3 min read
Contact centers all around the world face one and the same problem: high employee turnover. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, agents in the 20-34 age group do not stay on the job for more than 1 year. To break this trend, you have to motivate your staff. Here are five well-tried ways of rekindling your employees’ interest in their jobs.
Monetary rewards: incentives and rebates
Introduce rewards for reaching and beating targets, or offer agents spiff programs. This will encourage every employee to improve their KPIs. But you should keep in mind that KPIs must be simple and clear: the number of calls handled, adherence to work schedule, efficient time management, service script adherence, etc. It is equally important that the KPI system be clear so that the staff could track their own achievements, and compare them with their co-workers results. All these issues can be solved with the help of Noda Contact Center Quality Management module, which automatically scores calls according to preset parameters, and then, in case of deviations, sends the faulty call to a supervisor for listening and assessment. Besides, Noda Contact Center allows displaying the agent’s real-time performance indicators directly in his or her softphone.
Bonuses and prizes
Don’t forget about prizes, such as theater, cinema or concert tickets. Some NODA customers use gift certificates and holiday packages as rewards. Once, a bank working on Noda Contact platform offered its telemarketing and sales department a Grand Prize for best annual results: the winner got a foreign-made low-cost car. Sales and customer service training is also a great incentive since most contact center employees welcome opportunities for self-development and career growth.
Convenient schedules
If any of your agents are university students, you should keep in mind that evening shifts are more convenient for full-time students, and morning or daytime shifts for those who study in the evening: don’t forget that both categories will need some time off for exams. You will boost the value of your jobs no end, if you offer your employees a flexible schedule that caters to their needs.
This task is made easy by Noda Workforce Management module. Noda WFM can build work schedules automatically, with the account of individual needs and work rules. Besides, the system automatically notifies agents of any alterations in their schedules. If an employee reports sick, he or she can find a substitute through the mobile app, without seeking a manager’s or supervisor’s help.
After Noda WFM had been implemented at Gran, a Russian large-scale outsourced contact center, the company’s labor hours spent on scheduling shrank by 143 hours, which is almost 18 working days.
Professional recognition
It is vital that your staff realize their work is important and appreciated. They must be aware of positive customer feedback; a regular mailout praising the most efficient agents can be an asset. Give examples of the best phone calls or written communication with customers. These examples should be made public – this way you will show your staff that their efforts and input are valued, at the same time giving their co-workers good learning material.
Mentoring
To make one’s job successful, meet targets and achieve KPIs, agents should receive training. In most cases, a suitable coach or mentor can be found within the call center itself. An experienced and friendly agent or supervisor can be a great mentor for the new employees. For example, one of the banks operating on Noda platform streams its new employees into four training courses: inbound support, telemarketing, customer data verification, and debt recovery. Training courses are held by experienced managers who once started their call center career as agents.
Noda Contact Center offers convenient tools for compiling training groups; you can also mail out training schedule notifications and learning material.
Resume
Motivating call center staff is a many-fold task and requires more than just a bonus, or a random concert ticket. Material and non-material motivation should be well-balanced; combine different rewards and do it regularly and systematically to keep your staff happy.