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Improving the Productivity In Outbound Call Centers Through the Help Of KPIs

Saturday, February 6th, 2010

The outbound call centre industry is a booming business these days. Banks, mobile service providers and even Insurance agents involve the use of outbound calling for increasing their company sales, marketing their products or services and sometimes even for obtaining crucial customer feedback. Complete information on the first call itself and engaging customer interest are the parameters for a good outbound call. It is imperative to offer ample information and guidance to the customer in a manner that leaves no room for doubt. New customers obtained and profit measures are significant factors.

While there are many strategies that management in the outbound call centre can apply in improving the overall productivity and quality. Nothing proves as beneficial as using a well thought out contact center metric system that can accurately measure the performance aspects of the agents and other stakeholders.  A well structured contact centre metric can easily decipher the choke point areas in the operations and even draw attention to areas that require immediate oversight.  Last but not the least such a metric group can also offer insights about restructuring the operations with an eye on shoring up the productivity.

Practices in call center management

Wednesday, October 14th, 2009

Call centers are centers where thousands of calls are switches daily to be replied for their questions. This proposes that appropriate arrangement of time is of highest significance for directors in such a place. Therefore, by formations metrics aimed at guaranteed usual following of procedures that happen at call center, one can determine the issue of presentation management.Balanced Scorecard can play improving the worker efficiency in call centers. A key imminent that this case presents us is the information that directors at call center should recognize that the workplace conditions are suitable for personnel reducing the unenthusiastic effects on their physical condition. This is for the reason that the observation that quite a few the health turbulence have direct impact on the employees’ presentation. The developers of the call center should disburse the preferred concentration to such features for creating relaxed environment. These should be capable to help the personnel in their useful necessities of procedures and work.On the other hand, the intended users should disburse concentration to the reality that not each countable gauge is countable and not each countable limit can be counted. Assembling metrics only for the reason that those can be easily added up will not provide the idea rather shove the firm in an incorrect direction all in all. Consequently, the key is to resolve for simply those pieces that are mainly probable to communicate the current state in as correct way as likely. To turn up at such a place, one can bank upon the most excellent practices being followed by trade leaders.

Raising the revenues for each call in a call center is a compound task as there is no magic system that can accomplish the same. Most frequently than not there is a complete set features to be taken care off which comprises excellence customer care to process good organization. As a result weighing up these different metrics requires assist of an appropriate tool such as a balanced scorecard. On a balanced scorecard you work out your own call center metrics or get the help of prepared to use call center scorecards as for each your obligation.

 

A call center scorecard hands out as essential orientation point and assist you speedily picks up the revenues for each call by permitting you to adapt you assessment methods according to its fixed KPIs. It as well serves as an important tool for small centers which are short of the expertise to plan their own assessment metrics from scrape. Last but not least they assist you put aside expensive time which otherwise is necessary for designing your own modified metrics and permits you to rapidly start off the chunks.

Better Talk Time can be determine with Scorecards

Wednesday, October 14th, 2009

The victory aspects in any trade depend on, how professionally the overall processes, actions and methodologies are assembled. They should not just guarantee cost- efficiency, but exploit the best of individual and technical possessions. How fine the personnel of an entity execute is directly associated to what capital are offers to them, how appropriately demanding and skill-stretching their everyday jobs is, how well aggravated they are and what are the corporation policies that establish worker retain over a creative number of years.

Similar to any additional trade unit, the domain of a call-center victory falls in the identical standard. With its different work atmosphere overloaded with information and possessions, how fine they are channelized to gain the utmost, is the key to success. The majority of the time the data is separated among persons who are managing a whole categorization of queries and making inbound and out bound calls for this requirement. This creates it completely essential to measure the performance of the overall functions in a call-center.

Both technical capital and personnel are plentiful in a call-center, therefore, mistreatment or ignore in handling any of these can result in inefficiencies that would later be the vital stimulators of decline in the efficiency of an association. This is the cause associations are depending greatly on well incorporated hold up systems as balanced scorecard. One such matter that can be attempted successfully but is typically unnoticed includes calculating competent average of Talk Time. By classification talk time is; the term or time bound for which a call center mediator was occupied in a deal.

Talk time for each call can be enhanced by twenty to thirty seconds for each call by using balanced scorecards; additional developments can be determines if better controls are allocated using the weights and indicators. This permits correct understanding of call time necessities all the way through the front-line administrators who are openly communicating from side to side this device. With the aid of metrics, normal time period allocated can be evaluated to the present regular call length. One more helpful instrument balanced scorecard presents is the balancing tree with the aid of which objectives and the load given to this assignment or any other can be calculated. For example if X task has load defined to be 4 and Z task has load of 6, then the assignment with additional load shall be measured more important.

This will assist the association put up sound approach that will help in construction towering companies of tomorrow. They key matters that can be handled by means of scorecards for this reason comprise; ad hoc call representative abilities, better make contact with procedure and well-organized systems hold up.

Call Center Scorecards

Friday, September 25th, 2009

An effective strategy based on Balanced Scorecards enables to measure the efficiency and productivity of the call center, management and its operations in a cohesive approach. Call centers which are the hub of businesses, dealing with the customers, provide a channel of interaction between business entities and the potential consumers. These businesses can be the utility providing firms as the; banks, mails or catalog firms. A call center can be either inbound or outbound. Inbound call centers receive calls from customers who may need assistance or information about a certain product or service. However, outbound call centers, on the other hand, make outgoing calls to potential customers for marketing purposes.

One of the dilemmas for the management of a call center like any other business entity is; curbing the costs and striving to reach a balance between expenses and the service levels provided. Since none of the calling customers want to be on hold or call waiting for a very long time, call centers have to increase the number of their call agents in order increase the responsiveness time towards these calls. The salaries of the call center agents make up to seventy percent of the call center expenses and hence, the management tries to maintain a minimum number of efficient workers. Still, it is essential for call centers to enhance and optimize the productivity of their agents and other resources in order to combat this particular scenario.

Since a few years call centers have been relying on forecasting techniques via telecommunication in order to identify the requirement of agents for a particular point in time. This approach focuses on predicting call traffic intensity in any given hour and scrutinizes the historical data and the market trends of the past and present. Another important factor studied is the behavior of the customers when their calls get queued. The performance measures focus on the aspects that include; talk time, handling time, calls attended per hour and time of delay etc.

However in today’s world there is s considerable shift in the concerns of the organizations and the management on the whole. As compared to talk times and handling time, which was given the most significance in the past, overall call center performance based on the indicators identified by the scorecards are given more importance. These key performance indicators are based on the goals of the organization and thus keep the targets and objective in-line with the mission and vision. A vigilant focus on these KPIs will allow the management to track and predict loopholes, performances and efficiencies of the system. Also, they will help in pinpointing and formulating solutions and implementation strategies for the same. With the help of scorecards management and measurement not only becomes an easier tasks for the administration but it also allows the other stake holders to view a clear picture of the performance of a call center with respect to its internal and external issues and influences.

Call Centre outsourcing KPI

Friday, September 18th, 2009

With call centers flourishing by leaps and bounds entities have even opted to manage their internal functions and routine tasks and help desks through it.  Business entities entertain international services and internal functions through call centers. In such organizations managers are the sales agents of the firm. They serve in the front line and take to problem resolution, communication, satisfying and sales of any product or service. Hence, knowing what are the stronger areas of the firm is as important as knowing where businesses are slacking from. To best combat this challenge Balanced Score card come equipped with solutions and tools to measure, plan, control, device the performance agents using its unique set of metrics.

A typical  Call Center Outsourcing Indicators and performance indicators include; call center outsourcing, financial perspective, percentage  increase in revenues, percentage  labor costs, average increase in remuneration per employee, percentage  incentives, customer perspective, average waiting time on calls, average holding time on call, accessibility, percentage  first call resolution, privacy issues, operational efficiency, percentage  occupancy, calls answered, handling time per customer, percentage  of calls transferred, percentage  of calls reworked, education and growth perspective, percentage  hike in appraisal, average time of appraisal, number of training sessions, number of surveys and feedback.

Outsourcing call centers is a very demanding and meticulous job which calls for a measurable approach for the tasks involved. The metrics can be framed according to relevant situations and areas to identify the influencing factors and assigning them values. These scorecards are the mirror to the desired and actual states of processes, procedures, methodologies or approaches. Outsourcing is the result of businesses who want to focus on their core operations. The quality of output received from the contact center outsourcing determines the success of buying work. Therefore the use of scorecards allows management to sum up important areas in the form of metrics and monitor them with the help of numbers.

Another crucial area that deserves focusing and attention is the selection of metrics, when it comes to designing a scorecard for near shore outsourcing. It has to be kept in mind that everything that counts is not countable and everything that is countable does not count. By treading the scorecard path cautiously, one can come up with an effective way to monitor global outsourcing operations.

Outsourcing Scorecards can be used along the hierarchy of organization assisting the lower level management with performance measures and the high level with a viewpoint from varying angle that will help satisfy the stakeholders to the maximum and provide a clarified view of the operational tasks within an organization. Structuring relevant KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) on scorecard helps in tracking the potential areas in the form of indicators to which ‘target’ and ‘actual’ values can be assigned. These metrics that can be incorporated and related to the levels that need to be studied in a given circumstance

Tracking the outsourcing of call center functions through KPIs

Thursday, September 17th, 2009

Call Centers have been quite successful in providing various kinds of ‘support services’ to other organizations. With the trend of outsourcing call center tasks increasingly gaining momentum, organizations are looking towards techniques that allow them to track the performance of their outsourced processes.

It is an well known fact that most organizations have favored ‘balanced scorecard’ approach a track a majority of their processes. Now the same approach can be applied to outsourced tasks and with the help of a call center outsourcing scorecard one can track the ultimate outcome has ‘efficiency of call centers’ as one of the factors.

The actual acts will involve ‘laying down the important indicators at one place under suitable categories’; ‘setting the target values’; ‘calculating the actual values’ and ‘comparing the two sets of  values so as to keep actual values restricted within the given range’. By following these numbers and digits, user can get assured of being on the right track forever. However, regular up-dations regarding the targets have to be undertaken so that no ‘lagging (in any sense)’ is discovered in later times.

Use parameters to benchmark and assess the performance of call centers

Thursday, September 10th, 2009

Call centers are hubs where thousands of calls are handled everyday to be answered for their queries. This suggests that proper alignment of time is of utmost importance for managers in such a place. Thus, by structuring metrics aimed at ensuring regular following of processes that occur at call center, one can resolve the issue of ‘performance management’.

One can assign values to these indicators and ensure that actual values are well within the pre-decided range. By doing this, it will be possible to keep things in control and improve situations gradually.

The act of identifying call centre metrics however has to be a very tactical one as wrong selection can fall severely heavy on organizational operations in the long run. This set of parameters thus, can help sail through the sea of uncertainty and turbulence in a pretty easy and smooth manner.

To say it all, one can get over the difficult issues of call centers in a quantitative manner and emerge a winner with this balanced scorecard. However, this act of devising parameters is a thoughtful one and should be carried out with care as any wrong decision can take a toll on the previously fine running processes.

Determining Better ‘Talk Time’ With Scorecards

Monday, September 7th, 2009

The success factors in any business depend on, how efficiently the overall operations, activities and methodologies are constructed. They should not only ensure cost- effectiveness, but utilize the best of human and technological resources. How well the workers of an entity perform is directly linked to what resources are provided to them, how aptly challenging and skill-stretching their tasks is, how well motivated they are and what are the company policies that ascertain employee retain over a productive number of years.

Like any other business entity, the domain of a call-center success falls in the same criterion. With its distinct work environment overloaded with data and resources, how well they are channelized to obtain the maximum, is the key to triumph. Most of the time the information is segregated among individuals who are handling an entire classification of queries and making inbound and out bound calls for this need. This makes it absolutely necessary to gauge the performance of the overall operations in a call-center.

Both technological resources and staff are abundant in a call-center, hence, abuse or neglect in handling any of these can result in inefficiencies that would later be the crucial stimulators of deterioration in the productivity of an organization. This is the reason organizations are depending heavily on well integrated support systems as Balanced Scorecard. One such issue that can be tackled effectively but is mostly overlooked, includes calculating efficient-average of ‘Talk Time’. By definition talk time is; the tenure or time limit for which a call center agent was engaged in a transaction. It starts from the time of acquaintance i.e. a simple ‘hello’ and ends upon the closing note which is ‘goodbye’ in almost all cases. In customer relationship management, it is the significant time when valuable information can be extracted from the customers and is expressed in terms of average minutes.

With the use of balanced scorecards, talk time per call can be improved by twenty to thirty seconds per call. More improvements can be ascertained if better controls are assigned using the weights and indicators. This allows proper understanding of call time requirements throughout the front-line managers who are directly communicating through this tool. With the help of metrics, average time duration assigned can be compared to the current average call duration. Another useful tool balanced scorecard offers is the Balancing Tree with the help of which goals (i.e. reducing call time) and the weight assigned to this task or any other can be measured. For example if X task has weight defined to be 4 and Z task has weight of 6, then the task with more weight shall be considered more significant.

This will help the organization build sound strategies that will assist in building towering corporations of tomorrow. They key issues that can be handled using scorecards for this purpose include; improvised call agent capabilities, better contact process and efficient systems support.

Call Center Management through Balanced Scorecards

Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009

With the rapidly changing dynamics of the marketplaces today, the call centers have covered by leaps and bounds the drift between organization and their diversity needs. It is a consolidated office well-equipped with tools which are essential for transmitting and receiving large volume of information, queries and communication means. It involves entertaining incoming calls for queries and issues regarding a particular product or service. However, it can also be used for the purpose of making outbound calls to serve needs as; telemarketing, debt collection and promotions etc. Other devices that have become an integral part of a call center include mailing and fulfillment, live online chat support, emails and faxes etc.

Within a call center open workspaces are provided to a number of agents individually, along with a telephone and headset. It can be monitored and managed independently but more often is linked to a corporate support system. For such an environment where data is random and in abundance it is crucial to structure an implementation design that guarantees maximum data management. Control over data within an organization will prove to be as successful for present as it would be for future. For this reason business entities are relying on effective support systems that ensure to preserve data for current trend-watching and analyses. One such support system is the Balanced Scorecard that allows organizations to research and study in detail random data to interpret it as useful information.

For efficiency management it is empirical that the related processes should be identified, the key areas are measured and result is communicated throughout the firm for better understanding. With the staff grouped in varying tiers a support system works coherently managing and handling calls according to the flow. The information retrieved or yielded during these calls is categorized and saved in the central databases. However this is not the only function balanced scorecard is helpful in. It encompasses other related departments and their activities like; services, product development and system improvisation etc.

How it is conducted is very simple. Metrics are used as indicators to visualize the projection. These metrics are number based and important for assessing the performance of a business entity. It helps corporations to plan, control and organize their business operations. These metrics are grouped together but can be used only once and not duplicated.

For various organizations it helps focus on varying issues. These performance and efficiency metrics enable studies, productive time and corporate management to become a relatively easier task. Thus enabling these customer interaction centers to gather valuable information regarding; policies, performances, tasks and better employee and customer relationship management for the purpose of utilizing this to build their resource pool in future.

Call Center KPIs

Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009

Most corporate enterprises make use of call centers to interact with their potential target market. The count of such examples is endless ranging from; customer support to mailing and fulfillment. With call centers operations expanding some entities even opt to manage their internal functions and routine tasks like technical support and help desks through it.  Businesses even service internal functions through call centers. Examples of this include help desks, retail financial support, and sales support. In such organization managers are the best sales agents of the firm. They serve in the front line and take to problem resolution, communication, satisfying and sales of any product or service. Hence, knowing what are the stronger areas of the firm is as important as knowing where businesses are slacking from.

To best combat this challenge Balanced Score card come equipped with solutions and tools to measure, plan, control, device the performance agents using its unique set of metrics. It can be used along the hierarchy of organization assisting the lower level management with performance measures and the high level with a viewpoint from varying angle that will help satisfy the stakeholders to the maximum and provide a clarified view of the operational tasks within an organization.

The operations, activities and tasks within call centers are defined using number based scoring system. The widely arrayed task ranging from promotion to post service poses challenges of the management that relate to technology and staffing field. It is of high concern that organizations   develop an adequately powerful knowledge-pool about the various aspects involved in customer service to aptly resolve the concerns that keep springing up now and again.

Structuring relevant KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) on scorecard helps in tracking the potential areas in the form of indicators to which ‘target’ and ‘actual’ values can be assigned.

These metrics that can be incorporated and related to the levels that need to be studied in a given circumstance. The operations within a call center are dependent on two types of calls namely; inbound calls and outbound calls. Inbound are the ones that are done by customers for having information about the operations, thereby giving it the shape of help-desk. Outbound calls, however, are made to people for the purpose of selling or promoting products or services to them. These two categories with numerous tasks assigned can be managed better with the help of scorecards.

Balanced Scorecards also offer ideas of presenting that are appealing and logical. For example its use of stop lights which are indicated as a red, yellow or green triangle and appear next to the metrics that require attention, which can be adjusted according to specific performances and turned off as well. These spot lights can also be used in the reports for the purpose of data communication. This allows data to become easy to be tracked and comparable against defined measures of calculation.