Welcome to… Paradise or Purgatory?

Quit, work, miserableCall Centers spend huge amounts of time and resources researching, hiring and training their agents, only to have them take off in a matter of months. It’s a frustrating and expensive result that ultimately impacts the companies success. But really, it’s all about where you put your attention. It seems that today, most businesses haven’t dedicated enough emphasis in meaning.

 

Someone who gets it.

Author and motivational speaker Chip Conley started his own hospitality company, Joie de Vivre (JDV), and, as CEO for two-dozen years, grew it into the second largest boutique hotel and California’s largest independent hotel company.

How did he do it?

What do Call Centers really need?

According to Psychologist Maslow’s theory, we are born with a pyramid of basic needs. Without meeting these needs, we will be unable to grow and progress up the pyramid. Like life, work and its relationship with its employees has its own set of basic needs. When leadership doesn’t understand and actively apply the basic needs, employees lose motivation and eventually quit.

Even with a large focus in technology and metrics, Call Center’s have been known as a neglected, unrewarding and innovation-deprived industry. This has unfortunately resulted in high attrition rates, low motivation, and poor performance among others. Somewhere, something was lost, and needs transformation.

We’ve discovered what that was…

Find out here:

Call Center Gamification: How Great Call Centers Get Their Mojo From Maslow

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Listen up Call Centers….your Customers are calling

Call Centers have been an easy target. They’re the brunt of criticism or jokes when people describe the service from recent calls to their cable company, insurance agency or credit card center. Many times, they have a good reason to be dissatisfied. What challenges does upper Management and Agents face that have ultimately caused issues?

Management Challenges

  • Metrics

Developing influential and accurate metrics that hit company objectives is a difficult task. To maintain a competitive advantage, Employees must use these results to connect with and achieve their goals. A Call Center may handle and analyze thousands or hundreds of thousands of calls per day. With all the measuring, it can be easy to lose the balance of obtaining results and keeping sight of quality customer service. Continue reading →

Demotivated…what happened?


Sometimes, you just don’t want to work. You lie in bed and process why you’re dreading going in. You’ve had a bad week or maybe you’ve been miserable from day one. Regardless, something has changed and the thought of stepping out of bed makes your stomach turn. Maybe one of the following is a reason why…

 

No Direction

Your targets or goals are vague or unrealistic and you feel you have really no way to achieve them. Maybe you weren’t trained sufficiently, or you don’t have the support. Either way, you’ve lost your confidence and ambition. It’s hard to take pride in your job when you have no idea what your doing.

No Kudos

Did you work really hard on a great project only to have your credit shrugged off or unfairly given to someone else? Or maybe no one seems to recognize the effort you put in day after day in an incredibly tough job. If there isn’t enough praise or if you feel like the work you do is never appreciated or recognized, why try?

No Social life

Too many hours. You live, breath and think about work. You have no time for your family or friends. You’re burned out, exhausted and overburdened which renders you unable to perform your duties well.

Continue reading →

Supervisor Skills 101

With greater accountability, pressure and responsibility, it’s tough being a Supervisor. What’s even tougher is working under one that has little to no idea in properly managing and leading others. What abilities should they possess that will set them apart?

 

Feedback

If it’s positive or negative, it takes skill to effectively communicate. Supervisors have the power to make it pleasant and meaningful. How? Most importantly, feedback should be an ongoing process, and not just a once a year followup. It should be relevant, constructive, and give the employee an opportunity to develop or change behavior and performance through realistic goals.

Listening

One way to value an employee is by giving them quality attention. Supervisors should be prepared to allow employees to provide their input in situations, listen and ask appropriate questions. Listening= Learning.

Attitude

…is everything. A negative attitude can contaminate a workplace and generally make things feel awkward. While everyone has their bad days, having a higher position means greater control in altering workplace morale. Work with a Supervisor who continually criticizes, complains or has a bad temperament towards work or employees? Not so fun.

Continue reading →

Call Centers: 10 reasons why it’s a miserable job

Call centers fill a valuable role in the world of telemarketing, health care, customer service and much more.  Working there seems like a great opportunity to advance ones career, learn communication skills and make some cash. But Is it? 

Call centers have been associated as a negative, thankless job… here’s why.

1. The Training

Insufficient. Mainly, the focus is to train and get you on the floor as quickly as possible.

2. Repetition

Impersonal, fluffy scripts. Pick up the phone, follow the directions, deal with the problem, and repeat as quickly as possible. A constant, mind-numbing blur.

3. Customer handling

Help is skewed towards scripted empathy, concern, and reassurance.  Actually resolving the customer’s problem comes second.

4. The Customers

It’s nerve-wracking when irate customers target you with their frustrations, questions and complaints, and even worse if you’re not from their country.

Continue reading →