Contact Center Processes - Best Pratices

viewpoint paper

Improving Contact Centers Through Operational Processes

Contact centers remain the crucial touchpoint in customer relationship management. To

help their companies win additional customers and market share, they must give customers

superior service while delivering measurable business value at low cost. Optimizing operational

processes – in addition to customer delivery processes – helps contact centers meet these

goals. This paper describes how organizations can use this approach to achieve “top box”

performance in customer delight while significantly reducing costs and improving enter-

prise competitiveness.

>> Contact Centers eds.com

Author

Brian Hughes

Manager

EDS BPO Customer Interaction

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

Operationalprocessview 1

Operationalprocesses–bestpracticeslinkage 2

Theprocesses 3

Contact center planning 3

Employee retention and growth 4

Operational management 7

Customer contact management 8

Making it happen 9

Sizeandscope 10

Challenges 10

Technologyoptionsandopportunities 10

Results 11

Successstory:leadingU.S.newspaper 12

Conclusion 12

Abouttheauthor 13

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EDS viewpoint papercontact centers

Introduction

Is your contact center performing in ways that maximize profitability and market share for your business? Sharply reducing costs

and improving employee satisfaction are important success factors. The ultimate goal, though, is to delight your customers – and

win more of them as a result. Yet in today’s environment, these goals seem to compete with each other. Employees fear layoffs,

offshoring and frozen salaries; managers face increasing client expectations with diminishing resources and budgets.

To meet their objectives, contact center organizations have focused primarily only on customer delivery processes such as handling

customer requests and initiating contacts. Through our work with clients, EDS has discovered that another area – operational

processes – demands equal attention. These processes are often twice as numerous as delivery processes, and thus have a

significant impact on the business. In fact, operational processes are the “infrastructure” that supports the business, client care

and customer delight.

Specifically, it’s crucial to ensure that the same operational processes and tools are used both within individual contact centers

and across all sites. By implementing such optimized, globally consistent delivery – and clearly measuring processes quantitatively

and qualitatively – you can achieve your goals.

Operational process view

We divide operational processes and

associated measures into four categories:

planning, retention and growth, operational

management, and customer contact man-

agement. (See Figure 1.) These categories

drive one another as a cycle.

Within each category, there are a series of

specific, linked processes with associated

tasks and steps that should be defined and

managed as a set. Investing the time to

identify the tasks and steps within each

category – and connecting or driving

performance measures from the tasks

and steps – provides the power of full

optimization.

Planning

Retention & Growth

OperationalManagement

CustomerContact

Management

Processes

Figure �. Process diagram

EDS viewpoint paper contact centers

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Operational processes – best practices linkage

Figure 2 depicts how to link operational

processes (and related customer delivery

processes) to achieve top box performance

with low cost. It also shows, at a high level,

how a successful contact center functions.

By formalizing, documenting and optimizing

operational processes through this model,

EDS has discovered the key for creating

successful contact centers that focus on

operating within budgetary allocations

while ensuring employee care. Top box

customer service is still the primary driver

for success, and the idea is that satisfied

employees satisfy their clients.

EDS has 24 patents pending for the opera-

tional support processes (shown in Figure 2

as dark blue boxes).

Figure �. Operational processes — best practices linkage

The processes shown in the model should

be a starting point for every contact center.

The model is not “one size fits all,” though.

Your organization may require additional

processes for its industry- or business-specific

needs. And there are alternatives for optimizing

processes. For example, your organization

may decide not to implement a student

intern program or an internal help desk

staffed by high performers.

CustomerDelight

Recruiting/Selection

Acclimationand

Training

Link to R&Soccurs onlywhen firststaffing CC –all other, link to WFM

ProjectManagement

ChangeManagement

Resource/Contingency

Planning

StudentIntern &

Part-time

Work ForceManagement

WorkloadPlacement

CapacityPlanning

EarnedHeadcountBudget

PerformanceEval-Scorecard

& QualityMonitoring

PerformanceManagement

Program

Career Planning and Leadership Development

Balanced LifeAccount

RecognitionAnd

Appreciation

Promotion/Job Change

Separation/Admin. Exit

Compensationand Benefits

PerformanceImprovement

Training (Agent, Supervisor, Manager, Client Partnership Model)

EmployeeSurvey

ClientContact

Management

FinancialTransactionProcessing

CustomerInquiry

Management

CustomerInteraction

Management

Quality Assurance and Management

ServiceLevel (SLA)

Management

CustomerSurvey

EscalationLegend:

Light blue box = Deliver (directly and consistent touching customers)

Dark blue box = Support (necessary operations indirectly or infrequently touching customers)

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The processes

Following are detailed descriptions of the

four categories of operational processes. For

each category, we’ve included definitions of

the related processes and the benefits you

can receive by optimizing them.

Contact center planning

Based upon EDS’ experience, organizations

can realize significant cost reductions –

potentially up to 50 percent ROI – by

optimizing contact center planning. While

reducing costs, the processes listed in

Table 1 can also yield improvements in

service levels and your ability to meet

customers’ other requirements.

Table �. Contact center planning

Capacity Planning • Provides profile of organizational staffing requirements based on strategic business forecasts

• Considers staff required to offset turnover, satisfy increasing volumes and support new initiatives

• Decreases costs through effective planning • Delivers costs savings of up to 10% (based on EDS

experience and EDS/A.T. Kearney contact center optimization benchmarking)

Process name Definition Benefits

Workload Placement • Provides management of call/contact volume load balancing among contact centers

• Reduces staffing costs by balancing workloads across sites

• Delivers savings of 5%–15% (EDS’ conservative estimate)

Work Force Management • Enables matching work schedules to staffing requirements based upon workload (contact volume) and forecasting, including intraday management

• Decreases salary costs through efficient staffing • Delivers 10%–25% savings (estimate by EDS and

our partners based on use of revised business processes with supporting technologies)

Earned Headcount Budget (EHB) • Enables preapproved hiring ability and account-ability at the site level, matching headcount with volume forecasts.

• Facilitates local leaders managing appropriate agent productivity at the account level

• Illustrates whether staffing levels are appropriate (at the business level)

• Improves staffing efficiency by reducing staff approval time, ensuring sites are staffed appro-priately and allowing sites to react quickly to new client demands or add-on business

• Contributes to Work Force Management savings (see above)

Recruiting and Selection • Enables consistent recruiting and selection prac-tices, from profiling the candidate requirements to preparing for the applicant to start work

• Provides several job aids and checklists, and electronic résumé collection

• Improves quality by providing qualified candi-dates as quickly as possible

• Improves performance by reducing performance problems and attrition

Resource and Contingency Planning • Facilitates identification of staffing strategies to achieve customer expectations

• Encompasses strategic and tactical work force management

• Optimizes productivity results by developing contingencies and alternatives for staffing peaks

• Contributes to Work Force Management savings (see above)

Student Intern, Part-time Planning • Provides guidance for managing employees who do not work full time or are working for academic credit and/or experience

• Provides guidelines for skills development, supervisor attention and management for this group of employees

• Reduces salary expense by ensuring staffing peaks will be covered by co-ops and part-time agents

• Develops a pipeline of talented resources for future employment consideration

• Delivers 1%–3% savings (EDS estimate)


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Employee retention and growth

Attrition rates of 40–90 percent per year

make retaining and developing staff a high

priority for most contact centers.

Table 2 lists the processes that fall within

the employee retention and growth cat-

egory and the benefits of optimizing them.

Table �. Employee retention and growth

Acclimation and Training — New Agent Essential Skills Program

• Provides collateral and skills for orienting new agents, their customers and their jobs

• Can combine with sites’ current best training practices

• Reduces attrition and improves measurable performance expectations by reducing ramp-up time for new agents


Career Planning • Provides employees with management support to identify career opportunities and plan their desired career path, and leaders with an opportunity to refine leadership skills

• Facilitates coaching in identifying employees’ desired career path

• Motivates contact center employees to improve their skills, continue their education and cross-train

• Improves skills and personal growth• Promotes employee satisfaction and increases

retention• Increases retention by improving skills and

career goal motivation

Leadership Development Program (LDP) • Provides an apprenticeship program for non-supervisory employees so they can determine whether a supervisory role is a career interest

• Provides a pool of experienced candidates for supervisory roles

• Reduces attrition and improves employee satis-faction by offering high-potential employees an opportunity to learn management responsibilities with guidance

Training — Supervisor • Provides training curriculum and delivery method for acclimating and training contact center delivery employees at the supervisory level

• Continues support to further develop knowledge, skills and abilities around a set of identified requirements

• Includes training for soft skills, contact handling/ processing and systems support, as well as selective training to introduce new initiatives (systems, procedures and projects)

• Equips supervisors with performance and coaching skills needed to align agents’ skills and knowledge to organizational goals

• Reduces time required to reach performance expectations

• Increases average calls handled over time• Reduces/controls turnover

Training — Manager • Provides curriculum and delivery methods for acclimation and other training at the manager level

• Assists managers in translating broad business objectives into day-to-day targeted action that aligns with business needs and client expectations

Training — Client Partnership Model • Provides training in partnership and win-win conflict management techniques

• Enables leaders to introduce best practices to their clients, and partner with them in a con-sultative manner, so they can provide best-in-class service offerings together

• Improves customer retention and satisfaction through a proactive, consultative leadership style

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Table �. Employee retention and growth (continued)

Performance Evaluation and Quality Monitoring • Ensures adherence to established processes, pro-cedures and customer service standards based on customer service level agreements and other contractual obligations

• Reduces administrative time and expenses• Satisfies customer and contractual obligations


Performance Evaluation (Scorecard) • Measures employee performance based on defined performance metrics

• Facilitates leader’s ability to provide feedback, rewards and recognition, and coaching

• Ensures consistent performance in meeting client obligations

• Facilitates consistent and focused feedback to employees on performance, using industry standard metrics for contact center excellence and client SLAs

Quality Monitoring • Facilitates monitoring and evaluating work performance of agents, recording calls and data transactions, and providing feedback to agents

• Optimizes agent performance through coaching and identification of opportunities for reward and recognition

• Provides an objective, external viewpoint• Improves performance against service level

standards and customer expectations

Performance Management Program • Provides a measurement and feedback program specifically focused on agent performance

• Facilitates consistency between scorecards and agent performance management program measurements

• Rolls up monthly performance data into an annual performance report for agents

• Reduces expense and administration time through a streamlined process

• Improves employee satisfaction through consistent and focused performance management

Recognition and Appreciation • Provides structure for developing a program to recognize employees’ achievements

• Includes a database of creative ideas from all sites for activities

• Promotes achievement of business goals by recognizing desired results

• Capitalizes on sharing ideas between sites

Balanced Life Account • Provides common procedures and tools that assist employees in managing their time off

• Encourages agents to manage their own time off effectively

• Reduces attrition by offering solutions to agents who may need help managing their time

Performance Improvement • Provides guidelines to assist leaders in consistently addressing problem performance, attendance and/or misconduct by employees

• Facilitates early recognition and documentation of problems

• Provides uniform method to conduct improvement plans


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Table �. Employee retention and growth (continued)

Compensation • Enables contact centers to incent and reward employees with more frequent merit and performance-based increases through a pay-for-performance strategy

• Provides various differentials for special skills, accomplishments and work schedules

• Supports discussions of wages and nonwage compensation for employees

• Can comprise base salary, bonus/incentives, stocks/bonds and benefits in the form of health/welfare, time away from work and retirement plans

• Supports focus on business goals • Increases retention and improves morale through

competitive pay practices and pay-for-performance • Ensures competitive wage structure explored• Continues to improve morale and attrition


Benefits • Provides employee benefits on par with market best practices

• Allows employees and business to pay only for benefits they use

• Allows benefits for part-time employees

• Reduces expenses for employees and the business • Improves satisfaction and retention of management

and nonexempt employees

Promotion/Job Change • Offers change in job responsibilities to provide growth opportunities

• Addresses upward advancement in career ladder with increased responsibilities

• Enables employees to change jobs for variety or if they are not performing well in one area

• Ensures eligibility for promotion tied to performance

• Retains employees and helps employees find a satisfying work environment

Separation — Administrative Exit • Provides procedures and guidelines for managing voluntary or involuntary separation of an employee

• Ensures consistency in management of separations• Provides data on reasons for leaving — used to

reduce further attrition • Allows for analysis and action plans for negative

trends

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Operational management

Operational management is the third

category that yields high results. Imple-

menting and maintaining standardized

Table �. Operational management

Change Management • Provides a framework, methodologies and training for managing operational and system changes

• Reduces costs by enabling contact centers to focus on and effectively manage change

• Reduces attrition through a controlled approach to managing change


Project Management • Provides a formalized process and training to manage a project within the contact center

• Reduces costs through a consistent, prescribed project management methodology

Client Contract Management • Manages contracts between business and provider of services

• Can be between multiple contact centers within a business and the associated business units, or between the business and a service provider

• Develops consistency between centers that provide service to the same client

• Builds client satisfaction

Service Level Management • Establishes, manages and monitors service level measurements for customer satisfaction (e.g., 80% of calls resolved in 30 seconds)

• Ensures contractual obligations are met, facilitating long-term relationships with clients

• Improves customer satisfaction

Quality Assurance and Management • Provides a framework and structure for implementing Customer Operations Performance Center (COPC) standards and certification when required

• Improves consistency and quality through compliance with COPC standards

Employee Survey Administration • Provides a process for measuring employee engagement and satisfaction by effectively managing the Voice of the Employee survey process

• Reduces attrition and improves employee and customer satisfaction

• Facilitates development of plans to address negative responses

processes and tools in this category enables

consistency, quality and cost control.

Table 3 lists the processes that fall within

operational management and the benefits

of optimization.


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Customer contact management

Customer contact management, the fourth

category of operational processes, includes

customer delivery processes.

Table �. Customer contact management

These customer contact management

processes are listed in Table 4.

Customer Interaction Management • Defines and manages customer interaction to create and enhance the desired customer experience

• Includes training on tone of voice, empathy, timeliness, etc.

• Ensures contractual obligations are met through quality scores and resolution on first contact

• Improves customer satisfaction• Reduces customer attrition


Financial Transaction Processing • Uses organizational infrastructure and change management strategies to fulfill customer requests, perform research and execute required transactions

• Builds consistency between centers that service the same client

Customer Inquiry Management • Addresses working with customers to handle inquiries and service requests, ordering and problem resolution

• Supports incoming and outgoing contacts • Identifies appropriate routing strategy to eliminate

customer frustration• Ensures request resolution by performing required

services or redirecting to appropriate resources

• Provides quick resolution in a customer-focused manner

• Immediately routes contacts that need additional expertise for resolution

Escalation Process & Structure (internal) • Provides process for agents to seek advice on requests without sending all escalations to supervisors or managers

• Provides an internal help desk driven by service levels, available 100% of the time, staffed with leadership development program candidates and/or high performers

• Provides process to evaluate trends and develop plans to address deficiencies

• Reduces need for management escalation and improves customer satisfaction through efficient resolution of requests

• Facilitates tracking of complaints to offer continuous improvement opportunities

• Provides job growth opportunities for high- potential agents

Service Level Agreement (SLA) Management • Establishes, manages and monitors service level measurements for customer satisfaction (e.g., 80% of calls resolved in 30 seconds)

• Ensures contractual obligations are met, facilitating long-term relationships with clients

• Improves customer satisfaction

Customer Survey • Provides survey instruments to obtain valid opinions and fulfillment data from customers on their interaction experience

• Facilitates performance benchmarking • Enables leaders to address deficiencies and build

new offerings • Improves customer satisfaction

Customer Delight • Establishes and monitors metrics for customer satisfaction based upon performance management objectives and quality monitoring

• Facilitates quantitative and qualitative measurements related to customer satisfaction

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Making it happen

EDS recommends a structured, four-stage

approach for optimizing operational

processes. (See Figure 3.) This approach

provides the flexibility for organizations

to adjust procedure tasks and steps based

upon regional laws and regulations,

contractual deliverables, or industry-/

business-specific needs. Most important,

it enables your contact center to achieve a

culture of high performance while control-

ling costs.

Figure �. Four-stage approach for contact center optimization

Prioritize the management processes that createcustomer, employee and shareholder value

Benchmark the high-priority operations

Develop gap assessment for the high-priority management processes

Define three reasonable solution alternatives that align with operations strategy and bridge the gaps

Determine the “best fit” solution fromamong the three alternatives

Build the implementation planfor the “best fit” solution

Build and present the business case

for implementation

Build a transition plan, focusing upon gaps and organizational change

management activities

Implement new processes with a strong training and

communications program

Measure change and identify barriers to success

Remove barriers to success

Ensure mandatory yearly audits to verify compliance

ObjectiveStage

DefineSolution

Implementation

ImplementSolution

Plan

Define,Measure,Analyze

Measurable Improvements inCustomer Delight, EmployeeSatisfaction and Productivity


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Size and scope

All contact centers, regardless of size or

number of sites, should focus upon optimizing

the operational processes we’ve described.

The center’s relative size and complexity

do, however, help determine how long the

optimization project takes and what

resources are required.

In most cases, a single-site, single-customer,

single-language contact center can complete

the job in only three–six months and with

two–six dedicated resources. A multiple-site

center that supports many customers and

languages might need nine–12 months and

10–20 resources. In all cases, project duration

depends in part on contact center readiness –

how close the sites are to optimization and

how ready they are to embrace change.

Challenges

Challenges fall into three categories –

people, processes and technologies. The

most challenging aspect of any project is

managing people through the change.

People challenges include:

Resistance to change

Lack of sponsorship for the change

Backlash against a command-and-

control approach

Lack of compliance to change

Undefined or underdefined

accountabilities for the change

Inappropriate depth and breadth of

communications

Difficulty in obtaining commitment to

change – from the contact center senior

leadership down to the supervisor level

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•

•

•

•

•

•

Process challenges include:

Lack of formally documented and

defined processes

Undefined or underdefined accountabilities

for the processes

Unidentified process owners and

subject-matter experts

Inability to obtain appropriate time and

attention from the process subject-

matter experts

Technology challenges include:

Lack of systems and tools to support

the processes

Lack of skills to develop appropriate

systems and tools

To manage these challenges effectively,

it’s essential to ensure that rigorous

organizational change management and

project management practices are in place

and followed.

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Technology options and opportunities

People are obliged to spend time and

money maintaining a new car engine to

ensure it a longer, more efficient life; in

the same way, companies should invest in

technology that makes it easier to maintain

and improve the redesigned processes.

Numerous software programs and vendors

support a majority of the operational

processes. Organizations need to determine

their “pain points,” the amount of support-

ing technology they can afford, and their

highest-priority items.

One of the biggest impacts can come from a

work force management system. Automating

many aspects of work force management –

such as forecasting, planning and scheduling

components (with shift allocations) –

significantly reduces manual errors and

time to reforecast.

Other technology options include quality

assurance and scorecard evaluating software,

as well as systems that support the appropri-

ate training and education environment.

Each organization should evaluate its

needs, priorities and budget allocations.

This will help determine which supporting

tools and technology to invest in first.

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Results

Research documents significant quantifiable

and qualitative benefits of moving to rigorous,

standardized and optimized operational

processes. The experience of EDS and our

alliance partners shows that full optimization

of work force management and contact

center planning processes can reduce contact

center costs by 25–50 percent. We’ve also

found that high attrition (the primary burden

on almost all contact centers) can be reduced

to best-in-class numbers … if all these

operational processes are implemented

and managed.

Direct results of implementing these

processes are:

• Reduced negative (or unwanted) attrition

• Increased revenue

• Improved service levels

• Increased work force productivity

• Reduced shrinkage – or wasted time

Indirect results include:

• Targeted, skilled work force

• Improved planned attrition

• Improved client satisfaction

• Improved employee satisfaction

Figure 4 depicts the cost elements and

related objectives that drive the need for

process optimization – as well as the perfor-

mance improvement goal you can achieve

once the transformation is complete.

Figure �. Transformation to optimized operational processes

Objectives

PerformanceImprovement

Goal

Transform the contact center to ensurecustomer delight while delivering superiorbusiness value at an acceptable cost level

Trim current operationscosts

Reinvest cost savings/ ROI forimprovements to business

CostElement

Reduceattrition

Standardize practices/tools for cross-contact-center leveragability

Deliverservices

efficiently

Enable rapidcontinuous

improvement/redesignto meet customer and

business needs


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Success story: leading U.S. newspaper

Recently, a leading U.S. newspaper’s

advertising contact center faced a discon-

tinuous production cycle for the placement

of employment ads in the newspaper. The

contact center’s operational processes were

breaking down due to large production cycle

spikes and crisis-management activities.

As a result, advertisements were not being

produced quickly with full quality reviews.

The newspaper kept trying to change the

operational processes to address the problems,

but with minimal effect. It was difficult to

measure success – and all parties couldn’t

agree on the best approach.

The contact center then teamed with EDS.

Based on our joint review of current

processes, we recommended process,

procedural and technology improvements

aimed at resolving the problems.

Through high-level business process

reengineering, the team provided a detailed

baseline of the current environment,

identified quick hits and made radical

recommendations for streamlining business

operations. We then implemented the

recommendations and measured their

success in the contact center environment.

The results? EDS’ services and support

helped the contact center achieve measur-

able business improvements:

Quality reviews reduced adjustments

from 1% to less than 0.3% of revenue.

Implementation of appropriate training,

organizational redesign and work force

management cut after-hours contact-

request processing from 98% each day

to less than 2% – eliminating the need

for any temporary staff.

Immediate confirmation of advertising

details, information received and a

quote for advertising space improved

dramatically – from 3–5% to 99%.

•

•

•

With appropriate support processes

(including training, quality, contingency

planning, scorecard and performance

improvement processes), outbound

contact volume increased 16% without

any increase in the employee base.

Return on investment is approximately

$500,000 annually.

Conclusion

To achieve excellence and maximize

profitability, a contact center business

depends upon its people to function as a

single team focused on a common goal.

That takes consistent performance by each

individual and site. Implementing an

operational process model ensures consis-

tency and “institutionalized excellence” in

customer delight, employee satisfaction

and productivity, which in turn drive profits.

•

•

< �� >


About the author

Brian Hughes

Brian Hughes manages

the process and train-

ing team in EDS CRM

Service Delivery. He

is responsible for

development, design

and deployment of

contact center procedures, processes and

best practices in workplace learning for the

customer relationship management market.

Prior to joining EDS in 2002, Brian had more

than 20 years’ experience in managing

contact centers and serving on corporate

contact center project support staffs for

two major industry leaders, JCPenney and

Alliance Data Systems. Hughes’ teams

have reduced operating costs and increased

profitability and growth while standardizing

operational activities to ensure market

competitiveness.

ContactBrian HughesManager, EDS BPO Customer Interaction Process and Training TeamA1-1E-245400 Legacy DrivePlano, Texas 75024-3199972 604 [email protected]

AboutEDS

EDS (NYSE: EDS) is a leading global technology services company delivering business

solutions to its clients. EDS founded the information technology outsourcing industry

more than 40 years ago. Today, EDS delivers a broad portfolio of information technology

and business process outsourcing services to clients in the manufacturing, financial

services, healthcare, communications, energy, transportation, and consumer and retail

industries and to governments around the world. Learn more at eds.com.

EDS and the EDS logo are registered trademarks of Electronic Data Systems Corporation. All other brand or product names are trademarks or registered marks of their respective owners. EDS is an equal opportunity employer and values the diversity of its people. Copyright © 2006 Electronic Data Systems Corporation. All rights reserved. 07/2006 5GCPH5522

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Contact Center Processes - Best Pratices