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Rich Tehrani

This is the fifteenth year Customer Interaction Solutions has brought you the winners of its MVP (Marketing Via Phone) Quality Awards. In the ensuing years since we introduced the awards in 1993, we have been impressed by the growing sophistication of the quality measures that have been introduced to the contact center by the leading-edge companies that apply for our MVP Quality Award. Over the years, we have seen new technologies adopted and the standards for a quality interaction refined and improved. Each of the following companies has demonstrated, through its MVP Quality Awards application, a true commitment to high ethical standards, stringent policies and challenging goals.


On a 16-point essay, entrants described a specific teleservices program and its results, and explained their overall policies and procedures, including human resources, technologies, customer services, ergonomics and public image that are used to establish, sustain and measure the program’s quality. We’ve shared some of the most compelling items on the winners’ application essays with readers. To all of the winners, congratulations.
– Tracey Schelmetic

Gold Award Winners:

APAC Customer Services, Inc.
b-to-c inbound
Deerfield, IL

www.apaccustomerservices.com
Q: Describe all efforts made to make your work environment more stress-free and ergonomically correct.
A: The center has a large employee lounge with vending areas, wireless Internet access, on-site food vendors, telephones and PCs for employees to use during breaks. Employees “bid” for shifts that allow them to structure their changing family needs etc. with our clients’ peak processing. Flexible schedules, with part-time options and the ability to “trade shifts” within the employee group, allows our teams to manage their personal lives without tight constraints.

Cross Country Automotive Services
b-to-c integrated inbound/outbound
Medford, MA
www.crosscountry-auto.com
Q: What do you do to demonstrate your commitment to staff quality?
A: Our new hire “nesting program.” This program is designed to help associates to achieve a smooth transition from training to their new role by extending the “training” beyond the OJT [On-the-Job Training]. In this program, new associates will leave the OJT training period and enter into a Momentum Team. Here a dedicated supervisor closely monitors them during an eight-week period. Scorecards are introduced to associates during this period and the associates are expected to meet certain scorecard performance levels before being able to proceed from this program to the floor on their own.

GC Services Limited Partnership
b-to-b and b-to-c integrated
Houston, TX
www.gcserv.com
Q: How do you measure customer satisfaction?
A: Some of our clients have entrusted us with administering customer satisfaction surveys directly, either through calls placed by our customer service representatives, quality first coaches, or through an automated IVR process. Customer comments are notated, assigned point values, and saved to a database. We then either send the raw data to our clients for analysis, or analyze the data ourselves and present our findings to the client. Through the surveys, we are able to quickly identify opportunities, make recommendations for improvement and enhance our customer service department.

InfoCision Management Corp.
b-to-c integrated inbound/outbound
Akron, OH
www.infocision.com
Q: Detail a specific program and results.
A: [The client, a non-profit organization], delivers food, medicine, clothing and other necessities to individuals, children and families who lack these essentials due to famine, war, poverty or natural disaster. [The client] places television airings in spot buys throughout the nation. Before working with InfoCision, it had a string of poor experiences in which only a fraction of calls were handled. [After program implementation], InfoCision answered 98.8 percent of calls at an average speed of fewer than five seconds per call. This allowed us to deliver a 6:1 return on [the client’s] investment.

Silver Award Winners:

ePerformax Contact Centers
b-to-c inbound
Cordova, TN
www.eperformax.com
Q: How do you ensure a consistent message of quality across various contact channels?
A: The passion and quality of our people coupled with our Performance Maximization Model and Process is designed to ensure a consistent message of quality across all contact channels — from the role our reps have in delighting each of our clients’ customers, to our call center account management team delighting our clients, to our entire company portraying an image that says, “It’s not how many calls we handle or e-mails we respond to, bur rather how many of those customer interactions result in delighted customers who are willing to buy from our clients both now and in the future.”

eTelecare Global Solutions
b-to-c integrated inbound/outbound
Scottsdale, AZ
www.etelecare.com
Q: Explain how quality has evolved in your contact center, how it is sustained and how it is measured.
A: A key factor in sustaining quality is ongoing training. eGS provides extensive weekly, one-on-one coaching and regular skills refresher training to each agent. [Also]…our non-hierarchical, performance-based culture promotes an atmosphere of open communication and continuous improvement. The result for our clients is superior dedication and initiative from our staff, while the result for our employees is that eGS is run as a professional organization where positive opinions and ideas are valued.

Hamilton Contact Center Services
b-to-c inbound
Aurora, NE
www.hamiltontel.com
Q: What do you do for customers that gives them the impression of quality and high ethical standards?
A: Throughout the vendor selection process and into daily program management, Hamilton facilitates both full shadow and blind call monitoring. Hamilton’s willingness to offer both options to clients and prospective clients indicates to them the high level of confidence that we have in our agents and our proclivity for full disclosure. Invariably, this leads to Hamilton being recognized as a quality organization focused on doing right by each and every client and with each and every contact.

NCO Customer Management, Inc.
b-to-c inbound
Horsham, PA
www.ncogroup.com
Q: What elements make it easy to do business with your firm?
A: Our unique approach to operations strongly differentiates NCO from other vendors in the outsourcing sector…NCO has developed a client-centric organizational structure that better reflects the needs of our clients. Each client relationship is assigned a VP-level resource to head operations and all other aspects of client interface. This leader oversees the client services team and the call center managers who are all dedicated to a single client. NCO’s client-centric organizational structure includes no shared resources, split responsibilities or conflicting priorities as are commonly found with other vendors.

NOVO 1
b-to-c outbound
Laurel, MD
www.novo1.com
Q: What are your monitoring practices?
A: Besides sales, completed surveys, dials, connects and talk time, monitoring tells us how well the call center is serving clients. Monitoring helps diagnose the effectiveness of training, supervision and quality assurance. By doing it rigorously, we can detect the need for the slightest program adjustments. Evaluations cover product knowledge, telephone etiquette and demeanor, data entry and script adherence.

Synergy Solutions
b-to-c outbound
Phoenix, AZ
www.synergysolutionsinc.com.
Q: What implementation tactics and strategies were used to accomplish the goal [detailed in your application program]?
A: Representatives selected for this program had to have a history of above average quality and data entry skills demonstrated on previous programs. The CCRs selected for this program were issued a combination of five various standardized tests including spelling, data entry, customer service scenarios, senior sensitivity training and product knowledge education prior to making these survey calls.

Bronze Award Winners:

The Connection
b-to-c integrated inbound/outbound
Burnsville, MD
www.the-connection.com
Q: What do you do to demonstrate your commitment to staff quality?
A: To create a world-class service organization, we have outlined and developed the skills necessary for outstanding performance. These have been grouped into “tools of the trade.” The skill groups include perception management, time management, call management, workspace management and knowledge management. Agents will use these “tools” as a means to craft world-class service.

Intelenet
b-to-c inbound and outbound
Plano, TX
www.intelenetglobal.com
Q: What is special or unique about your staff that contributes to quality?
A: Performance-driven culture. For Intelenet, process efficiency is more than just a statistical measure; it is a client-centric culture, which ensures everyone in the company displays a passion for the customer, process excellence and constant productivity and quality improvements. Our culture of process efficiency spans not just operations but also people practices. Intelenet has never missed a “go-live” date on over 50 transitions; and Intelenet has outperformed contractual service level obligations and competing service providers.

Sitel
b-to-b integrated telephony/Web-enabled
Nashville, TN
www.sitel.com
Q: Specifically state your company’s philosophy/motto on quality.
A: Sitel’s ongoing drive to improve its transaction quality produces benefits to clients. Through ongoing process improvement initiatives, Sitel is able to provide valuable feedback that may serve to decrease the number of transactions, lower the cost per transaction, increase the revenue per transaction and provide insight to help the client manage its business drivers.

Speakeasy
b-to-b inbound
Seattle, Washington
www.speakeasy.net
Q: Explain how quality has evolved in your contact center, how it is sustained and how it is measured.
A: In the last year, Speakeasy launched a new Quality Assurance (QA) program. Speakeasy has staff dedicated to QA. Once a month, the QA managers compile data on calls and customer contact and report out to the team. Employees who are performing below the “Speakeasy level of service” are coached.

TELUS International Philippines
b-to-c inbound
Pasig City, Philippines
www.telus.com
Q: What do you do for your customers that gives them the impression of quality and high ethical standards?
A: TELUS International dedicated quality analysts for each program, allowing analysts to intimately know the nuances of the program and make intelligent recommendations. TELUS’ FTE to quality analyst ratio is typically lower than what is seen stateside. To compute for number of quality analysts required, TELUS takes into account the type of program.

Thomas L. Cardella & Associates
b-to-c outbound
Cedar Rapids, IA
www.tlcassociates.com
Q: What do you do to demonstrate your commitment to staff quality?
A: We developed a Mentor team in each center using four criteria. The prospective mentors need great Quality, Production and Hours. The fourth required element is citizenship, meaning they must be a good patron of the call floor. The mentor team is introduced to the New Hire class on day one through buddy listening, and they continue to work with the new hires throughout the first two weeks. Through mentoring, we have seen improved performance as well as a noticeable reduction in new hire attrition because of the strong friendships being built.


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