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Pay Attention To Your Call Center and Customer Service Staff and They�ll Reward You With Better Attendance!
MarySue Lucci has been involved in the Teleservices and Direct Marketing Industry for over 25 years. Formerly President and Co-founder of RMH Teleservices, an international call center operation that she co-founded with her partner, Ray Hansell, in the mid 1980�s and took public in 1996, MarySue has more than 25 years experience in every aspect of telemarketing operations, including employee recruitment, training, and motivational programs for RMH, and prior to RMH, for companies such as Colonial Penn and Clement Communications.
Currently, MarySue is the President and Co-founder of MaraStar Communications. Based in Wayne, PA and founded in 2000, MaraStar produces animated training and communications products for their national and global business customer base, designed to train and motivate employees within the call center and customer service industries.
Improving Attendance and Punctuality
Attendance and punctuality are always hot issues in call centers and customer service work environments. Because of their direct interaction with customers, front line employees are a call center�s most important asset. Managers work hard to staff their centers with the correct number of qualified staff necessary to meet the needs of their clientele and customers. But absenteeism and lateness represent a difficult challenge and can negativly affect customer satisfaction and employee productivity, both of which impacts your bottom line.
Many call center and customer service managers feel that absenteeism and punctuality are problems with no set solution; after all, you can only control so much, and sub par attendance and lateness have long been considered the nature of the beast in the call center world. You may be surprised however to know that your day to day communication and interactions can have a direct effect on your team members� attendance.
Why do call center and customer service representatives fail to show up for work or show up late?
There are numerous reasons why attendance may be poor�.some you can affect, and some you can�t. Of course, there are going to be times when employees call off due to an illness or a family emergency, but in the call center environment, there is also a danger of low turnout due to burn out, lack of motivation and even lack of interest. It is not likely that your team members will share these reasons with you, but you may be suspicious of these issues if morale is low.
Employee morale factors directly into employee attendance. If you improve employee morale, you WILL improve employee attendance. When people are happy in the job they do, and feel like they are an important part of the company, they are more likely to have consistent attendance and be at work on time. The primary way to build this type of long term employee morale is through consistent and positive employee communication and recognition. Simply put, you need to show your call center staff positive attention every day, and get them involved!
How do you get employees to come to work? Give them things to come to work for!
There are several communication methods that, when done correctly, can sustain positive employee morale, and encourage people to come to work consistently and enthusiastically, on time, ready to perform!
1. Get them involved.
Ask employees for the solutions to the issues your department is facing. In many cases, your employees have the answers to your attendance and morale questions, and are eager to share them with you. When people are asked for suggestions to a problem, they are more likely to be part of the solution.
Talk about the company in a way that tells your staff their contributions are important. People should feel a sense of pride in the work they do; an excellent way to do that is by connecting the work they do every day to customer satisfaction and the success of the company.
2. Celebrate successes.
Find ways to communicate the successes of individual employees, departments and the entire company. Team meetings, employee recognition days, and even simple emails are great ways to tell people what they are doing right.
3. Prepare them for success.
Offer training that is informative, fun and effective. In a call center, training must be highly efficient, but it is also a great opportunity to give your employees a break from their everyday tasks on the phone. For this reason, training should be exciting and refreshing.
4. Provide ongoing coaching.
People want to be good at the job they do. Offering ongoing coaching for performance improvement and career development is a perfect way to pay attention to your team members. Conversations about the work they do and how they perform their jobs are encouraging and show that you care about their success.
5. Tell them you are happy they came to work.
Simply, greeting people as they start their shift makes them feel welcome, and let�s them know you are happy they came to work, and at the time expected.
6. Have some fun!
Call centers are fast paced and the work can be very repetitive. For this reason, it�s important to create friendly competition to keep things lively.
Daily and weekly contests and games that focus on attendance, punctuality, sales, quality, and other performance factors are a terrific way to keep performance and motivation high and dramatically improve attendance.
Offer motivating prizes for high achievement in these contests. Prizes can be anything from a free lunch, pizza, dinner at a local eatery, or a movie! Find out what types of rewards will motivate your team members, consider your budget, and create an easy game plan.
How about a specific reward system for perfect attendance? I�ve seen customer service centers develop an effective and ongoing reward point system for perfect attendance each month. The points can be accrued toward larger prizes at the end of each month. You�ll be surprised at the positive impact on attendance these small, but fun, changes can bring! Fun emails and newsletters can further reinforce your point system and contest program by announcing winners on a team and individual basis.
Keeping your customer service staff engaged in friendly competition, where meeting attendance and punctuality requirements means prizes and acknowledgement, will keep your staff doing their job enthusiastically, every day, and on time!
So, how is the attendance and punctuality in your call center and customer service area? There is almost always room for improvement. Take a look at the ways you are communicating with your employees.
? Do you give your staff and their work the attention they deserve?
? Do you ask for their ideas regarding the challenges your department faces?
? Do you recognize their achievements?
? Are you offering training that helps them succeed in their work?
? Are you coaching for improvement and career growth?
? Are you creating a fun environment?
To see a positive change in your team�s attendance, find ways to pay attention to your employees. The more involved they are with the company and the more communication they receive, the more enthusiastically they will come to work. Give them attention, and they will improve their own attendance!
An ideal way to communicate and involve your employees is to use MaraStar Communications ToonUps. ToonUps are 30-60 second customizable animations that can be presented in Power Point presentations, emails, intranets and Learning Management Systems. These animations were designed to communicate company messages, make training memorable, and bring humor to the everyday topics addressed in call centers. They are a great way to give people something to come to work for. Click here: www.marastar.com to see a sample of an animated email ToonUp message, and see how you can make your employee communication memorable, relevant and motivating!
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