In the 1920s, Danish mathematician Erlang created the eponymous formula. A pioneer in queuing theory, his work is still the foundation of any network analysis and switchboard staffing. Continue reading
Category Archives: Human Resources
How to Prevent Call Center Agent Burnout
We have often talked about how demanding being a contact center agent is. Whether they are dealing with routine queries or angry customers, it can be an intense job that leads to stress and ultimately lack of motivation and decrease in productivity. It is therefore essential that managers act before this happens and reduce the risk of agent burnout. Continue reading
How to Design a Call Centre Training Programme
Training your contact centre staff is essential to conveying your brand’s message, delivering outstanding customer service, create a knowledge base in your company and motivating your staff. However, for many contact centres, training is limited to learning how to use systems and listening in to calls next to a more experienced agent for days. Continue reading
Top Tips to Reduce Contact Centre Shrinkage
First things first, what is shrinkage? Shrinkage is the amount of time an employee isn’t available to work during paid time. As far as contact centres are concerned, this means not being able to take calls. Continue reading
How to Work Out How Many Staff You Need in a Contact Centre
The quality of service provided by your contact centre will be highly dependent on being adequately staffed. Too few agents will lead to longer waiting times, but too many will affect your profit, so how do you find the right balance? Continue reading
How to Manage Remote Call Agents
With nowadays technology, it is as easy to have staff working remotely as to have them all under one roof. While it may be trickier to create a sense of belonging, having remote agents brings businesses significant savings as companies no longer need to pay for office space. Continue reading
Lessons from LEGO’s Contact Centre
In 2015, the sales of the LEGO Group reached US$2.1 billion (NZ$3 billion), making it the largest toy company in the world in terms of revenue. Each year, its contact centres deal with 1.8 million calls and emails worldwide across 3 sites. Continue reading
Top 5 Tips to Improve Call Quality Monitoring
Call quality monitoring should be at the heart of process improvement in contact centres. It will, of course provide you with invaluable information about people’s experience when they call you, but also with wider-ranging data such as requirements for training programmes, assessing whether your equipment and systems are delivering what your business needs, and ways to motivate your staff. Continue reading
How to Retain and Manage Contact Centre Staff
If you are a contact centre manager, one of your biggest headaches is probably how to retain staff in an industry where turnover is notoriously high. Each time an employee leaves, knowledge goes with them, and new members need to be trained, costing the company money and quality of service. Continue reading
Tricks That Contact Centre Employees Use to Avoid Calls
While most staff want to do well and are hard workers, you will occasionally harbour a few employees who are work shy. Recognising the tricks of the trade and what they may do to delay taking the next calls is essential. Read our article to find out how to spot those problems. Continue reading