In this series we will look at some useful tips for contact centre management, as seen by our work in the Australian contact centre industry. They are not presented in any particular order.
This article is the sixth of nine articles in the series.
Celebrate Success
This is different to selling success – it is internal to the contact centre.
Contact centre work is difficult and often thankless – but you can change that! If staff exceed realistic targets, get good customer feedback or similar, celebrate their success – reward them and actively promote their achievements.
This can be through a formal reward and recognition program, or it can be simply ‘catching someone doing something right’. Ideally, it should be both.
Don’t ignore it – recognise it, then others will put in a greater effort to be recognised and customer service goes up.
Every contact centre should have a reward and recognition program. It has to be fair, defined and documented so the right staff are recognised. If staff believe the wrong staff are being recognised it will have a negative effect. However, it needn’t be expensive – the short-term rewards can be very small and very inexpensive, because it is the recognition that counts. Longer term (quarterly, half-yearly or annual) need to be a bit more substantial but they still don’t have to be expensive in terms of your overall budget. The benefit to customer service will more than offset the cost.
A reward and recognition program has to be balanced. If you include only productivity, or only quality, you will drive the wrong behaviours. The key attributes of a reward and recognition program are:
- Objective
- Fair
- Balanced
- Measurable
- Open
- Viewed as desirable by staff.
Without these attributes it is unlikely to be successful.
For more information please email spels@ccaction.com.au or call +61 3 8648 6577.
All previous articles are available on our web site – www.ccaction.com.au
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