Ongoing training reaps ongoing benefits

Telemarketing & Call Center Solutions, Jun 1997 by Wasserman, Bob

Long before call centers became the $700 billion industry they are today, people in the industry knew the importance of training their employees. That's because businesses that rely on call centers know that customers who are treated poorly can easily express their dissatisfaction by dialing their business elsewhere.

Most companies do a good job of training employees when they start on the job, giving the new hires the full range of training. This may include teaching them about the company's product or service, explaining the company's mission, showing them how to listen to what customers are saying instead of talking over them, demonstrating how to probe to find out what the customer wants, and, of course, upselling past the initial sale.

Where companies fall short is thinking that after new-employee orientation or after a four-week training session, they have given their staff all the tools they need to succeed. Successful call center managers know that training is not accomplished in a finite period. Rather, it occurs before employees join the company, when they join the company and for the length of time they work there. In other words, successful training is not a destination companies hope to reach, but a journey that rewards them with success as long as they travel it.

While ongoing training will reap benefits for call centers, lack of training will conversely cause problems. Consider the following very different examples of companies impacted by deficiencies in training.

* A call center manager expects the most recent airfare war to generate thousands of calls into her center from business travelers and would-be vacationers looking to get a cheap flight. In anticipation of a two-week crunch, she works with a staffing agency to get additional people to help answer calls and keep customer satisfaction high. Unfortunately, the additional calls don't get answered because the new staff were ill-prepared to meet the challenges in her busy center.

* It's a Saturday night and a company's commercial just ran on two stations. The call center manager has a full staff ready to handle the expected influx of calls, but the queue is backed up with callers while employees sit idle. The automatic call distributor is not working properly, and the company's voice mail message says that someone will return the call when the office opens...on Monday morning. Meanwhile, the call center manager's mood shifts from anger to frustration because there is no one on his staff who can fix the problem, which is now costing thousands of dollars in lost sales and wasted human resources expenses.

* Another call center manager has been fortunate in that there has been low employee turnover in her call center. But a quick scan of employee performance shows that the staff as a whole is answering fewer calls per hour than it was a few months ago, which directly impacts the bottom line. She starts to think maybe the earlier success was a fluke and resigns herself to the fact that she'll have to accept the lower level of production.

While companies need to make training an ongoing priority, they can see immediate results by concentrating on the following areas: making sure staff comes to work prepared to succeed, partnering with equipment vendors to train staff members on systems and technology, and teaching existing staff how they directly impact the business.

Train Before Employees Start

The very nature of the call center industry means that call volume is constantly changing. Many call centers are turning to staffing agencies to help them meet demand. This, however, will only be effective if the staffing agency understands call centers and how they work and supplies workers accordingly.

To ensure its employees succeed in call center positions, the staffing firm Manpower uses a proprietary call center testing, training and performance reward system.

"Call centers can be an awkward place for new employees if they are not suited for or well prepared to work within that unique environment," said Manpower's Kirsten Lee. "The selection of skilled, professional representatives has a direct impact on customer satisfaction and service level."

Before beginning training, Manpower conducts an orientation to familiarize employees with working in a call center environment. By communicating a realistic picture to candidates of what it is like to work in a call center, Manpower can staff a center with people who will thrive in a call center environment, improving productivity and minimizing turnover.

Once employees have been selected as good matches for call center positions, training can focus on building their "soft skills," including active listening skills, professional voice qualities and courtesy. Training also will include call-handling techniques that are vital to the success of a call center, including keeping calls on track and handling angry callers. Manpower concludes its training with a roleplay that determines an employee's job readiness.

To be successful in training workers for call centers, managers need to address the whole person. Because call centers are production oriented, they can be very stressful for employees who get limited breaks and are typically required to be at their stations for the majority of the day. In addition to working with employees on ways to be healthy on and off the job, Manpower also reinforces employee success through a performance program.