In continuation to the previous article, in which we discussed how to calculate the turnover in your call center, what are the main reasons that cause it and how it affects the work processes, in the present article we will share with you ten valuable tips that would help to retain the experienced and qualified personnel in the contact center, which will positively reflect on the reduction of staff turnover.
Here they are:
1. Hire the right people
One of the main reasons for turnover in call centers is the hiring of the wrong staff. It is essential to determine which types of people best suit your conditions, especially considering that a significant part of contact center positions are remote.
Create the "ideal agent" in theory, who meets all the requirements regarding personal and professional qualities, and use it to guide yourself by it. Also, update job descriptions to match exactly what you need and use them when posting job openings.
More in-depth interviews will also help weed out the wrong candidates.
2. Train your team on a regular basis
If you don't give employees the opportunity to feel competent in their work, it will demotivate them and make them consider leaving.
Every contact center manager knows that trainings are important, but it's even more so when trainings are timely, regular, and cover a wide range of topics such as company policies, customer demographics and engagement, and even personal development.
Regular trainings will lead to positive results -- employees will be more confident and focused in their work, which will also increase customer satisfaction.
3. Be open in communication with your employees
Have regular conversations with contact center employees and ask for their feedback with respect to workflows and software they work with to find out what they're happy with and where it needs improvement.
One-sided communication discourages agents and gives the impression that you don't care about how they feel at work.
Be transparent about business information affecting the company and ask for their professional opinion. This will make them feel understood and appreciated.
4. Build a strong team culture
The more isolated agents feel from each other, the more likely they are to consider pursuing new opportunities.
Building a good team culture shows employees how to communicate with each other, work together and help each other.
In addition, you should encourage the so-called work-life balance and discuss personal growth and career opportunities with your agents.
5. Give honest and adequate feedback
Providing regular feedback plays an important role in reducing agent turnover, helps them monitor their own progress, and positively affects their motivation and job satisfaction.
Encourage your employees when they have performed well. For a job well done, praise them in front of the whole team. This will make them feel appreciated in their efforts to provide a high level of service.
6. Provide opportunity for career development
If agents don't see a future in your call center, it's normal to have high employee turnover.
Lack of career opportunities is one of the main reasons employees leave, so if a particular agent shows potential, start training them for a supervisor or other senior position.
It makes sense that your best agents will grow into team leaders over time. This would not only show them a clear direction of development in the company, but will also help in the training of more inexperienced employees who will be able to rely on their knowledge.
7. Create a customer-centric work environment
Agent performance metrics are important to all contact centers, but most focus on quantitative metrics rather than the actual quality of customer service.
If you pay more importance to the numbers, the level of service may drop significantly. Therefore, build a customer-oriented work environment and use the so-called Quality Assurance methods to improve it over time.
This helps create a more personalized relationship between agents and customers, resulting in satisfaction for both parties.
8. Allow agents to be autonomous in service
The use of scripts is standard service protocol in any call center.
However, repeating the same words every day and on almost every call would be discouraging and exhausting for agents and negatively impact their engagement.
To prevent this burnout, allow employees to take control of their conversations with customers, at least to some degree. Create a guide for them to follow, but don't get too specific and detailed to stimulate their creativity and give them the opportunity to assess for themselves the complexity of the situation and what measures they could take to resolve the case.
9. Take advantage of the capabilities of the Call Center software solution
No matter how dedicated and focused your agents are, they wouldn't be useful in solving customer cases without the right software tools.
The use of features such as Automatic Dialer and technologies such as IVR would help the productivity of the agents, and a CRM built into the system would be especially useful for leads, sales and any customer information.
InfoServ CRM, a complete Call Center and Helpdesk solution, has the full toolkit of useful functionalities that will increase the efficiency of employees, improve customer service and increase the level of customer satisfaction.
Learn more about the capabilities of the software solution by registering for a free trial HERE.
10. Perform exit interviews
No matter how hard you try to reduce turnover, there will always be employees who want to leave.
Instead of trying to find out why they're leaving on your own, conduct "Exit Interviews" to understand the reasons first-hand and learn whether their desire is for a personal reason or related to your business.
This will further assist you in retaining future employees and overall improvement of contact center workflows.
These helpful tips may not help you reduce turnover in your call center to zero, but they will certainly contribute to reducing it.
Communication, team culture, feedback and opportunity for development, combined with regular training, autonomy in service and the right Call Center solution with useful functionalities for agents are the right mix of factors that will play a major role in the satisfaction of your employees and their retention in the company for a longer period of time.