Call Center Metrics Changing Overall Performance

The statistics and metrics you provide (display) to your call center and agents should be changing their performance.  If you are not seeing a change in performance this could mean:

1. You are not reporting the proper metrics;
2. Your goals are not set properly; 
3. You are not showing (displaying) the correct metrics and statistics;
4. You do not show the appropriate amount of concern to your agents.

Performance change typically means the agents and team leaders regularly meet and exceed the stated goals for the call center.  The performance improvement could also mean that agents are communicating more often and call center morale is improving.  These changes can be hard to measure and track but should not be forgotten. 

Proper Metrics
Each industry has a given set of metrics that are most appropriate for their industry.  This means a financial call center will report on a different set of metrics than a call center in the utilities sector.  If the metrics the agents are looking at are not relevant to them they will not improve the overall performance of the call center.

Your goals are not set properly
The goals that are set will trigger threshold alerts and messages to the agents. If the goals are set too high or low it will trigger an alert message to the agent too often.  (How often do you pay attention to a car alarm going off?) Set the goals properly for the metric based on the industry standards, your staffing levels, time and day of the week and your agent’s skill sets.

Show the correct metrics and statistics
The metrics and statistics that are reported and displayed to the call center will change depending on how the agents receive this information.  Metrics and stats can be displayed on an LCD screen, wallboard, desktop, IP Phone, email, web report, printed report or on a smartphone.  The type of metrics and stats the agents read will change based on how the information is viewed.  Group level metrics and stats belong on a LCD screen, wallboard and first level of a web based report.  Agent metrics and stats belong on the desktop, IP Phone, email, smartphone and second and third level web reports.  

  

Be concerned about the metrics and statistics
If you do not care if a metric or statistic threshold has been exceeded should your agents care?  Your management style is entirely your choice, however, it is very easy to point out when thresholds have been exceeded and goals have not been met.  Recording how often a threshold violation has occurred will also be useful during reviews with the agents and team leaders.

The proper use and reporting of metrics and statistics in your call center will improve the overall performance in your call center. If you are not seeing an improvement in performance it could be one of four reasons for this lack of performance change.  As a manager you should also review your goals at least annually to ensure on-going performance improvements.

Spectrum is a leading provider of Unified Contact Center Reporting.  Contact Spectrum today to learn more about Contact Center Activity Monitoring and Unified Reporting. 

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Dan Boehm
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Spectrum
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Smart phones in the call center

Everywhere you look today you see smartphones. Call center managers, team leaders, agents, IT support, etc all have smart phones. Since so many people are using smart phones why not extend the use of the phone to the call center.

So what is a smart phone? If you have an IPhone or a Blackberry phone you have a smart phone. However, Wikipedia defines a smart phone as a phone with traditional phone features and advanced computing and connectivity.

Call centers leaders are now using their smart phones to stay in touch with the call center with web based reporting, scheduled reporting that provide current call center status and ad hoc alert message about metrics that are outside of the goals.

Managers are very mobile and the smart phone is an ideal tool to stay in touch with the call center in a very unobtrusive way.

Five Tips for Successful Real time reporting deployment

In addition to desire there are five tips that Spectrum recommends a company follow if they want a successful Unified Contact Center Reporting solution.  

1. Goals:  State your goals for the reporting solution and do it in writing.  Too often the goals change from one person to the next. This implies the goal is not really a goal more likely it is a plan of action.  This also implies there really is no goal, the goal is not written down for all involved to understand or the goal is really steps to create a better call center. The goal should be measurable and stated in clear concise terms that leave nothing to interpretation.

Some examples of goals for the call center:

1. Improve agent productivity
2. Increase revenue
3. Improve the customers experience with the call center
4. Reduce operating expenses
5. Reduce agent attrition

It does not matter if your goal is one of these top five or something completely different, it only matters that you have a goal(s).

2. Data: Call centers have a wealth of data hidden away in application databases. Capturing the data that exists in these applications provides the call center with information that can be used to improve the overall performance of the call center and agents.  What data does the call center have that if an effective report was build it would help achieve the goals?

Data can and should come from such sources as the multi-channel ACD, CRM, WFM, Help Desk software, CSat surveys, and in house data sources.  The reports can provide summary information with drill down to find the root cause of an issue.

Next decide which KPI’s within these data sources will be most helpful in obtaining your goals. For example, if one of your goals is to improve agent productivity the types of data that you should be capturing and reporting include:

• Agent Occupancy (How much time the agent spends actually working)
• Adherence
• Agent Idle time

3. Audience:  Each level within the call center and business needs to see specific types of information either real time or integrated (Historical and Real time).  Each level of the organization also needs to certain kinds of data. Kinds of data include agent statistics, multi channel ACD stats, WFM, CRM stats, FCR, CSat, and in house data.

Reporting is not just for one level of the call center. Everyone in the call center must have access to real time information.  Agents who most directly affect the goals should see their real time status, team leaders that manage groups of agents should see the real time and historical status, and managers should see the overall scope of the call center with drill down capabilities.

4. Reports: Think about the goals for the call center and determine which stakeholders within the call center will benefit most from real time reports.  The stakeholders are: Agents, Team Leaders (supervisors), Call Center Managers and Senior Management.

With the audience defined the process of determining the types of reports becomes much easier.  Reports can be Web based reports, reports that are displayed on LCD screens, text based information shown on wallboards, desktop displays, and daily threshold or schedule based email reports.

Reports can real time and they can be historical. A real time report allows for immediate corrective action and results.  A historical report provides a view into the past and possible reasons for the results the call center is experiencing.  Most CC managers view both types of reports to determine the root cause of the problem.

5. Results:  Prior to putting a Unified Contact Center Reporting solution in place measure and record the KPI statistics: Baseline.  Next determine where the call center should be within 6 months after the reporting solution is in place.  After 6 months review your results and make changes accordingly.  The goals of the real time reporting solution is to measure track and adjust.

Share the results with the call center not only the negative but also the positive results. There are some CC Managers that believe in only showing the negative stats to the agents because they believe this will motivate the agent.   This is short term and irresponsible.

Thinking and acting on these five tips for deploying a Unified Contact Center Reporting solution will result in a successful installation that improves the overall call center.

Spectrum is a leading provider of Unified Contact Center Reporting.  Contact Spectrum today to learn more about Contact Center Activity Monitoring and Unified Reporting.

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Call Center Metrics Changing Agent Behavior

The statistics and metrics you provide (display) to your call center and agents should be changing their performance.  If you are not seeing a change in performance this could mean:

1. You are not reporting the proper metrics;
2. Your goals are not set properly;
3. You are not showing (displaying) the correct metrics and statistics;
4. You do not show the appropriate amount of concern to your agents.

Performance change typically means the agents and team leaders regularly meet and exceed the stated goals for the call center.  First call resolution ratings are up customer satisfaction is improving and other metrics and statistics are improving when the performance in the call center is changing for the positive. The performance improvement could also mean that agents are communicating more often and call center morale is improving.  These changes can be hard to measure and track but should not be forgotten.

Proper Metrics

Each industry has a given set of metrics that are most appropriate for their industry, business and skill sets.  This means a financial call center will report on a different set of metrics than a call center in the utilities sector.  Within the business groups will look at a different set of metrics. Finally agents with different skills should see different metrics. If the metrics the agents are looking at are not relevant to them they will not improve the overall performance of the call center or their own performance.

The goals that are set will trigger threshold alerts and messages to the agents. If the goals are set too high or low it will trigger an alert message to the agent too often.  (How often do you pay attention to a car alarm going off?) Set the goals properly for the metric based on the industry standards, your staffing levels, time and day of the week and your agent's skill sets. Each group should have its own level of thresholds not one level. For example, in the insurance industry a new policy group would want to keep a very low abandon rate while the cancellations group may have a higher abandon rate.

 

Show the correct metrics and statistics

The metrics and statistics that are reported and displayed to the call center will change depending on how the agents receive this information.  Metrics and stats can be displayed on an LCD screen, wallboard, desktop, IP Phone, email, web report, printed report or on a smartphone.  The type of metrics and stats the agents read will change based on how the information is viewed.  Group level metrics and stats belong on a LCD screen, wallboard and first level of a web based report.  Agent metrics and stats belong on the desktop, IP Phone, email, smartphone and second and third level web reports.

 

Be concerned about the metrics and statistics

If you do not care if a metric or statistic threshold has been exceeded should your agents care?  Your management style is entirely your choice, however, it is very easy threshold alerts to change agent behavior.  Also recording how often a threshold violation has occurred will also be useful during reviews with the agents and team leaders.

The proper use and reporting of metrics and statistics in your call center will improve the overall performance in your call center. If you are not seeing an improvement in performance it could be one of four reasons for this lack of performance change.  As a manager you should also review your goals at least annually to ensure on-going performance improvements.

Spectrum is a leading provider of Unified Contact Center Reporting.  Contact Spectrum today to learn more about Contact Center Activity Monitoring and Unified Reporting.

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Dan Boehm
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Spectrum
dboehm@specorp.com
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Call Center Digital Signage Content

I have been helping customers this week layout their Call Center Digital Signage Content. This is the content that will be displayed on their LCD screens in the call center. The content is real time information from multiple sources such as the ACD, CRM and WFM. However, one consistent challenge that I have run up against is the amount of content the customer wants to display on a single screen.

In each case that I worked the customer wanted two - three times the amount of content that is recommended for a LCD screen. Content over run occurs becuase the manager has so much they want the agents to be aware of at any given point in time. So how does a manager cut down the content or decide what content goes to the second and third page on the screen?
1. Know your audience;
2. Understand what the goals are for the audience;
3. What type of impact does the content need to have on the audience;
4. How far is the average person from the screen?

Know your audience: If the digital signage is for the agents and team leaders then the content should be directed to them. Displaying historical data from the IVR may be interesting but it does not help the agents achieve their goals.

Understand the goals for the audience: If the goal for the audience is to improve Average Handle Time then display the metrics that affect the average handle time including AHT.

What type of impact does the content need to have on the audience: Be sure the content is prominently displayed and is the first to be read/seen by the audience. Make the important content stand out with larger fonts and use color thresholds to gain attention.

How far is the average person from the screen? On average a 1 inch tall character on an LCD screen can be read from 16 ft away. If your agents are 50 ft from the screen a 3 inch tall font is required.

Since this is a blog I did not want to go into much more detail. Contact Spectrum for more details on this topic of Call Center Digital Signage content.

Smartphones and Unified Contact Center Reporting

A smartphone is a mobile phone that combines the traditional phones features and advanced computing and connectivity capabilities according to Wikipedia.  The advanced features include email, text messaging, browsing, interactive maps and calendar functions to name just a few business applications.  For the call center manager the smartphone provides constant contact with the call center reporting tools from Spectrum. 

A reporting solution must provide reports, alerts and allow for proactive response from the manager to be an effective and efficient reporting solution.  Smartphones have the features that offer this type of functionality and Spectrum takes full advantage of those features.

Reports and Alerts

An alert can take many forms above are just two ways that a manager can be alerted to the current status of the call center.  Graphics give a tremendous overview of the call center which is easy understand and react to.  A spreadsheet report could be run as a web page with drill down if the manager wanted to go to the next step.  Or a simple email notification that presents the status of the call center may be more appropriate for the manager.

Proactive Response:

 Productive and efficient managers use their smartphones to proactively respond to a change in status in the call center.  Using remote log in a manager is quickly able to send a message to the group, team leader or even to an agent and provide immediate direction and support.

The benefits of utilizing a smartphone in the call center are:

1. Call center manager productivity is enhanced with scheduled and ad hoc reports;
2. The manager and senior executives can remain mobile and receive alerts when thresholds and variances have exceeded the goals;
3. Agents and team leader benefit from positive reinforcement messages from the manager.

Call center managers are very mobile and need the ability know what is going on in the call center but to also reply and respond to changes in the status of the call center.  Using a smartphone as part of Unified Call Center Reporting managers receive on going updates from the call center, are alerted when a threshold or a variance has occurred and are able to reply and respond quickly and effectively.

Spectrum is a leading provider of Unified Contact Center Reporting.  Contact Spectrum today to learn more about Contact Center Activity Monitoring and Unified Reporting.

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Dan Boehm
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dan@specorp.com
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Contact Center Activity Monitoring

In 2002 Gartner Group coined the phrase Business Activity Monitoring or BAM. This phrase refers to the aggregation of real time acitivities inside the organization. To narrow the focus of BAM within the call center another phrase is used - Contact Center Activity Monitoring or CCAM.

Contact Center Activity Monitoring is a process of capturing real time and historical data from various call center applications. Call center applications store the data in different manners so the application used to retrieve that data must be flexible and powerful enough to get the data. An effective CCAM software application must have mulitple methods of being able to connect and capture the data.

The image above shows six common methods of retrieving data from call center applications.

After the data is captured unified reports are built and published to the agents, team leaders and managers to use and gain the benefits of the information.

Key benefits of CCAM:

1. The call center manager is able to make immediate and informed decisions;
2. The call center is able to react quickly to changing status in the call center;
3. Managers can make changes to the agents and team leaders to take advantage of the status change within the contact center.
4. Agents, team leaders and managers are more effective and efficient with real time information.

Unified Reporting

Unified Reporting is a term that is used often in the call center industry. Unified Reporting unifies data into single reports. By taking data from multiple sources and creating a single report out of that data is a unified report.

Unified Reporting (UR) provides a snap shot view of the most important KPI's from various data sources.

1. Snap Shot View: This is a report that is updated continuously so the information is real time and accurate. You do not want to make a decision based on old information.


2. Most important KPI's: These will vary by company and industry. The KPI's should include metric information more than statistics. Metric information shows how well someone or some group is performing. Statistics just show what has been done. For example, average handle time is a statistic while CSat is a metric.


3. Data Sources: These are different software applications that are also in operation in the call center. In the call center industry these sources could be any of the following: ACD, WFM, CRM, Ticketing Systems, Customer Satisfaction surveys, or other in house data source. There are many different applications in the call center and this is just a short list.

Unified Reports can take different shapes and sizes depending on how the report is going to be used. Reports can be displayed on LCD screens, LED wallboards, Agent and Team leader desktops, web based reports, configured as email messages or as short flash reports through an SMS message.

Furthermore the unified reporting would change based on the person viewing the report. Agents will see real time information about their performance, team leaders will see reports for the groups they manage and managers will see reports that are more historical than real time and will be for the entire call center.

Unified Reporting is an ideal way of bringing together critical data from the many call center applications. Saving time, being more efficient and reducing the many headaches that come with trying to find critical data are the benefits of unified reporting.

At-home agents

My nephew just started working out of his home rather than at the office. He asked me about some things that he should be doing to make certain his sales do not drop off. I was thinking about this and realized how similar his situation is to a work at home agent. So I created a list of things that a work at home agent should have to be able to be effective. This list is not in any priority.

1. The right tools: This is a basic assumption that can be overlooked. Phone, computer, high speed access to the internet and company network, headset, desk and comfortable chair.
2. Work Space: A dedicated place to answer the phone and work. This needs to be comfortable too.
3. A quiet environment: There is little worse than talking to an agent and hearing the dog barking or dishes clanging in the background.
4. The proper attitude: Not everyone can work from home. Some agents need social interaction. Years ago I had a work from home sales rep quit because he could not "hang out at the water cooler" and get caught up on gossip. During the interview process be sure to determine if they have the proper attitude.
5. Dedication: It is easy to log on and then place yourself into some type of non working status. Agents that work from home need a schedule and they need to be dedicated and stick to the schedule.
6. Feel like part of the team: Include all agents in contests, share information, send messages and make them feel like part of the team.
7. Back up plan: The agent should have a notebook and pencil ready for when (not if) the internet connection or network access is lost of denied.
8. On-going training plans: All agents need on-going traning. Agents that work from home may miss out on the team leader or manager immediate support therefore training is important to keep at-home agents up-to-date.
9. Access to real time statistics at their desktops: Real time information will let the agent know their status and that of the call center and can be prepared for heavier call volume. The ability to change the statistics and metrics they see would be helpful.
10. Priority access to team leaders or managers: Working from home does not mean at-home agents do not have trouble at times. Because they are at home and do not take as much team leader or manager time they should have priority access when needed.

Spectrum can provide the Real Time desk top statistics and metrics. Contact Us for more information.

Statistics and Metrics for Call Center Agents

While we already know there is a difference between call center statistics and metrics (see my blog dated June 2, 2010) what many call center managers are unaware of is what metrics and statistics they should be providing to the agents.

Each level of the call center (agents, team leaders, managers and senior management) need to see not only different statistics and metrics they also need to see a different timeline for the information. Agents need to see real time information about how they are performing. Furthermore, the statistics and metrics can and should change based on the call center industry.





The statistics and metrics the agent views on their desktop should be real time and about themselves. Occasional group information and current status for the day are also relevant and useful but nothing further out than that. To improve efficiencies and become more effective an agent needs to see how they are performing right now so they are able to change their behavior.

Here are some of the top Metrics and Statistics agents should be viewing on their desktop:
FCR - if available
Customer Satisfaction Rating (CSat) - if available
Abandon Rate
AHT
ASA
Adherence
Service Level

Some industries and agent skill level will need to look at different metrics and statistics. At Spectrum we always recommend these metrics and explain why they are important to the agent.

Contact Center Activity Monitoring

The Spectrum June newsletter discussed Unified Contact Center Reporting (UCCR) and the benefits of this type of reporting.  Spectrum Unified Contact Center Reporting is a complete solution for capturing real time and historical data from contact center applications and building real time reports with proactive alerting for monitoring the contact center business processes.  This month the Spectrum newsletter will discuss one aspect of UCCR: Contact Center Activity Monitoring. 

In 2002 Gartner Group coined the phrase Business Activity Monitoring which means the aggregation of real time activities inside the organization.  Spectrum’s CCAM refers to the aggregation of real time and historical information inside the call center. 

Contact Center Activity Monitoring (CCAM) is the process within UCCR that captures the real time and historical data from various call center applications. Call center applications store and provide access to their data in different manners.  It is for this reason that an effective reporting tool must have multiple methods of being able to connect and capture that data.  Spectrum’s neXorce software has six methods of capturing real time and historical data.

Key Benefits of CCAM:

• The Call Center is able to make immediate informed decisions;
• The Call Center is able to react quickly to the changing status in the call center;
• Managers can make changes to the agents and team leaders to take advantage of the status change within the call center.

Example:
Through an alert notification at her desk top a call center manager is made aware that the Csat rating for the day is dropping, abandonment rate is going up yet the number of calls taken for the day is normal.  By drilling down on the web based report the manager is able to see that the AHT has gone up on two new groups (Split skills).  The manager knows these two groups were specifically created to handle calls relating to changes in customers policies.  The call volume was not expected to be this high. The manager look at other group call volume, messages two team leaders to log agents out of the slow groups and log them into the busier groups. This transaction takes less than 5 minutes.  Now the manager is able to review the two new groups and work on anticipated call volume for the future.

Spectrum is a leading provider of Unified Contact Center Reporting.  Contact Spectrum today to learn more about Contact Center Activity Monitoring and Unified Reporting.

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Dan Boehm
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Spectrum
dan@specorp.com
+1713 986 8839

Unified Contact Center Reporting

Spectrum Unified Contact Center Reporting is a complete solution for capturing real time and historical data from contact center applications and building real time reports with proactive alerting for monitoring the contact center business processes.  Spectrum UCCR provides agents, team leaders, managers and senior management with the information they need to make immediate and better business decisions.  As the environment in the contact center changes corrective action can occur on all levels from the agent to senior management.

Unified Contact Center Reporting (UCCR) consists of two components: Contact Center Activity Monitoring and Unified Reporting.  Contact Center Activity Monitoring (CCAM) captures Contact Center specific data from applications such as multi-channel ACD’s, CRM, WFM, etc and consolidates that data.  Then using industry standards, the unified reports are built for each level of the contact center to provide real time information and improve contact center performance. 

Key Benefits

• Monitor critical KPI’s across the contact center and take corrective action immediately.  Contact center efficiencies and effectiveness improve.
• Unified reports summarize all data into reports for each level of the contact center. Each level sees only the information they need to take proactive actions.
• Reports are published to desktops, LCD screens, web based reports, wallboards and smart phones. The contact center is able to see the reporting in multiple methods.
• Alerts and notifications are sent via to desktops, wallboards, LCD Screens, Email, SMS and smart phones.  Never be out of touch of the contact center.

Applications

• Agent level real time information presented to their desktops or to a wallboard. At the desktop the information will be agent specific information and group level details. On the Wallboard the information will be group level metrics.
• Team Leader real time information for the group with access to agent level real time information can be available as a desktop application or web based report.  Team leaders also utilize wallboards to see the current status of the group.
• Call Center Managers and Operations managers review historical information with drill down access to real time information on web based reports or desktop applications.  Analysis can be done quickly and the manager is able to make better decisions based on quality information.
• Senior management is able to determine that the contact center is operating at peak performance by reviewing web based reports.  Historical and real time information is readily available. 

Spectrum is a leading provider of Unified Contact Center Reporting.  Contact Spectrum today to learn more about Contact Center Activity Monitoring and Unified Reporting. 

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Dan Boehm
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Spectrum
dan@specorp.com
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What is a Call Center Wallboard?

The other day someone asked me for a call center wallboard. I asked them which kind of wallboard do you want? The customer was confused as he assumed there was only one kind. Here is some information on the two most popular types of call center wallboards.



Traditional LED Wallboards: These are the boards that show content in text only, can change colors on thresholds and will run messages on the bottom. They are available from single line of text up to the size of an entire wall.


















Key Benefits:

• Great for showing text only;
• Very low total cost of ownership (over the life of the board);
• Higly reliable.

Flat Panel Displays: These are also known as LCD screens or plasma screens. These boards will show content from the same sources as the traditional boards and can show graphs, charts, RSS feeds, images such as jpegs, web content, video, streaming video, television / cable, documents and camera feeds.















Key Benefits:

• Flat panel displays are very dynamic;
• Content can be much more than traditional contact center applications;
• More effective in changing behavior than a traditional LED wallboard.

For the money and if used properly a flat panel display can be a more effective call center tool in improving communications and creating an effective decision making contact center.

To learn more about Wallboards visit www.specorp.com.

Contact Center Statistics or Performance Metrics

There is a difference between statistics and performance metrics. Both are very helpful to the contact center but are used in two different ways. Confusing the two can be costly if you are purchasing a solution to improve the efficiency of your call center.

Statistics can provide a view of what is happening in the call center right now, for the interval or for the day. These statistics are helpful when the agents, team leaders and managers want to know the current status of the call center. Good statistics that show the status of the call center are:
Average Handle Time (AHT) or Average Call Handle Time (ACHT)
Service Level (SL%)
Abandon Rate (ABN%)
Average Speed Answer (ASA)
Longest Wait Time (LWT)
Calls in Queue (CIQ)
ACD Time (ACDT)
There are many more statistics that are available and each Call Center manager needs to determine what is best for their call center. These statistics and more are available from your ACD.

Performance metrics provide a different picture of the contact center. While statistics show us what is going on for our call center from our point of view performance metrics will show you what your customers think of your agents and call center. The team leader or call center manager may be aware of the call center status (statistics) but not aware of what the customers think of the call center or how well we are doing compared to our goals (performance metrics).

Performance metrics can provide a view of what our customers think of our call center and how we are doing compared to our goals. For example a recent study showed that agents thought their customer satisfaction rate was above 80% while the customer gave a satisfaction rating of just above 60%. Some performance statistics that are useful to the call center manager are:
First Call Resolution (FCR%)
Customer Satisfaction (CSat%)
Agent Utilization Rate (AUR%)
Cost per Contact (CoC)
Average Speed Answer (ASA)
Abandonment Rate (ABN%)

These metrics will provide a true picture of performance in the call center, identify strengths and weaknesses, and help establish goals for the call center and agents. Used properly these same metrics can be used in a scorecard (A single weighted number that shows how well the call center is performing, today)

Each contact center needs to select the metrics and statistics that are appropriate based on the businesses industry. However, it is not unusual for a single contact center to have different metrics for different groups.


So to truly improve the efficiency of the contact Performance Metrics are the better option. These metrics provide a view of the contact center from the customers point of view and give the manager an image of what needs to be worked on to improve the contact center productivity and efficiency.

Unified Reporting for the Contact Center

Unified Reporting for the contact center goes beyond summarizing an ACD report for the team leaders or managers. True unified reporting is a multi-tiered process.

1. Identify the data and the sources where that data is stored;
2. Capture the data from disparate data silos;
3. Build the reports based on specific needs of the users;
4. Create alarms and alerts for the reports so key metrics that are in variance are highlighted;
5. Publish the reports to each level of the Contact Center from the agent to senior management.

Contact Centers store a tremendous amount of data and most never do anything with that information. Unified reporting provides the contact center the opportunity to increase agent and team leader efficiencies with real time reports showing their current status. Unified reporting also aides the manager and senior management with historical reporting and real time drill down to assess the contact centers productivity.

Call Center Scorecards

Call Center Scorecards, Balanced Scorecard or simply scorecard exist to enable call center managers to review overall call center performance.  The scorecards also assist top management in their quest to understand the value and performance of the call center.  Too often top management views the call center as a cost center and does not understand the value that the call center brings to the organization.  In addition, when a call center manager has to explain how well the call center is performing numerous statistics, charts, graphs and reports are provided which end up confusing top managers.

A balanced scorecard provides a single easy to read and understand Excel file that focuses on a few key performance indicators rather than 100’s of statistics.  Furthermore these KPI’s are weighted and compared against either the company goals or industry benchmarks.

Each industry has its own set of KPI’s that should be used to create a scorecard. However, just using the industry standards may not be enough for your business. Each call center needs to review their needs and adjust the scorecard so that it is most effective for the business. Below is a list of KPI’s that call centers have used to create a scorecard. 　　　
Daily revenue
Cost per contact
Abandon Rate (consider using a total abandon rate including IVR, Email, Chat)
ASA
FCR
CSAT
Agent Utilization
Service Level
Ticket close ratio
Call Quality
Adherence
Average Handle Time
Agent Turnover
Agent Training
IVR Completion Rate
Agent punctuality
Absenteeism

An agent’s desktop scorecard can look and have a different set of data compared to a manager or supervisors scorecard.

Showing the days goals followed by the target and the threshold conditions can change an agent’s performance.

Industry Scorecard KPI’s will differ by industry.  What one industry would focus on is not the same as what another industry might focus on. Here are some examples of KPI’s by Industry. Your contact center may want to focus on some different KPI’s, but this can be used as a start.

 Within each call center these scorecard KPI’s could change. For example, an insurance based call center that has a group that takes calls for policy cancellation calls and another group that handles new policies may not have the same goals on abandon rate and ASA. The KPI goal and benchmark may differ for each group and it would be inappropriate to use the same for each group. The Call Center Manager needs to review what is important to each business unit and what will affect performance when deciding on which KPI’s to score.

Using 3 to 8 KPI’s is ideal for the balanced scorecard. Fewer than 3 KPI’s and any change to a single KPI changes the overall scorecard value quickly. A significant change to a KPI is not seen in the total score when there are more than 8 KPI’s are evaluated. The weighted value of each KPI needs to be considered as well. Too much weight on a single KPI will affect the outcome of the scorecard quickly. Determining the weight to put on each KPI is up to the call center and its purpose. There are industry standards for each KPI but each call center is unique and these standards may not apply. In most cases Customer Satisfaction, First Call Resolution and Cost / Call are more heavily weighed than Service Level, ASA and Agent Training.

There are many types of scorecards for a contact center to consider and use.

• Agent Scorecard: A select group of metrics showing how an agent is performing 
• Team Scorecard: A scorecard for the skill group. Because skill groups have different goals it is not beneficial to use the same goals for each skill group. 
• Summary Scorecard: An accumulation of team scorecards or agent scorecards. 
• Weekly, Monthly, Yearly Summary report: This is a summary scorecard for each type of scorecard. For example a weekly scorecard report for the Contact Center Scorecard. 
• Contact Center Scorecard: A select group of metrics showing how the entire contact center is performing.

Should the scorecard use company goals or industry benchmarks to determine the performance? Both are valid methods for determining performance. A company new to scorecarding may want to look at its own company goals first to become acquainted with using the scorecard. This “trial” period will also help determine if the KPI’s that are being used in the scorecard are appropriate. Once the company is comfortable with the scorecard looking to industry benchmarks can provide insight into where the company is in relation to the industry average.

A properly built scorecard is a very effective tool for the call center manager. With a single report the manager is able to determine how well the contact center has functioned that day. By trending these reports a manager is able to show how performance is improving within the call center. The scorecard will also assist the manager in finding the areas where performance is weakest and needs the most improvement.

For more information about Call Center Scorecards contact Spectrum or visit our website.

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Dan Boehm
VP Sales and Marketing
Spectrum
dboehm@specorp.com
+1 713 986 8839

Messaging in the Call Center

Recently I was visiting one of our customers and was asking me about what types of messages he should be sending his agents desktops.  What I recommend is five different types of messages: Personal, Threshold, Variance, Voluntary time off and Voluntary over time messages.  Each is explained and an example is given below.

Personal Messages:  These are the non business related messages.  Messages such as Happy Anniversary, birthday announcements, congratulations, group announcements, award messages, etc.  These messages are not to be taken lightly. One of the issues that many call centers face is poor overall morale.  These simple messages can do wonders to improve an agent’s day.  It has been shown when the environment in the call center is positive agents perform better and this increases customer retention and helps acquire new business.

Threshold Messages: When an agent or team leader has exceeded a statistical level that is important to the overall call center goal.  Typically these are KPI values for calls in queue, service level, oldest call waiting, etc.  These messages help keep the agent on track to meet daily performance goals.  Messages of this type are automatically triggered by the Spectrum software.

Variance Messages: These messages are more critical to the agent and call center.  Messages of this type are triggered when a performance metrics goals has been missed or exceeded.  For example KPI Values for Abandon Rate, Average Speed of Answer, FCR and CSat are all performance metrics and would trigger a variance message to automatically be sent out.

Voluntary time off (VTO): Occasionally the WFM software is inaccurate and you have a call center that has many idle agents.  When this occurs a message can be sent to agents that have previously agreed to leave early for the day.  Tremendous cost savings occur using this automatic message requested those agents who have agreed to leave early when they are idle.  Managers are notified by a similar message telling them agents will be leaving early because of the low call volume and high idle time.

Voluntary time off (VTO): Occasionally the WFM software is inaccurate and you have a call center that has many idle agents.  When this occurs a message can be sent to agents that have previously agreed to leave early for the day.  Tremendous cost savings occur using this automatic message requested those agents who have agreed to leave early when they are idle.  Managers are notified by a similar message telling them agents will be leaving early because of the low call volume and high idle time.

Messaging in the call center is not just personal messages directed at specific agents.  Messaging can also be used to change behavior (Threshold and Variance Messages) and to cut costs and increase revenue (VTO and VOT messages).  Contact Spectrum to learn how desktop solutions can help improve your call center’s performance.

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Dan Boehm
VP Sales and Marketing
Spectrum
dboehm@specorp.com
+1 713 986 8839

Call Center Statistics or Call Center Performance Metrics

There is a difference between statistics and performance metrics.  Both are very helpful to the call center but are used in two different ways.  Statistics are used to show what the current status of the agent or group and performance metrics show how well the agent or group is performing.

Statistics can provide a view of what is happening in the call center right now, for the interval or for the day.  These statistics are helpful when the agents, team leaders and managers want to know the current status of the call center. Good statistics that show the status of the call center are:

Average Handle Time (AHT) or Average Call Handle Time (ACHT)
        Calculation: Total talk time + wrap time (After call works)/total  calls

Service Level (SL%)
        Calculation: The percentage of calls answered with a certain amount of time.
For example if 80 out of 100 calls were answered within 30 seconds then the service level is 80%. Some call centers have a shorter time frame such as 20 seconds or even 10 seconds. 

Abandon Rate (ABN%)
        Calculation: Total Abandoned calls / Total incoming calls
Some customers are now adding abandon calls from the IVR and Chat sessions to this calculation.

Average Speed Answer (ASA)
        Calculation: The average number of seconds (minutes) it takes to answer a call.
If it takes an average of 30 seconds to answer a call then the ASA is 30 seconds. This statistics should be measured by interval and for the day. This statistics can change throughout the day depending on the type of call center. 

Longest Wait Time (LWT) and Average Wait Time (AWT)
 Calculation: The Longest Wait Time is the longest a caller has to wait before the call is answered. Average Wait time is the average time a caller has to wait before the call is answered.

Calls in Queue (CIQ)
        Calculation: The total number of calls in the queue waiting to be handled by the agents.
Some call centers are now adding email and chat queues to the total Calls in Queue.  Some call centers track these statistics separately.

ACD Time (ACDT)
        Calculation: The total talk time by and agent or group (split/skill) spent talking to customers.
 Some call centers view the average talk time to understand the amount of time, on average, that the agent spends on each call.
   
The calculations for each statistic are the industry standard, however, your call center may want or need to measure these statistics in another manner. 

There are many more statistics that are available and each Call Center manager needs to determine what is best for their call center. These statistics and more are available from your ACD. For a complete list of statistics that are available for your call center contact Spectrum

Spectrum supports Call Centers by capturing call centers statistics and providing a unique view for the individual agents, group view for the team leaders and call center view for the managers.  Reports can be generated and displayed on LCD screens, web based reports, desktops dashboards, traditional LED Wallboards, smartphones and email. 

Agents can improve their efficiencies by knowing how well they are doing compared to their goals and targets. But, is that enough?

Performance metrics provide a different picture of the call center. While statistics show us what is going on for our call center from our point of view performance metrics will show you what your customers think of your agents and call center. The team leader or call center manager may be aware of the call center status (statistics) but not aware of what the customers think of the call center or how well we are doing compared to our goals (performance metrics). 

Performance metrics are used to manage the call center and drive sales, improve efficiencies, and increase overall customer satisfaction.  When the call center performance metrics improve the state of the business will improve. Some performance statistics that are useful to the call center manager are:

First Call Resolution (FCR%)
        Calculation: The percentage of customer issues or tickets that are resolved on the first call.
Sometimes this is a survey that the customer takes immediately after the call or given by the agent.
This is a metric that can be difficult to measure however it is an important metric as it gives the call center a clearer picture of the quality of the call center. 

Customer Satisfaction (CSat%)
        Calculation: Satisfied customers / Total calls
This calculation is typically taken from secondary survey results.  When an agent asks if the customer is satisfied they may not receive a valid answer. To assume that the customers transaction is complete and therefore the customer is satisfied is incorrect as well.  Secondary surveys are the most accurate method of calculating CSat ratings.

Agent Utilization Rate (AUR%)also known as Occupancy (OCC)
        Calculation: Total talk time + After call work + Idle Time (in hours or minutes) / total paid hours worked (both in hours or minutes).  The total talk time, idle time, after call work, hours worked must all be for the same length of time (days, hours or minutes). If you capture the total talk time and after call work for the week, then the total hours worked must be for the week as well.
Example: Talk time = 18 hours, After call work = 10 hours, Idle time = 2 hours, Number of hours worked = 38. 18 +10 + 2 =30, 30/38 = 79% agent utilization rate.  Industry best practices suggest that an agent utilization rate should fall between 70 -85%.  To low and the agent is bored, too high and the agent is stressed.  Either condition will result in a high attrition rate among the agents.

Cost per Contact (CoC)
        Calculation: ACD Calls per hour / Agents hourly rate
If you contact center has multiple agents with varying hourly rates then this calculation should be taken across the entire call center or for each group, depending on how your call center is set up.  In this case total ACD calls for the group / total agents hourly rate. IVR cost per call is calculated by determining the amortization schedule of the IVR, breaking that cost down to a monthly amount and then dividing the number of calls handled by the IVR for the month / amortized IVR cost for the month.  Only calls that are fully handled by the IVR can be used in this calculation. 
 
Average Speed Answer (ASA)
        Calculation: On average how long it takes an agent to answer a call.
Standards vary depending on the industry. For example: Financials such as mutual fund companies strive for a less than 10 second ASA.  Software support desks for non maintenance customers can exceed 1 hour. Contact Spectrum to learn more about your industries best practices for ASA. 

Abandonment Rate (ABN%)
        Calculation: Number of calls abandoned / total calls
Call abandoned should be after the first 8-10 seconds.  Most calls abandoned during this time are false abandons, wrong numbers, caller was interrupted, caller was not ready, etc. Some call centers are including IVR abandons as well but only when they are certain their IVR is functioning properly.
       
The calculations for each metric are the industry standard, however, your call center may want or need to measure these metrics in another manner.  You will also notice that Abandonment Rate and ASA are shown as a useful statistic and a useful performance metric.  These two KPI’s can and should be used for both call center status and call center performance.

These metrics will provide a true picture of performance in the call center, identify strengths and weaknesses, and help establish goals for the call center and agents.  Used properly these same metrics can be used to provide an aggregate call center performance number (A single weighted number that shows how well the call center is performing, today)

To truly support the effort to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the agents in the call center reporting must include call center statistics and performance metrics. Statistics tell us how we are doing right now but do not tell us how we are performing against our goals.  Performance Metrics show us how well we are performing but do not tell us how we are doing right now.  By utilizing both statistics and performance metrics a call center manager can improve the call center.

Implementing call center statistics and performance metrics in the call center can be done by having unique reporting at the agent, team leader and manager level. 

• Agents can utilize a desktop solution that rotates through their statistics and performance.  They see how they are performing and then see what they are doing right now. As they improve on the immediate issues (calls waiting, handle time, problem solution, etc) they will see their performance improve) Agents will also benefit from seeing group statistics and performance metrics on a LCD screen for their group. 
• Team Leaders follow the agents and the group through a web report as well as the LCD screen.  When the group level performance falls they are able to drill down on the web report to determine which agent(s) are falling behind and can coach them. 
• Managers utilize web based reports and smart phones to keep tabs on the call center.  They are able to determine how the center is doing against goal with the performance metrics and can drill down on the call center statistics to see which group/agent need improvement and coaching.  Staying connected while mobile with a smart phone gives the manager flexibility to continue to do the job while attending staff and managerial meetings.
• Managers also are able to report to the business with a single report showing the score of the call center with a weighted scorecard approach.  By selecting key performance indicators attaching a weight to those KPI’s and comparing against the goals the manager can now show that improvement and trend of the call center over time.  Contact Spectrum for specifics on weighted scorecards.

As a call center manager deciding on a solution to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of your call center consider what is more important to your success statistics, performance metrics or both. Statistics will show you and the agents how they are doing right now and performance metrics tell you what your customers think of you and how well the center is performing against goals and targets.

Spectrum is a leading provider of Unified Contact Center Reporting.  Contact Spectrum today to learn more about real time reporting for your contact center. 

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Dan Boehm
VP Sales and Marketing
Spectrum
dan@specorp.com
+1713 986 8839    

At-Home Call Center Agents

Envision your contact center with fewer agents in the office yet customers are receiving the same if not better support and service. Imagine a contact center where agents can have flexible hours, but you still have full coverage 24 hours a day. With an at-home agent program your call center could realize these benefits and much more. Some of the benefits of an at-home agent program include:

• Larger pool of talented individuals to pull from
• Better educated
• More responsible and reliable
• More productive agents
• Flexible scheduling
• Costs savings
• Lower attrition rates

Spectrum supports at-home agents with dashboards to allow real time reporting and messaging to a users desktop. Aside from the technical challenges of setting up at-home agents the agent themselves will experience personal challenges.  Agents want:

• To know how they are performing
• To know how they compare against other agents
• How well their group is doing
• To have contact with the corporate call center
• To feel like they are a valuable part of a team

Utilizing Spectrum desktop reporting agents receive detail statistics on how well they are doing, how they are performing against their goals, how their group is doing and they are aware if they need to log into other groups to provide further support.

In addition, at-home agents have the advantage of communicating through messages to and from the office.  These messages can be threshold messages, personal messages offering encouragement, scheduled messages reminding the agents to log in/out and the messages can be generated by the agent if needed.

Spectrum supports user rights and roles and therefore only those agents that have the proper rights will be able to initiate a message.  If the agent does not have the proper rights they will be limited to read only or read/reply access.  All messages sent to the agents can be stored indefinitely to meet corporate or regulatory compliance.

As call centers continue to evolve the look for ways to reduce costs yet retain the same level of service they have always had.  Companies can benefit from at-home agents when the agents have the right tools to do the job and feel like part of the team.  

Spectrum desktop reporting and messaging (XorceView) is available to help your work-at-home agents with real time information to assist the agent.  Contact Spectrum today and learn more about at-home agent reporting.

Dan Boehm
VP Sales and Marketing
Spectrum
dboehm@specorp.com
+1 713 986 8839