Expectations and Resolutions at the End of a Challenging Year. Why now is the time to invest in service

By Joe Fleischer

Until the middle of this decade, the most visible displays of real-time data in call centers were from readerboards and wallboards that contain light-emitting diodes (LEDs). The types of electronic displays you now find in call centers are far more versatile, and they can present information from more sources, than LED models. Yet despite these advances, call centers primarily track real-time data not to improve their ability to plan.

When we say that someone in a position of responsibility within an organization has vision, we often mean that this person has clear goals for what the organization can achieve, and can lead the organization toward meeting these goals. Those with vision recognize that their aim is not to predict what lies ahead, but rather to evaluate their priorities in light of what they see in front of them. For customer care leaders, who have chosen a profession that requires them to adapt to unpredictability, vision is precisely what their organizations expect of them now.

During the downturn this year, many organizations, either through their own actions or as a result of the actions of others, have lost many of the resources they expected would enable them to achieve their goals. It can seem difficult to project a vision for the future when you don’t know if your organization will have the means to survive for the present. Adversity forces us all to take stock not only of where we work but also what we do and what our priorities need to be. In an environment where many people feel forced to lower their expectation, now is the time to invest, rather than cut back on, service.

Chances are that, despite the economic slump, your primary investments continue to be in people. It’s likely that you seek different combinations of skills among the agents you hire, and you seek different methods to develop these skills, than you did ten years ago. What hasn’t changed is that equipment and software are replaceable, but service has no shelf life.

What should call centers plan to invest in during 2009? As we’ve learned during this downturn, a characteristic of solid organizations is that they have a foundation from which they measure performance. To justify their investments in people, call centers will have to demonstrate how the ways they hire, train, coach and evaluate agents contribute to the performance of the entire company.

None of these endeavors occurs in isolation. If you can show, for example, that your method of training agents has a demonstrable effect on your company’s ability to retain customers, you safeguard your investment in agents who, in turn, protect your most vital source of revenue. That’s especially important if your company is within an industry, as is the case with providers of wireless services, where keeping customers is a challenge even in good economic conditions.

As performance management emerges as a priority within organizations, it becomes necessary for customer care leaders to invest in relationships they maintain within their organizations. If they aren’t already doing so, now is the time when customer care leaders need to start collaborating with colleagues in human resources, IT, training and finance to identify what aspects of service they can automate without alienating customers, and what aspects of live service could be better. There are many types of transactions that customers are willing to complete on-line or through an interactive voice response system, as long as they know they can reach knowledgeable people when they need help. Performance management is the principle that guides organizations that learn from their experiences of hiring, evaluating and training agents how to improve service.

When resources are scarce, organizations have little choice other than to scale back. But service is essential for an organization’s survival; it is not a luxury. Just as call centers, like many organizations, can run the risk of overspending in boom times, they can also make the fatal mistake of neglecting vital investments during tough times. They decide not to upgrade their infrastructure or their software, which costs them far more in lost productivity than the expenses they would have incurred had they upgraded. They cut their customer service teams to the bone, and then lack the resources they need to assist the customers who remain. They behave as though a recession is an entirely external phenomenon, and assume there is nothing they can do to make existing processes, like gathering or disseminating information about agents’ performance, more efficient.

It doesn’t have to be this way. Your most important investments are the time and effort you devote, in collaboration with your colleagues, to learning from customers what it takes to earn their trust. At a time when consumers are uncertain about the solvency of the institutions they have come to rely on, your dedication to service demonstrates your vision for your organization and justifies your customers’ investment in the work you do.

Joe Fleischer has covered the call center industry for more than 11 years. With Brendan Read, he co-authored the book The Complete Guide to Customer Support.

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