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Presentation Prowess Design Prototype Greg Mason November 21, 2010

Overview

TeleTech is a Business Process Outsourcing company that offers customer-

centric solutions in more than 18 countries across the globe. In addition to

the company’s on-shore customer support centers, the company has several off-shore centers that support English speakers in the United States, the

United Kingdom, and Australia. Our customers demand agents with solid communication skills so that their issues will be completed resolved in an

efficient and friendly manner. Given that the majority of these off-shore agents are non-native English speakers, language barriers and cross-cultural

communication issues pose a significant risk to customer satisfaction.

In addition to the communication skills training that we offer agents at the

beginning of their tenure, our Language and Communication Development department offers operations leaders a coaching system that is designed to

reduce customer complaints around language and communication skills. This presentation will address the challenge around delivering consistent coaching

and skills development.

I have included the following design decisions which will be explained in the

Significant Design Designs section of the document:

Story-telling to illustrate the problem

Using analogies to communicate key points

Using visual design schemes to show contrast

Using design concepts to strategically position text

Combining reporting with storytelling

Sticking to the Commander’s Intent

Combining imagery and sound to communicate key points

Using relevant evidence to build a credible argument

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Audience

This presentation targets operations executives at a director and VP level. These executives are the decision makers that determine what the balance

between agent development and production should be. They range in personality types but based on my experience communicating with them,

there are some common characteristics that tend to make up the TeleTech executive profile. First, operations executives tend to be what Abela refers to

as “judgers” (Abela, 2008, p. 26) in the sense that they want to know the main point up front. They also tend to be “thinkers” (Abela, 2008, p. 24),

being primarily focused on costs and benefits. The majority of our operations

executives tend to be in the 40-50 year age range, however there are a few who are in the 30-40 year age range.

Learning objectives and assessment

Executives who complete this presentation will be able to:

Explain the importance of maintaining a consistent system around

coaching and skills development in the off-shore call center

environment.

Identify the necessary components within the coaching process.

If the participants were to agree to an assessment, they would need to

answer at least eight out of ten multiple choice and true/false questions

correctly to demonstrate comprehension.

Problem/solution

Agents are evaluated on several different metrics ranging from average handle time to quality scores. The metric that carries the most weight lately,

however, is customer satisfaction. Off-shore agents in particular are more susceptible to customer complaints around language and communication

issues. If an agent receives a customer complaint from customer satisfaction surveys, they are flagged for coaching. The problem is that the operations

department does not provide agents with the necessary time for consistent coaching and skills development. The corner stone of my argument is that

bottom-performing agents who are not consistently coached will continue to receive customer complaints and will subsequently be terminated from the

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company or leave voluntarily out of frustration. The bottom line is that a lack

of coaching allows for attrition to happen and attrition is a major cost for the company.

The solution to this problem is to not only dedicate time for one coaching

session but to commit to a coaching package that consists of a planning session to collaborate on an action plan to improve, a skills development

session to complete the items on the action plan, and a follow-up session to review the agent’s performance subsequent to the completion of the action

plan. Committing to this plan will provide agents with a chance to realistically improve their performance which will not only reduce customer

complaints but also agent attrition.

Evidence

This presentation features the following evidence:

A poll that shows customer perceptions toward off-shore customer service

A poll that indicates how much free time agents have per week to work on developing their skills

A poll that indicates what percent of agents on their coaching list they can coach with the pull out time they have available

A quote from researchers that conveys the challenge of balancing development time with production within the call center environment

Anecdotes

This presentation features the story of an agent, Rene, who needs help with

his communication skills but cannot get the help necessary to improve his performance. It shows how his language coach, Luis, tries hard to get the

necessary pull out time to help Rene but to no avail. Before I tell the story of Rene and Luis, I reveal the tragic ending. The idea is to show the result

and then back up to the beginning and show how things led to that result. This type of story closely corresponds with the “tragedy” story plot that

Abela presents in “The Seven Basic Plots” (Abela, 2008, p. 70)

In addition, an analogy runs parallel to story in the presentation. I’ve chosen

to compare developing agents in the call center environment to growing

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tomatoes in a desert. This analogy reinforces the concept of having the right

learning conditions to help agents improve their performance.

Format

I’ve chosen to use the Pecha Kucha presentation style (20 frames at 20

seconds per frame) and to deliver the presentation through video format.

Pecha Kucha works particularly well for this audience because it forces the

content to be concise and direct. It also provides a great framework for

storytelling, which is a key component of the presentation.

The video file format is an appropriate method of communicating the

presentation because I can easily upload the video to our company’s social

network and executives can easily access it. My hope is that executives will

be more responsive to this format as it requires very little reading but still

engages the learner from a visual and auditory perspective.

Sequencing

This presentation uses Abela’s S.C.o.R.E method and here’s how:

Situation: The purpose of this presentation is how we can reduce agent

attrition. One of the causes of agent attrition is the agent’s inability to improve performance during the performance management process (also

known as Performance Improvement Process or PIP). This probationary

period is reserved for agents who continually receive customer complaints as well as underperform in other key performance areas.

I convey this situation in the first two slides of the presentation where I contrast ideal performance within the call center environment with the

reality where agent attrition occurs as a result of consistently poor communication skills.

Complication: Agents are not getting adequate time for coaching and

development to improve their performance. Because agents do not receive coaching and development opportunities immediately after a

communication-related complaint occurs, complaints continue to accrue and the agent is consequently placed on PIP.

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To illustrate this complication, I present a scenario where an agent is flagged

for poor communication skills, but the language coach struggles to schedule a coaching session with him to address this performance issue.

Resolution: We can prevent performance-related agent attrition from

happening if we address these issues early with coaching and development strategies. Operations management needs to provide coaches with the pull

outs necessary to meet with agents one-on-one.

Example: An agent receives a language complaint and the coach immediately meets with the agent to give them feedback. In the

presentation, the story shows the language coach finally meeting with the agent to address the performance issue. It appears that the situation has

been resolved.

Complication: Agents need more than just a coach delivering feedback.

Agents are still underperforming even after they meet with the coach. The presentation’s story has a sudden twist after the coach and agent meet. We

see that it’s simply not enough conduct one coaching session with an agent who is underperforming.

Resolution: Agents need to commit to a development plan that allows them

multiple sessions to address their performance. The first session is for action planning, the second session is to work on the items from their action plan

and the third session is to review their performance: Plan – Develop – Follow up.

Example: As mentioned above, the coach needs to follow up with the agent

to review their performance after the agent has completed their action plan items. At the end of the presentation, I include two possible outcomes. The

first is the tragic outcome that occurs when the coach is unable to set up a

development and follow-up session. Rene has exhausted all is chances to improve his performance. The second outcome occurs when the agent is

able to work on his communication skills and the coach is able to follow up with him and validate that his performance has improved.

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Specific design decisions

1. Story-telling to illustrate the problem

Story-telling is an essential instructional component used in this

presentation. It’s important to show how employees are affected by poor management decisions. Using employees to tell stories is one of the

storytelling techniques that Duarte recommends.

What you can do is recollect the stories that you hear your clients and your

employees tell. Use that information that you collect from them to establish a vision

that optimizes today yet still while building for tomorrow. (Duarte, 2009)

To simulate the agent attrition process, I enlisted the help of our

language and communication support staff at our Mexico City call center. Rene and Luis are both language coaches and both used to be agents.

Therefore, they can convincingly act out the parts of coach and agent. Because I was not able to be there to take the photographs, I gave

specific instructions to the staff on how to set up each frame of the story.

Duarte’s recommendation triangulates well with the methodology that

Abela suggests (Abela, 2008). As mentioned earlier, the story I have

chosen to tell fits in the tragedy plot. The images combined with the sounds support the sense of frustration, nightmare, and destruction that

Abela refers to (Abela, 2008, p. 70). One could argue that the presentation also presents a comedy in the sense that I show how

adequate coaching time provides a resolution that could transform the situation for the hero of the story, the agent.

2. Using analogies to communicate key points

In this presentation, I use analogy alongside my storyline to reinforce my

argument. Heath and Heath claim that using “visual proverbs” to communicate a message can help to make the message more

memorable. (Heath, 2008, p. 48-50)

Throughout the presentation, I compare developing an agent in the call

center environment to growing a tomato in the desert. The analogy helps

to communicate the idea off-shore agents are more fragile and require more attention than on-shore agents. The desert represents the poor

conditions for learning in the call center environment. Hence, developing off-shore agents in the current work environment is like trying to grow

tomatoes in the desert. Figure 1 in the appendix shows how I illustrate this analogy.

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Abela also supports using this metaphorical approach in presentations.

I’ve followed his suggestion by consistently applying a single metaphor (growing tomatoes) throughout the presentation (Abela, 2008, p. 68).

The metaphor does a great job reinforcing the message of the hypothetical story of the low-performing agent.

3. Using effective visual design schemes to evoke emotion.

Garr Reynolds provided helpful design tips that were instrumental in

illustrating my “growing tomatoes in the desert” analogy. I used an achromatic theme (Reynolds, 2010, p. 75) in the parts of the

presentation that express the hopelessness of call center performance. I used the black and white color theme to represent the dismal learning

environment in a call center. This is why I chose to make the desert image black and white. As mentioned earlier, I use the tomato to

symbolize the off-shore agent. The subtle use of red in contrast to the

black and white reinforces this analogy. (Figure 2 in the appendix) In contrast to the slides that contain an achromatic color theme, I use

saturated color themes (Reynolds, 2010, p. 70) to portray the positive messages. Note how the achromatic color theme of Figure 3 in the

appendix contrasts with the saturated color theme in Figure 4. In addition to the color theme, the images themselves work to express the emotions

mentioned above. In his discussion on Choice of Images McCloud emphasizes the need for “stylistic and expressionistic devices to affect

mood and emotion” (McCloud, 2006, p. 37).

4. Using design concepts to strategically position text

There were two key points to consider in the placement of text throughout the presentation: using the text with the images rather than

separate from them and where to place the text in relation to the images

on each slide. Abela (2008) helped me to make the first decision on how to use text.

It is a good idea to put text and visuals close together. Remember, though, that in

any case, ballroom style slides should have very few words. (p. 133)

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This justifies not only keeping the text on the slides with the images, but

also stripping the text down to the essential keywords.

Reynolds visual design principles proved to be extremely useful in helping

me make the next decision. That is, where should I place the text in relation to the images? Here he provides insight on how to align text with images to

direct the audience’s attention.

You can achieve a more subtle form of continuation by aligning an important element

with the line of sight of a human subject in a composition (Reynolds, 2010, p. 171).

In Figures 5, 6, and 7 in the appendix, you can see how the subjects in the images direct the viewer’s attention to the text on the slide.

5. Combining reporting with storytelling

The balance that Nancy Duarte speaks about (Duarte, 2010) between reporting and storytelling was important to consider in my presentation.

While the presentation definitely warrants a story that shows the humanistic side of performance management, I couldn’t ignore that my

target audience is composed of inherently skeptical executives who want to see facts. Likewise, it would be ineffective to submit a dense report to

this audience without molding the facts into an organic story. Therefore, this presentation does a good job reporting to executives in a meaningful

and humanistic way.

This also corresponds well with Abela’s presentation methodology (Abela,

2008) where antidotes are combined with evidence to build a credible

argument. In this presentation, I have infused the story with relevant facts that help to keep the audience grounded.

6. Sticking to the Commander’s Intent

Since this presentation is designed for an executive audience, it’s

important to make sure the core message speaks to what Heath and Heath refer to as the “Commander’s Intent” (Heath, 2008). There is a

major drive right now within the company to reduce attrition because of the impact that it has on costs. Therefore, reducing attrition will save the

company money and help grow the business. I made it a point to communicate this core message at the beginning of the presentation.

Within the first minute, executives know that the purpose of this

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presentation is ultimately to fulfill the Commander’s Intent of the

company.

Addressing risks to the commander’s intent is exactly the problem-solving

approach that Abela refers to:

The important thing is to be able to highlight why your audience is likely to suffer if

they do not listen to you. If you refocus your presentation on the problem that they

have, then your audience will be more willing to listen to you (Abela, 2008, p. 39).

In a sense, this presentation embodies a Six Sigma style because it seeks to address one of the root causes of attrition within the company. Why is

there attrition? Agents are consistently underperforming. Why are agents

consistently underperforming? They aren’t working on their skills. Why aren’t they working on their skills? They don’t have time during their

shifts to work with their coaches. The presentation of this root cause is essential for persuading the program executives to commit to more agent

development time.

7. Combining imagery and sound to communicate key points

Medina helped me to understand the relationship between sight and sound and how combining the senses can help to reinforce ideas.

Our senses evolved to work together-vision influence hearing, for example-which

means that we learn best if we stimulate several senses at once (Medina, 2008, p.

219).

I used music and natural sounds to supplement images throughout the presentation. In terms of music choice, I used Vivaldi’s Four Seasons at

the beginning and end of the presentation to convey a sense of hope and optimism. I chose Portishead’s Over to convey a sense of hopelessness

and tragedy.

The natural sounds also help to reinforce concepts. For example, I

compliment the desert image with the sound of harsh desert winds. This helps to convey the idea of a lifeless and infertile environment – one that

is not conducive to development. Later in the presentation, I present an image of a budding tomato plant and compliment the image with sounds

of chirping birds. This conveys the idea of a fertile environment where development can occur.

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8. Using relevant evidence to build a credible argument

Providing relevant evidence helps to maintain credibility and keep the

audience grounded in reality. Abele states,

The reality principle states that you should always prefer to present evidence that is

concrete and particular rather than conceptual and general (Abela, 2008, p. 36).

This is why I’ve chosen specific statistics that help to explain the importance and challenge of developing our off-shore agents. For

example, the second slide provides a statistic for the audience to reflect on while they are presented with the concept that the call center learning

environment is like a desert.

Garr Reynolds (2010) also maintains that using “evidentiary data can be

a powerful way to support your case or your discovery” (Reynolds, 2010, p. 129), however, it needs to be used in a simplistic way that conveys

meaning. I have made sure to follow Reynold’s principles of simplicity when presenting this data throughout the presentation.

Peer review results

I composed a formative evaluation survey to evaluate the following design

decisions:

1. Throughout the presentation, I use limited text to supplement the

other stimuli. I wanted to determine if the use of text was appropriate or if it distracted the learner.

2. Do the use of music and other sound clips effectively convey the

messages of the presentation?

3. Does the desert slide effectively convey the idea of a poor learning

environment without any narration?

4. Are the slide transitions appropriate for the presentation?

5. Does the color and overall visual design scheme effectively communicate the concepts in the presentation?

Based on the feedback I received from my peers, I arrived at the following

conclusions:

1. The feedback I received indicated that the use of text is appropriate

throughout the presentation. However, I received conflicting feedback that suggested putting the text on separate slides. I disagree with this

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suggestion and feel that separating the text from the slides would

disconnect the learners.

Another comment implied that the slide with the graph on off-shoring

was too busy. I’ve decided to follow up on this suggestion and take the narration out of that slide and replace it with background audio from a

call center. This will allow viewers to focus more on the slide’s visuals.

This comment also compelled me to replace narration from the slide

about the Plan-Develop-Follow up coaching strategy with sounds of chirping birds. This will also allow views to concentrate more on that

slide’s text.

2. Feedback from this question told me a few things that warranted

change. The first is that the evaluators could not hear the desert wind on the second slide. To address this problem, I have simply turned up

the volume on this slide. The second is that evaluators did not like the audio fade from each slide. To fix this, I’ve simply taken out the audio

fade from certain slides.

3. Feedback indicated that the desert slide needs more stimuli for it to be effective without narration. With that said, I have turned up the

volume on the desert winds audio and included a statistic for the viewers to reflect on.

4. Feedback indicated that the video fading is appropriate as is. It is subtle and does not distract from the presentation. I have decided to

follow one of the suggestions to add a video effect to compliment the sound of the record scratch.

5. Feedback on this question indicated that the color and design scheme is effective as is and does not warrant change.

Peer Feedback

Darlene

You presentation was neat, I really enjoyed viewing it.

1. Do you feel like the text in the slides distracts at all from the audio

presentation? If yes, how would you improve it?

The text does not distract from the audio presentation, it actually adds to the presentation. One suggestion would be on the slide where you

begin to talk about Renee, I would introduce him like you introduce Luis in the following slide.

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2. Does the music and use of sound in general effectively convey the

message of the video? Would you do anything differently with the sounds?

I like the music you selected but I am not sure of the sounds, I could not

hear them. I am assuming there was sound o the second or third slide, I could not hear anything. To watch the slide for 20 sec was hard. I would

recommend that maybe you add voice to the slide to reinforce it.

3. For the desert frame, I left it with only the sound of the wind and a picture of the desert. I wanted to provoke reflection on this concept of a

poor learning environment. Did you feel like this was effective?

I did not hear the wind, so I did not find it effective. Above in #2, I talk about this slide. Even with not hearing the wind, I did not portray the

slide the way you wanted it. Sorry. Like I said earlier I would add voice

to this slide.

4. Would you include any better transitions between the slides?

I would think of adding more to the transition, it is so ever slight that I did not notice there was a transition until I went back to review your

presentation. The transition does not take away from the presentation at all.

5. Do you feel like the use of color was effective and consistent throughout

the presentation? If not, how would you improve the color or over all visual design scheme?

Color was very effective; I really like the first slide of the tomatoes in

the desert where half is dying to demonstrate how lack of coaching

affects the call center productivity. The colors were soothing to look at.

For the second slide, since you are focusing on a call center I would have an image of a call center. I looked at the images as business

people working in the office using headphone for their call. Having a call center would really enhance what you are trying to portray.

You used great visuals, the one that stood out was the balance, it really

reinforced what you were trying to say.

I hope this helps

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Stephanie

1. Do you feel like the text in the slides distracts at all from the audio

presentation? If yes, how would you improve it?

No I think it adds to the audio. I think it would be interesting to play around with either picture on one slide and text on another. For

example, have the sad attrition guy sitting there with the music, and then have another slide following that with just the text. It might be

more powerful to separate them and not put too much info on the channel (dual coding). I think that’s tufte or Mayer that is talking about

keeping them separate. So one suggestion is to keep the voice over but separate the images and text.

I do like how you put a box around the text and the color of the text.

Nice touch.

Another idea is that you could put the text on the music slide and then

have the image with the voice over.

Also, the slide that has the off shore graph and text and people is too much. Divide them up over the current narration if you can.

2. Does the music and use of sound in general effectively convey the

message of the video? Would you do anything differently with the sounds?

The biggest distracter I had with the sound was the fading out of the

voice over at the end of each slide. Can you add more silence at the end so it doesn’t fade out? I was wondering if that was the program you

used that was doing that automatically. If so take the audio and ramp it

up at the end so it cancels it out and sounds like its not fading. As for the sounds I love how you used different music for each

transition. It really set the tone and mood for that section.

3. For the desert frame, I left it with only the sound of the wind and a

picture of the desert. I wanted to provoke reflection on this concept of a poor learning environment. Did you feel like this was effective?

I was wondering if that was the wind I heard. I would increase the

volume of the wind or get something more windy sounding. It seems a little too long as well. My suggestion would be to make it a question, like

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what are the conditions of your call center? So that they have something

to reflect on. I didn’t really get what I was doing here and seemed a little too long...

4. Would you include any better transitions between the slides?

You can try putting a slide transition or something bolder between

thoughts or concepts that the brain can have a little more time to process the change and know we are starting something new. Then

when the same concept is or thought is going through several slides, I would keep the subtle fading so that it blends really well.

I think the music slides might work with that too. When the record skips you can have a big movement or transition on the slide.

5. Do you feel like the use of color was effective and consistent throughout

the presentation? If not, how would you improve the color or over all visual design scheme?

I loved the color! It was really nice to see that the difference. It didn’t pop out at me at first that all the desert scenes were grey and black and

white and all the good scenes were in color.

The red text was very effective against the black and white.

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References Abela, A. P. (2008). Advanced Presentations by Design. San Francisco: Pfeiffer.

Duarte, N. (Director). (2009). The Importance of Visual Storytelling [Motion Picture].

Duarte, N. (Director). (2010). Engage Through Storytelling Motion Picture].

Heath, C. a. (2008). Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Die and Others Survive. New York: Random House.

McCloud, S (2006). Making Comics: Storytelling Secrets of Comics, Manga, and Graphic Novels. New

York: Harper.

Medina, J. (2008). Brain Rules. Pear Press.

Reynolds, G. (2009). Presentation Zen Design: Simple Design Principles and Techniques to Enhance Your

Presentations. Berkeley, California: New Riders.

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Appendix Figure 1

Figure 2

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Figure 3

Figure 4

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Figure 5

Figure 6

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Figure 7