropriate rewards: Agents who are not adequately recognized and
rewarded for a good performance may feel underappreciated and unaccomplished. This increases
cynicism towards their workplace, which breeds burnout.8.Workplace conflict:Conflict with
coworkers, management or customers can cause frustration for the call center agent. It can also
contribute to stress, anxiety, and a diminished ability to adequately perform their job
duties.9.Agent personality characteristics:What agents bring to the table – their personality
characteristics – have an impact on their experience of stress and burnout. Agents who are low
on th.
Assembling Your Staff
The practice of medicine is by far one of the most important fields in which people can work. Taking care of peoples health is such an important profession that it should have only employees who take pride in their job and want to come to work each week
The document discusses the benefits of using employee scheduling software. It argues that scheduling can be complex for restaurants and retailers due to varying employee needs, shifts, and turnover. Before software, managers spent significant time manually scheduling with spreadsheets, leading to issues like understaffing. The document outlines how scheduling software saves time by automating tasks, improves communication of schedule changes, allows access from any device, empowers employees, ensures proper staffing, and protects the bottom line through analytics and forecasting. In conclusion, it maintains scheduling software streamlines operations, opens communication, and gives control over labor costs.
This document discusses managing your career effectively. It begins by explaining that choosing a career is an involved process that takes time and research. It then provides steps for finding a job, including creating a resume, researching companies, applying online and following up. It emphasizes developing good interpersonal skills like self-awareness, listening, motivation and having a positive attitude when entering the workforce. Finally, it discusses the importance of time management and controlling time wasters to be productive.
How to build a centralized healthcare call centerNisos Health
The document provides guidance on setting up a centralized healthcare call center, including determining the need, gathering baseline data, identifying leadership, integrating software, hiring staff, ensuring compliance, testing, and establishing metrics. Key steps include assessing the patient experience, integrating practice management software with call center software via APIs or HL7, hiring the right supervisor and agents, creating scripts, getting a single phone number, and establishing metrics to measure performance.
Sistema de encendido electrónico de efecto hallCelin Padilla
Este documento describe el sistema de encendido electrónico por efecto Hall. Explica que el sensor Hall envía señales a la unidad de control para calcular la velocidad del motor y posición de los pistones. También describe la estructura básica del sensor Hall y cómo funciona aprovechando el efecto Hall para generar impulsos eléctricos que sincronizan la chispa en las bujías. Finalmente, ofrece algunas anomalías comunes y procesos para corregirlas.
Ways to help your Call Center employees handle stress EffectivelyTentacle Cloud
Call center managers are often under pressure to get responsibilities completed within the deadlines, sometimes having to work with fewer resources than they would have wished for.
Burnout is an individual experience that is specific to the help des.pdfsooryasalini
Burnout is an individual experience that is specific to the help desk agent. Each help desk agent
may progress through the levels of burnout differently in response to certain stressors and report
a different experience with burnout. This is because burnout it is influenced by interwoven
interpersonal, organizational, and/or personality factors; thus the help desk agent’s experience
with burnout is unique to them. Below is a list of specific factors associated with burnout within
the call center: 1.Increasing job demands:Work overload has been found to be directly related to
emotional exhaustion. Within the call center, work overload often involves high frequency
customer contact, continually making or receiving calls, ambitious performance targets,
unrealistic time constraints, and pressure from management to reduce after-call work time.
Agents who feel overworked or aren’t allowed sufficient downtime due to strict call schedules.
So workload should be reduced.2.Insufficient resources:A lack of sufficient resources to
adequately perform their job can contribute to stress and frustration for the call center
agent.3.Lack of sufficient training:Agents who are not sufficiently trained to meet the needs of
their customers often feel underprepared and under-qualified. This can lead to stress when
companies expect excellent customer service interactions and call center agents feel as if they
don’t have the knowledge or experience to meet the demands of the customer and their
company.4.Strict call monitoring practices:Excessive call monitoring increases anxiety and
emotional exhaustion and is therefore highly associated with stress and burnout. Help desk
agents who feel as if they are under surveillance and their calls consistently scrutinized may feel
frustrated by strict call monitoring practices.5.Tedious work:Help desk agents often perform
highly routine job duties. Their work becomes even more monotonous when they are required to
adhere to a strict script. Agents who perform the same tasks day-in and day-out report higher
levels of burnout than those who have less routine work.6.Role ambiguity:When the help desk
agent’s role is not clear or they don’t have sufficient information to adequately perform their job,
they may struggle to find direction. This causes confusion, feelings of lack of effectiveness and
frustration.7.Lack of appropriate rewards: Agents who are not adequately recognized and
rewarded for a good performance may feel underappreciated and unaccomplished. This increases
cynicism towards their workplace, which breeds burnout.8.Workplace conflict:Conflict with
coworkers, management or customers can cause frustration for the call center agent. It can also
contribute to stress, anxiety, and a diminished ability to adequately perform their job
duties.9.Agent personality characteristics:What agents bring to the table – their personality
characteristics – have an impact on their experience of stress and burnout. Agents who are low
on th.
Assembling Your Staff
The practice of medicine is by far one of the most important fields in which people can work. Taking care of peoples health is such an important profession that it should have only employees who take pride in their job and want to come to work each week
The document discusses the benefits of using employee scheduling software. It argues that scheduling can be complex for restaurants and retailers due to varying employee needs, shifts, and turnover. Before software, managers spent significant time manually scheduling with spreadsheets, leading to issues like understaffing. The document outlines how scheduling software saves time by automating tasks, improves communication of schedule changes, allows access from any device, empowers employees, ensures proper staffing, and protects the bottom line through analytics and forecasting. In conclusion, it maintains scheduling software streamlines operations, opens communication, and gives control over labor costs.
This document discusses managing your career effectively. It begins by explaining that choosing a career is an involved process that takes time and research. It then provides steps for finding a job, including creating a resume, researching companies, applying online and following up. It emphasizes developing good interpersonal skills like self-awareness, listening, motivation and having a positive attitude when entering the workforce. Finally, it discusses the importance of time management and controlling time wasters to be productive.
How to build a centralized healthcare call centerNisos Health
The document provides guidance on setting up a centralized healthcare call center, including determining the need, gathering baseline data, identifying leadership, integrating software, hiring staff, ensuring compliance, testing, and establishing metrics. Key steps include assessing the patient experience, integrating practice management software with call center software via APIs or HL7, hiring the right supervisor and agents, creating scripts, getting a single phone number, and establishing metrics to measure performance.
A Complete Guide to Promoting a Healthy Remote Work-Life BalanceKashish Trivedi
Our homes are no longer homes, and our offices are no longer offices.
The long-term impact of an abrupt shift to remote work means many employees struggle to adjust. But employees aren’t the only ones who have to adjust.
Companies now need to find a “new normal.” Remote work has given employees a taste of great flexibility and they’re not ready to part with it.
To prevent the Great Resignation, employers need to find a way to keep their business running efficiently while also promoting a healthy remote work-life balance.
We’ll explore how to adapt to this new reality. We’ll also look at how it’s impacting our recruiting, hiring, and managing of employees.
The document provides guidance on retaining, evaluating, and growing a call center team. It discusses the importance of staff retention and understanding why employees leave. It recommends giving employees additional interesting work, consulting with them, promoting from within, varying their daily tasks, and offering flexible shifts. The document also stresses the importance of evaluating employee performance based on key metrics and goals. Finally, it suggests ways to help growing employees feel motivated by assigning them new challenges, supporting career development, and hiring those that are a good motivational fit.
The concept of a ‘meeting’ in any workspace can evoke mixed emotions – from dread and boredom to excitement and anticipation – depending upon how it’s undertaken. In the hospitality industry, meetings are key because timely and meaningful communication is what the industry hinges on. This article stresses on the importance of meetings and communication in the industry, aiming to provide some food for thought for those who conduct them on a daily basis.
Calling cadence plays an important role in lead nurturing. It is a symphony of prospecting balance that involves rhythmic timing and structure. Learn some tips on how to best strategize this balance.
The document discusses conducting a market research survey to determine how many people and how much they would be willing to pay for a telephone answering service operating between 8am-6pm Monday through Saturday; the survey found that most private organizations and individuals needing emergency assistance would utilize and pay for such a service, though government establishments and many self-employed individuals likely would not.
Employee turnover and retention in banks was studied. Turnover refers to employees leaving and being replaced, while retention aims to keep valuable employees. High turnover can hurt productivity and profitability. Reasons for turnover include low pay, lack of career growth, and poor work environment or management. Banks can reduce turnover by offering competitive pay and benefits, training and development opportunities, and an engaging workplace culture with supportive supervision. The cost of employee turnover is high, so retention is important for banks to maintain a stable, skilled workforce.
The document provides 7 tips for more effective call center scheduling: 1) Implement a flexible shift model to better match staffing to call volumes, 2) Track and reduce shrinkage to improve service levels and save costs, 3) Improve schedule adherence through education, measurement, and incentives, 4) Cross-train multi-skilled agents to handle multiple call types with fewer staff, 5) Ensure agent log-in times match schedules, 6) Include all agent activities in schedules and forecasts, and 7) Rank agents and match personalities to teams to retain top performers. The tips are aimed at simplifying scheduling, improving service levels, and reducing costs for call centers.
The document provides guidance on how to write effective job descriptions focused on the key elements of what the job entails (tasks and responsibilities), how the job will be performed (quality standards), and how performance will be measured (metrics of success). It advocates for keeping job descriptions simple, clear and focused on performance outcomes. An example job description for a receptionist is outlined highlighting what the job involves, how each task should be performed to standard, and how performance could be measured through feedback and metrics. The document stresses that well-written job descriptions that clearly define performance expectations can serve as an effective guide and tool for employee development, goal-setting and performance reviews.
In the coming years, managing revenue cycle employees from their home might be a normal business practice for many healthcare providers. This report explains what telecommuting is and describes the pros and cons of allowing your revenue cycle employees to work from home.
Remote work has its advantages—flexibility, low or no overhead costs, and a greater pipeline of applicants from which to hire. And it has its disadvantages—less interaction, managers worried about how to tell if their employees are staying on task and communication challenges. How can companies maximize the advantages and minimize the disadvantages?
If you want to learn more about this topic: https://www.newsteer.com/resources/managing-remote-teams
This document discusses schedule adherence in contact centers. It defines schedule adherence and factors to consider when setting adherence goals, such as scheduled hours, average handle time, and non-productive time allowed. The document provides calculations from ICMI on how to determine adherence targets based on these factors. It discusses how changing average handle time can impact goals and service levels. Finally, it discusses strategies for improving adherence, such as setting realistic goals, accurate forecasting, efficient scheduling, training agents on the importance of adherence, and holding employees accountable. Not meeting adherence goals can require more full-time employees, inconsistent customer service, and higher occupancy rates.
The document discusses how utilizing home agents can help contact centers reach peak efficiency. It notes that staffing is the biggest challenge for contact centers. Home agents provide more flexibility than brick-and-mortar centers to adjust staffing levels quickly. Home agents also have higher skills on average, lower turnover, and lower costs. Outsourcing home agents to companies like West at Home provides additional scalability and expertise to help contact centers meet variable call volume demands.
Job redesign involves reshaping jobs to make them more motivating for employees by incorporating elements like job rotation, enlargement, enrichment, flexible hours, job sharing, and telecommuting. When implemented effectively through strategies such as rotating employees through different departments, expanding employees' responsibilities, and allowing flexible or remote work arrangements, job redesign can benefit both organizations and workers by increasing employee motivation, satisfaction, and productivity while reducing costs associated with absenteeism and turnover. However, a company's structure and management style as well as individual employee needs must be considered to determine if job redesign is suitable.
This document provides 25 tips for motivating call center staff. Some of the key tips include recognizing employees for good work through rewards, praise, and opportunities for growth. It also emphasizes the importance of listening to staff needs, providing the right tools and environment for them to do their jobs well, and keeping morale high through regular feedback, training, and fun team-building activities. The overall message is that motivated employees are more productive, so call centers should focus on creating a positive culture where staff feel valued, supported and able to perform at their best.
8 ways an answering service can help grow your businessomari_anderson
An answering service can help businesses by answering calls outside of regular business hours, providing a live person for customers to speak with or leave messages. This allows businesses to appear available 24/7 while reducing costs compared to hiring full-time staff. An answering service can also take other clerical tasks like call handling off the plate of existing staff, allowing them to focus on higher priority work. During emergencies or disasters, an answering service ensures business continuity by continuing to field calls and messages for customers.
1 2Root Cause Analysis The Problem.docxtarifarmarie
1
2
Root Cause Analysis
The Problem: Customer Service Representatives not resolving issues on a first time call
Why is it happening?
1. Not properly trained: why is that?
2. Were only trained to handle minor issues: why is that?
3. Used to pushing complicated issues to other areas: why is that?
4. Leaving subscribers and providers on hold for long periods of time: why is that?
5. This in turns leaves claims inventory high with unresolved issues.
Action to take: Customer Service Representatives needs to be willing to be trained on complex issues to be able to help members/providers when they call in. Another action would be for the company to set up a number of different phone lines to certain claim representatives to help when a customer service rep has issues. This will reduce the number of calls customer service receives, no more holding times for members/providers, and will also reduce the inventory in claims.
Root Cause Analysis
xxx
MHA 505
Running head: ROOT CAUSE ANALYSIS
1
SYSTEMS DIAGRAM
2
Record documentation contains spelling and grammar errors making it difficult to understand and causing unnecessary client escalations.
why
R&D budget was spent on items that would prevent extra work for staff such as rules engines.
why
Microsoft Word also does not correctly identify and spell some medical terms correctly. We also use abbreviations and Word does not recognize common medical abbreviations.
why
why
why
why
why
Three significant system enhancements in 2016-2018 took priority over adding a spelling and grammar check.
Development resources previously denied for this project.
There is no integrated spelling or grammar check in the system
Some representatives copy/paste their notes into Microsoft Word to check spelling and grammar, but there often is not enough time to complete this and make quotas, so reps skip this step leaving the grammar and spelling mistakes in the notes.
English is the second language for overseas employees, so grammar and spelling mistakes are common due to where the work is being performed
Invest in development time to build a spelling and grammar check into the system for the precertification team.
Incomplete clinical documentation faxed to carriers on the first submission.
To counter the lack of medical experience athenahealth previously provided extensive new hire training to the offshore team. Due to the recent influx in the number of new offshore employees, the length of the new hire training was reduced to accommodate more classes and onboard the staff faster.
why
why
why
why
why
We partner with an offshore vendor that has high customer service ratings but most of the employees have technology, bu.
As we begin 2019, we take look at the importance of employee engagement, and how HR solutions can be used to enhance their experience and help increase their well-being whilst at work.
The document outlines strategies for effective delegation, including preparing employees for tasks by clearly outlining specifics, communicating expectations clearly in a respectful tone, confirming understanding by asking questions, following up periodically to ensure projects are on track, and avoiding hovering over employees as they work. The key steps are to prepare well by understanding the task yourself, communicate details clearly and respectfully, confirm the employee understands fully before handing off the project, follow up regularly for accountability, and trust employees can handle the work without hovering.
A Complete Guide to Promoting a Healthy Remote Work-Life BalanceKashish Trivedi
Our homes are no longer homes, and our offices are no longer offices.
The long-term impact of an abrupt shift to remote work means many employees struggle to adjust. But employees aren’t the only ones who have to adjust.
Companies now need to find a “new normal.” Remote work has given employees a taste of great flexibility and they’re not ready to part with it.
To prevent the Great Resignation, employers need to find a way to keep their business running efficiently while also promoting a healthy remote work-life balance.
We’ll explore how to adapt to this new reality. We’ll also look at how it’s impacting our recruiting, hiring, and managing of employees.
The document provides guidance on retaining, evaluating, and growing a call center team. It discusses the importance of staff retention and understanding why employees leave. It recommends giving employees additional interesting work, consulting with them, promoting from within, varying their daily tasks, and offering flexible shifts. The document also stresses the importance of evaluating employee performance based on key metrics and goals. Finally, it suggests ways to help growing employees feel motivated by assigning them new challenges, supporting career development, and hiring those that are a good motivational fit.
The concept of a ‘meeting’ in any workspace can evoke mixed emotions – from dread and boredom to excitement and anticipation – depending upon how it’s undertaken. In the hospitality industry, meetings are key because timely and meaningful communication is what the industry hinges on. This article stresses on the importance of meetings and communication in the industry, aiming to provide some food for thought for those who conduct them on a daily basis.
Calling cadence plays an important role in lead nurturing. It is a symphony of prospecting balance that involves rhythmic timing and structure. Learn some tips on how to best strategize this balance.
The document discusses conducting a market research survey to determine how many people and how much they would be willing to pay for a telephone answering service operating between 8am-6pm Monday through Saturday; the survey found that most private organizations and individuals needing emergency assistance would utilize and pay for such a service, though government establishments and many self-employed individuals likely would not.
Employee turnover and retention in banks was studied. Turnover refers to employees leaving and being replaced, while retention aims to keep valuable employees. High turnover can hurt productivity and profitability. Reasons for turnover include low pay, lack of career growth, and poor work environment or management. Banks can reduce turnover by offering competitive pay and benefits, training and development opportunities, and an engaging workplace culture with supportive supervision. The cost of employee turnover is high, so retention is important for banks to maintain a stable, skilled workforce.
The document provides 7 tips for more effective call center scheduling: 1) Implement a flexible shift model to better match staffing to call volumes, 2) Track and reduce shrinkage to improve service levels and save costs, 3) Improve schedule adherence through education, measurement, and incentives, 4) Cross-train multi-skilled agents to handle multiple call types with fewer staff, 5) Ensure agent log-in times match schedules, 6) Include all agent activities in schedules and forecasts, and 7) Rank agents and match personalities to teams to retain top performers. The tips are aimed at simplifying scheduling, improving service levels, and reducing costs for call centers.
The document provides guidance on how to write effective job descriptions focused on the key elements of what the job entails (tasks and responsibilities), how the job will be performed (quality standards), and how performance will be measured (metrics of success). It advocates for keeping job descriptions simple, clear and focused on performance outcomes. An example job description for a receptionist is outlined highlighting what the job involves, how each task should be performed to standard, and how performance could be measured through feedback and metrics. The document stresses that well-written job descriptions that clearly define performance expectations can serve as an effective guide and tool for employee development, goal-setting and performance reviews.
In the coming years, managing revenue cycle employees from their home might be a normal business practice for many healthcare providers. This report explains what telecommuting is and describes the pros and cons of allowing your revenue cycle employees to work from home.
Remote work has its advantages—flexibility, low or no overhead costs, and a greater pipeline of applicants from which to hire. And it has its disadvantages—less interaction, managers worried about how to tell if their employees are staying on task and communication challenges. How can companies maximize the advantages and minimize the disadvantages?
If you want to learn more about this topic: https://www.newsteer.com/resources/managing-remote-teams
This document discusses schedule adherence in contact centers. It defines schedule adherence and factors to consider when setting adherence goals, such as scheduled hours, average handle time, and non-productive time allowed. The document provides calculations from ICMI on how to determine adherence targets based on these factors. It discusses how changing average handle time can impact goals and service levels. Finally, it discusses strategies for improving adherence, such as setting realistic goals, accurate forecasting, efficient scheduling, training agents on the importance of adherence, and holding employees accountable. Not meeting adherence goals can require more full-time employees, inconsistent customer service, and higher occupancy rates.
The document discusses how utilizing home agents can help contact centers reach peak efficiency. It notes that staffing is the biggest challenge for contact centers. Home agents provide more flexibility than brick-and-mortar centers to adjust staffing levels quickly. Home agents also have higher skills on average, lower turnover, and lower costs. Outsourcing home agents to companies like West at Home provides additional scalability and expertise to help contact centers meet variable call volume demands.
Job redesign involves reshaping jobs to make them more motivating for employees by incorporating elements like job rotation, enlargement, enrichment, flexible hours, job sharing, and telecommuting. When implemented effectively through strategies such as rotating employees through different departments, expanding employees' responsibilities, and allowing flexible or remote work arrangements, job redesign can benefit both organizations and workers by increasing employee motivation, satisfaction, and productivity while reducing costs associated with absenteeism and turnover. However, a company's structure and management style as well as individual employee needs must be considered to determine if job redesign is suitable.
This document provides 25 tips for motivating call center staff. Some of the key tips include recognizing employees for good work through rewards, praise, and opportunities for growth. It also emphasizes the importance of listening to staff needs, providing the right tools and environment for them to do their jobs well, and keeping morale high through regular feedback, training, and fun team-building activities. The overall message is that motivated employees are more productive, so call centers should focus on creating a positive culture where staff feel valued, supported and able to perform at their best.
8 ways an answering service can help grow your businessomari_anderson
An answering service can help businesses by answering calls outside of regular business hours, providing a live person for customers to speak with or leave messages. This allows businesses to appear available 24/7 while reducing costs compared to hiring full-time staff. An answering service can also take other clerical tasks like call handling off the plate of existing staff, allowing them to focus on higher priority work. During emergencies or disasters, an answering service ensures business continuity by continuing to field calls and messages for customers.
1 2Root Cause Analysis The Problem.docxtarifarmarie
1
2
Root Cause Analysis
The Problem: Customer Service Representatives not resolving issues on a first time call
Why is it happening?
1. Not properly trained: why is that?
2. Were only trained to handle minor issues: why is that?
3. Used to pushing complicated issues to other areas: why is that?
4. Leaving subscribers and providers on hold for long periods of time: why is that?
5. This in turns leaves claims inventory high with unresolved issues.
Action to take: Customer Service Representatives needs to be willing to be trained on complex issues to be able to help members/providers when they call in. Another action would be for the company to set up a number of different phone lines to certain claim representatives to help when a customer service rep has issues. This will reduce the number of calls customer service receives, no more holding times for members/providers, and will also reduce the inventory in claims.
Root Cause Analysis
xxx
MHA 505
Running head: ROOT CAUSE ANALYSIS
1
SYSTEMS DIAGRAM
2
Record documentation contains spelling and grammar errors making it difficult to understand and causing unnecessary client escalations.
why
R&D budget was spent on items that would prevent extra work for staff such as rules engines.
why
Microsoft Word also does not correctly identify and spell some medical terms correctly. We also use abbreviations and Word does not recognize common medical abbreviations.
why
why
why
why
why
Three significant system enhancements in 2016-2018 took priority over adding a spelling and grammar check.
Development resources previously denied for this project.
There is no integrated spelling or grammar check in the system
Some representatives copy/paste their notes into Microsoft Word to check spelling and grammar, but there often is not enough time to complete this and make quotas, so reps skip this step leaving the grammar and spelling mistakes in the notes.
English is the second language for overseas employees, so grammar and spelling mistakes are common due to where the work is being performed
Invest in development time to build a spelling and grammar check into the system for the precertification team.
Incomplete clinical documentation faxed to carriers on the first submission.
To counter the lack of medical experience athenahealth previously provided extensive new hire training to the offshore team. Due to the recent influx in the number of new offshore employees, the length of the new hire training was reduced to accommodate more classes and onboard the staff faster.
why
why
why
why
why
We partner with an offshore vendor that has high customer service ratings but most of the employees have technology, bu.
As we begin 2019, we take look at the importance of employee engagement, and how HR solutions can be used to enhance their experience and help increase their well-being whilst at work.
The document outlines strategies for effective delegation, including preparing employees for tasks by clearly outlining specifics, communicating expectations clearly in a respectful tone, confirming understanding by asking questions, following up periodically to ensure projects are on track, and avoiding hovering over employees as they work. The key steps are to prepare well by understanding the task yourself, communicate details clearly and respectfully, confirm the employee understands fully before handing off the project, follow up regularly for accountability, and trust employees can handle the work without hovering.
Customer service and Non-Communicable Diseases: What Every Call Center Emplo...
White Paper - Making Big WFM Gains with Agent Motivation
1. WHITE PAPER | ANALYSIS AND C A SE STUDIES
Making big gains
with agent motivation
2. WH I T E PA PE R | A N A LYS I S A N D C A S E S T U D I E S | 2
THE IMPORTANCE OF
AGENT MOTIVATION
Employee motivation is one of the most im-
portant factors in your call center’s success. It
directly affects the productivity and creativity
of your employees and, if neglected, can be
detrimental to both your retention rate and your
profitability as unmotivated employees seek
work elsewhere and your organization is forced
to spend significant resources finding and
educating new ones.
The feelings symptomatic of a lack of pro-
fessional motivation were extensively
documented by Roger E. Herman in his 1999
book Keeping Good People. These feelings are:
It doesn’t feel good around here.
They wouldn’t miss me if I left.
I don’t get the support I need to do my job.
There is no opportunity for advancement.
Each of these feelings indicates a workplace that
has lost its “human touch” and is a red flag for
employee unhappiness.
Maintaining high employee motivation is pos-
sible if you pay attention to the five main drivers
of employee motivation:
I get relevant feedback on my work.
I work in a satisfying physical environment.
I am able to influence my own situation.
I am treated fairly.
I know and accept my work objectives.
If you ignore the warning signs of employee
unhappiness and fail to pay attention to the
five main drivers of employee motivation, you
risk having an ineffective work environment
hindered by high absence and attrition rates and,
when your agents are at work, poor on-the-job
performance. Job satisfaction across the world
is declining, having, for example, dropped from
61% to 45% in the United States during the past
two decades as the divide between manager and
employee continues to widen.
One major cause of lack of motivation is in-
effective resource planning, and it affects all five
drivers of employee motivation.
INCONSISTENT OCCUPANCY CAN
HURT MOTIVATION
Imagine a work day where your call center’s staff-
ing is accurate on a day level but less than optimal
with respect to intraday resource planning.
There are 230 hours of incoming calls (you have
calculated an average of about seven minutes per
call) and just under 215 scheduled man-hours.
Your service level, which is your organization’s
goal for how quickly the calls coming into your
queues are answered, is answering 80% of all
incoming calls within 20 seconds.
The day’s staffing might look something like this:
Figure 1: Intraday staffing for a call center, with
significant variations in service level and occu-
pancy. The call center has a service level, or call-
answering target, of answering 80% of incoming
calls within 20 seconds. In this figure, Answered
within SL means calls answered within 20 seconds,
Answered after SL means calls answered but not
within the 20-second target, and Abandoned calls
means calls that were abandoned by the caller
before any agents was able to answer.
The day averages may look good, but there
is another, equally important, dimension to
consider: consistency.
A quick visual analysis of the intraday staffing
shows us that, despite having accurately matched
your overall resources to the overall incoming
3. WH I T E PA PE R | A N A LYS I S A N D C A S E S T U D I E S | 3
call volume, on an intraday level your call center
is overstaffed in the morning. The waste of re-
sources early in the morning creates, from 9:00
on, an understaffed situation that persists for the
rest of the day.
The consequence of uneven resource planning is
an inconsistent occupancy, the measure of how
much of an agent’s scheduled telephone time is
spent actively speaking on the phone. Too low of
an occupancy means employee boredom, but too
high of an occupancy can cause your agents to
burn out from exhaustion.
Inconsistent occupancy can seriously damage
your employees’ level of motivation. Let’s discuss
how this might happen.
Unhappy customers
make for unhappy agents
Any employees that begin work at 10:00 or later
experience very little on-the-job satisfaction.
They spend the entire day speaking with angry
customers whose calls have been answered after
service level and, in all likelihood, close to the
point of abandonment. Because calls are coming
in faster than they are being handled, the agents
have high occupancies, spending all of their
time on the phone without a minute to rest and
regroup. To make matters worse, they are sur-
rounded by other unhappy and exhausted agents
who are also spending the entire day speaking
with customers who have been waiting in long
queues, contributing to a physical environment
that is anything but satisfying.
Lack of control means
lack of feedback
The fact that control is lost early in the day makes
it hard for managers to give quick and relevant
feedback. By 11:00, when nearly 30% of all calls
are being abandoned and 0% are being handled
within service level, it is clear that there is no
time for a manager to give employees any feed-
back at all without occupying necessary resources
and causing the situation to spiral even farther
out of control.
Differences in level of activity
during shifts are seen as unfair
If we consider two agents that each work a
4-hour shift during the day displayed in Figure 1,
one that begins working at 8:00 and one that
begins at 11:00, it is easy to understand that
there will be strong perceptions of scheduling
unfairness from both of the agents. The agent
scheduled to start at 11:00 will undoubtedly com-
plain that she has to work during severe under-
staffing for her entire shift, causing an unhealthy
amount of stress on her, while some other agents
get to enjoy shifts that are much less stressful.
She feels the negative effects of an occupancy
that is too high.
But the second agent, scheduled to start at 8:00,
might also complain. He will have a harder time
meeting his personal targets, since he works a
shift during a period that is overstaffed and will
spend most of his time sitting and waiting for calls
instead of spending it on the phone, talking. This
second agent is experiencing the downsides of an
occupancy that is too low.
Critical understaffing
means no flexibility
Finally, the constant and often critical understaff-
ing between 10:00 and 15:00 means that agents
working during that time will have very high
occupancies and, through spending nearly
Agent motivation is one of
the most important factors in
determining your call center’s
success, and high motivation
is the key to running your call
center with a human touch.
”
”
4. WH I T E PA PE R | A N A LYS I S A N D C A S E S T U D I E S | 4
every second on the job actively speaking on
the phone, very little control over their personal
space and work conditions. It is also probable
that any agent who wishes to leave the office
early or take the day off would not be granted
that right due to the detrimental effect it would
have on queue lengths for the rest of the day,
further denying agents the ability to influence
their own work conditions.
FLEXIBLE SCHEDULING
CAN IMPROVE OCCUPANCY
AND YIELD OTHER BENEFITS
More consistent occupancy values
Flexible scheduling is a great way to increase
the consistency of your agents’ occupancies.
Accurately staffing the peaks and valleys of your
call center’s incoming volume will lead to more
consistent occupancies, but to do this you need
to be able to vary the number of agents actively
taking calls throughout the week and day.
This includes but is not limited to variation of
start and end times, variation of shift lengths,
and optimization of breaks and other
non-telephony activities. Coupled with an
accurate forecast of incoming volume, flexible
scheduling will alleviate the problems discussed
in the previous section, “Inconsistent occupancy
can hurt agent motivation.”
This may at first seem like something that
would hurt your agents’ motivation by taking
away a degree of their freedom. They might be,
for example, used to all going on break at the
same time. The truth is that flexible scheduling
introduces a lot more freedom for your agents
by allowing you to honor requests for vaca-
tion, customized work times, shift swaps, and
intraday activity. If done correctly, it can be a
catalyst for increases in agent motivation.
Vacation planning
Your agents have private lives outside of work
and receiving a customized personal vacation
day schedule that allows them to attend a family
reunion, child’s piano recital, or whatever the
case may be makes a strong statement that you
care about their health and happiness. Granting
these day-off requests without sacrificing call
center performance is no easy task and requires
the coordination of all of your agents’ schedules.
Work time preferences
Call center managers have traditionally scheduled
shifts and rotations without listening to their
agents’ preferences. Shift rotations have been
adjusted to incoming volume but inequitably
distributed amongst agents or fairly distributed
but poorly matched to volume fluctuations.
Trying to accommodate as many time preferences
as possible for every agent and every day while
controlling for shift allocation fairness means
dealing with an extremely large amount of data.
Fortunately, this can be done easily and
effectively with cutting edge WFM technology
like Teleopti WFM.
Shift swapping
The dialogue with your agents should not end
when their schedules are published. Their needs
are constantly changing and an ideal call center
will consider these needs, allowing agents to
swap shifts with their coworkers in order to
adapt their schedules without sacrificing your
carefully calculated and scheduled staffing levels.
Intraday management
More accurate, up-to-the-minute information
on incoming call volumes, queues, and handling
statistics allows you to make better intraday
management decisions, giving your agents the
flexibility to leave early, take a break, or earn
overtime as the situation permits. The options
possible for responding to real-time information
depend on the flexibility of your workplace.
The more flexible it is the more responsive and
effective your call center will be.
5. WH I T E PA PE R – O P T I M A L AG E N T E FFI C I E N C Y | 4WH I T E PA PE R | A N A LYS I S A N D C A S E S T U D I E S | 5
IMPROVING AGENT MOTIVATION
WILL IMPROVE PROFITABILITY:
TWO CASE STUDIES
Case 1: Webhelp UK
Webhelp UK is a large outsourcer with more than
3000 agents across multiple locations. The
Webhelp UK management team wanted to create
a great customer experience and recognized
that outstanding employees were the key to
achieving this.
Unfortunately for Webhelp UK, their agents
were not as motivated as they would have liked.
Absence and attrition rates were running above
target, and call quality scores were also lower
than required.
After some internal analysis, it became clear that
a key reason for agent dissatisfaction was that
they felt unappreciated and, in some cases, even
completely ignored by their team managers.
According to one agent, “My coaching sessions
often seemed to be organized at short notice and
sometimes cancelled if it was too busy on the
phones.” Another agent “wanted to do my job
better but there seemed to never be enough
time for my manager to help me improve.”
The real problem was not that team managers did
not care about their agents or ignored them; it
was that they did not have access to the accurate
forecast data necessary to be able to effectively
schedule meetings.
The Webhelp UK management team decided
to implement Teleopti WFM to plan its team
managers’ days. Team managers now knew far
in advance what times they could set aside for
coaching meetings without having an adverse
effect on call handling. Managers then planned
coaching days for their agents, seamlessly syn-
chronizing entire teams’ schedules in order to
make sure that each employee got the time he or
she needed.
The qualitative effects on Webhelp UK’s perfor-
mance were profound. The better management
of team leaders’ time allowed them to provide
their team members with more effective, more
frequent coaching. The more meaningful and
more frequent coaching meetings provided team
leaders and the rest of the management team
with more accurate and up-to-date information
than they had ever had access to in the past.
This led to the ability to make better real-time
decisions, including better time management
for team leaders. The positive feedback loop,
enabled by Teleopti WFM, continued.
The quantitative results are no less impressive.
Coaching time exceeded expectations, jumping
from 1% to 3% of agents’ total work time with
no adverse effect on service levels whatsoever.
Call quality actually increased, by 9%. With a
gents feeling more appreciated and receiving
better feedback from their managers, motivation
increased with absence rates dropping 14% and
retention rates jumping 16%.
Webhelp UK calculated its annualized cost
benefit for a subgroup of 150 agents to be a very
significant $280,000.
At Webhelp UK, the goal was
to improve the customer ex-
perience by increasing agent
motivation. Augmenting
agent motivtion did improve
the customer experience,
increasing call quality by 9%.
Profitability also increased,
with Webhelp UK realizing
an annualized cost benefit of
$280,000.
”
”
6. WH I T E PA PE R – O P T I M A L AG E N T E FFI C I E N C Y | 4WH I T E PA PE R | A N A LYS I S A N D C A S E S T U D I E S | 6
Case 2: CallUs
The second case this paper examines deals with
an outsourcing company called CallUs, with 600
seats in two locations. CallUs management had
two goals, the first being to increase service levels
to 90% within 20 seconds in order to comply
with customer contracts and the second being
to improve both performance and efficiency in
order to increase overall profitability. One factor
notably missing from CallUs’s goals was employee
satisfaction.
CallUs implemented Teleopti WFM in order to
increase efficiency and profitability. Teleopti
allowed CallUs to schedule faster and more
accurately. Intraday management became more
responsive. Monitoring and reporting also
improved, led by increases in both involvement
and transparency.
The effects Teleopti WFM had on the agents and
the organization as a whole were unexpectedly
ubiquitous and exclusively positive.
The more fair and balanced schedules led to
increased agent satisfaction. Schedule adherence
was now more up-to-date than it had ever been
and for the first time became a relevant perfor-
mance index. Finally, the improved performance
management transparency increased self con-
fidence, involvement, and healthy competition
within the organization Quantitatively, yearly
attrition rates plummeted from 27% to 7%.
Absenteeism was cut in half, dropping from
12% to 6%.
But the most impressive statistics were the un-
intended consequences related to upper manage-
ment’s two main goals. Productivity increased
drastically from 69% to 85%, and service levels
finally exceeded 90%, climbing from 74% to 91%.
CONCLUSION
Agent motivation is one of the most important
factors in determining your call center’s success,
and high motivation is the key to running your call
center with a human touch.
Ineffective staffing can have unintended negative
consequences on your agents’ motivation levels,
but accurate scheduling, maximization of pre-
ference handling, and improved performance
management will undoubtedly have the opposite.
We examined two case companies that imple-
mented Teleopti WFM for different reasons.
• At Webhelp UK, the goal was to improve the
customer experience by increasing agent
motivation. Augmenting agent motiva-
tion did improve the customer experience,
increasing call quality by 9%. Profitaity
also increased, with Webhelp UK realizing an
annualized cost benefit of $280,000.
• CallUs’s goals were to increase profitabiity
and performance, not necessarily through
agent motivation. They implemented
Teleopti WFM and, through increased agent
motivation, what they got was an unexpected
route to the fulfillment of their corporate
goals. Productivity and service levels in
creased by 16% and 15%, respectively.
Agent motivation is an essential yet often over-
looked factor to call center success.
CallUs’s goals were to
increase profitabiity and
performance, not necessarily
through agent motivation.
They implemented Teleopti
WMF and, through increased
agent motivation, what they
got was an unexpectedroute
to the fulfillment of their
corporate goals. Productivity
and service levels increased
by 16% and 15%, respectively.
”
”