The Best Contact Centers have Top Training, Technology, and Analysis

There are several factors that separate the best-in-class contact centers from the average ones and the laggards, according to the recently published AberdeenGroup Report: Optimizing Your Workforce: Increasing Contact Center Agent Productivity.

The report finds that top firms are more than two times as likely as laggard companies to have customer satisfaction levels over 90 percent; that one and a half times the number of best-in-class companies have seen a decrease in operational costs compared to average organizations; and top firms are more likely to have customer retention levels above 90 percent. 

The top five enablers contact centers can employ to improve their performance, according to the report, are:

Improving Processes: Shift scheduling is a key enabler to improving the call center experience because it enables contact centers to adjust resource levels to meet customer demands.

Focus on Training: Agent training and coaching provides agents with the necessary skills and support system to properly utilize new product releases, tools and practices. More than half of best-in-class firms use e-learning to improve agent performance; another 39 percent employ periodic agent testing; 36 percent use issue resolution workshops; and 36 percent employ self-paced training.

Knowledge Management: Analytics is a key component of any workforce optimization suite because it provides the cornerstone to understanding the current and historical state of contact center activities.

Updated Technology: To optimize workforce utilization, a contact center needs integrated technology with multiple components. Forty-one percent of best-in-class companies have implemented workforce optimization suites.

Performance Management: Best-in-class companies that use workforce optimization solutions see increases in key performance management. Performance management solutions help companies improve sales or improve collections on outstanding invoices, according to the report.