Building
Customer Relationships: A Head Start
 by
Don Mick
Is there a time when call center executives get to
relax and enjoy the benefits of effec-tively managing a mission critical
operation? In my experience, not often. As much as we know that managing
customer relationships can provide strategic advantage to or-ganizations,
most call center executives labor under the burden of being viewed as
a necessary expense as they constantly try to meet rigorous performance
standards while containing or cutting costs.
One effect of the reality of not being seen as a strategic asset is
that call center executives are usually constrained to tactical efforts
to improve performance. They seldom have the resources, people and money
required to initiate strategic improvements in performance.
Is there a way for an assertive call center executive to “do
customer relationship management”, a kind of “CRM light”
as it were? The purpose of this brief article is to suggest that there
is.
It is possible to understand what is frustrating to customers by having
a dialogue with call center staff about what is frustrating for them.
One way to quickly detect opportunities to improve the customer experience
is by looking at what would improve the work experience of call center
staff.
This is a 6 step process.
- Ask staff what frustrates them and what would make their work lives
better,
- Assess what changes can be made to make improvements,
- Determine what changes effect the customer relationship,
- Test the improvements and get feedback from customers,
- Implement the improvements, and
- Assure consistency.
One of the first times I tried this process, the senior executives
in the company asked what we would hope to get from staff. Wouldn’t
they just say “more money”? Wouldn’t the list be short
and non-actionable? In that instance a team of ten created a list of
is-sues three pages long of things that would make their work life better.
Many of the items focused on aspects of the relationship with the customers
where staff felt stress be-cause they were not able to meet the customers’
needs in a seamless way.
This type of exercise usually produces a list of items that is both
rich and actionable. Many of the ideas will not require technology to
implement. For those that do, the proc-ess affords an opportunity to
make a business case for the investment required to ac-quire the capability
needed.
First line call center staff are people in direct relationship with
customers every day. They genuinely share the customer’s pain
when things are not going well. Sometimes the customer makes his or
her pain the call center person’s pain when things are not going
well. There is a significant advantage to call center staff having processes
and business rules that help them please customers. Because they are
in the relationship every day, they usually know what would please the
customer.
What is different about this approach from more traditional strategic
initiatives?
- It starts with the experience of people who work with customers
every day; it is not driven by a reengineering abstraction or a technology.
- It is not a labor intensive, comprehensive process redesign effort,
but rather an effort tightly focused on felt pain.
- The process can be done with a small number of call center staff
and does not require a large number of consultants or external resources
to do a program suc-cessfully. At the same time, some outside experience
is important to facilitate ob-jectively and break free of organizational
assumptions about what is possible.
- Changes can usually be made quickly because of the precise nature
of the recommendations that emerge.
- The call center executive can control the process and the outcome.
- This process has proven to be an effective way for call center
staff to raise stra-tegic issues with senior management. In one organization,
for example, is was apparent that much of the call center’s
operations was determined by “knowledge limitations” and
that better “knowledge management” would afford major
oppor-tunities to improve the customer experience and lower overall
call center costs.
When this process is done well, it invariably produces practical opportunities
to improve the customer experience, improve staff satisfaction and lower
cost of operations. Gen-erally, the short-term savings are tactical
in nature – perhaps 10-12 percent on the op-erations addressed.
It is also usually possible to put an economic value on the im-provement
in the customer experience. The program can be part of a more strategic
ef-fort, but it is reasonable to test this type of process in a smaller
way before undertaking something major.
What is the value of this approach for Intervox Affiliates? It is the
kind of program that, with support from Intervox, an affiliate can suggest
to his or her call center sponsor. This does not require Accenture or
large complex consulting teams to support success. This is an opportunity
for an Affiliate to offer a cost effective path to measurable improve-ment.
In summary, get practical improvements by asking what would make work
life better for call center staff. Their answers will produce suggestions
that positively impact custom-ers as well. With a bit of analysis and
creativity, you will develop a set of practical sug-gestions that will
produce measurable improvements.
Don Mick heads our Customer Interaction Management practice area and is a senior change management expert. He is also responsible for (engagement) quality assurance.
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