Calling time on a bad reputation
After years of having a bad reputation, call centres may be getting their act together, writes Patrick McCurry.
Call centres are often criticised as being little more than 21st century sweat-shops, with under-trained and over-monitored staff handling non-stop calls in a stressful environment.
Although this image is often unfounded, the industry has suffered from high levels of staff turnover. In an attempt to tackle this, and because the nature of the job is changing, a growing number of centres are putting in place rigorous training programmes, some of them accredited.
The call centre industry has expanded dramatically since the 1980s and now employs 2 per cent of the working population - more than the combined workforces of coal mining, steel and car production.
Staff turnover remains high - typically 20 to 25 per cent, according to Colin McKay, head of quality and standards at the Call Centre Association. "That's comparable to the retail sector, but the problem is that it costs a lot more to train a call centre agent than a shop assistant, with recruitment costs of up to £18,000 for the more sophisticated call centre jobs," he says.
Call centre jobs are also evolving. There is a move away from dealing with high volumes of calls in a scripted way to a concept of 'contact centres' where more emphasis is placed on communicating through other channels, such as e-mail, and agents take more responsibility for resolving customer problems.
A Health and Safety Executive study, released last December, concluded that call centres were not the sweat-shops of public image. However, the study did find that working practices were more intensive than for other computer-based office jobs, with rigorous targets set for agents and calls regularly monitored. Problem areas highlighted included agents suffering verbal abuse and stress.
Time pressures and tough targets can act as a barrier to training as team leaders can be so busy managing that they have little time for coaching or training, says Stephanie Wilson, general manager at Convergys, the world's largest provider of outsourced call centres. Convergys' Newcastle call centre has won an IiP regional award, but there are particular challenges to training and people development in call centres, she says.
"Team leaders have an important role to play in training and coaching but the company needs to make a commitment to support them, otherwise they will spend all their time on admin and report writing. We have transferred some of their admin tasks to others, which means the team leaders have more time to coach."
While it is still somewhat rare for a call centre to achieve IiP, Wilson says there was no prejudice againstConvergys when it sought accreditation: "IiP is used to service industries, like hotel chains, and we're not that different."
Qualifications
There is growing use of NVQs in call centres, following the development of specific call centre qualifications in the past two years. Blick UK, a manufacturer of clocking-in machines and other equipment, was one of the pilots.
Its Swindon call centre is relatively small - with 20 agents - but it faces competition for staff from the large number of call centres in the area.
"We've only had one person leave in the last two years, which is very good considering the other opportunities here," says national call centre manager Chris Jones.
It typically takes an agent 12 to 18 months to gain the NVQ level 2 and both team leaders have achieved an NVQ in call centre supervision.
"Staff like to gain a qualification and want to complete it so they are much less likely to leave during that 12-18 month period," adds Jones.
Another challenge is the variety of people who join call centres, many of which have been opened in areas where heavy industry once reigned.
Ventura provides outsourced call centre operations from sites in Leeds and the Dearne Valley, Yorkshire. Stephen May, head of training, says younger people tend to pick up keyboard and technical skills easily but need particular training in customer empathy, while the older recruits have opposite training needs.
Bradford-based Loop Customer Management, which provides services to DIY chain B&Q, has had to hire people who understand their market - typically, older men with backgrounds in engineering or construction. "They have been quite wary of the technology but we have reassured them that they will pick it up and stressed they already have great customer service skills," says training manager Corinne Brooksbank.
Despite the increase in training, there are still problems, says Kelly Bains, call centre development manager at recruitment agency Adecco. "Many are throwing training at the problem of staff retention but it often doesn't work as it should."
He says that team leaders, who are also expected to act as coaches, often do not have sufficient coaching skills. They are also often sidetracked into spending most of their coaching time on poor performers in a team and so neglect the better performers. "That leads to the better performers feeling they are not getting the training they need," says Bains.
Another issue which companies are having to address is the fact there are only limited promotion opportunities in the industry. Call centres are fairly flat hierarchies, with only two levels - agents and team leaders - says Ventura's May.
Many of the staff are working mothers or students, who like the flexible hours and are not necessarily interested in making it a career. To tackle this, Ventura has introduced a 'performer plus' scheme for those who have been in the job 12 months and meet certain performance standards.
There are four performance levels, each carrying a pay increase. This means staff can continue to train with the incentive of earning more and do not feel they are stuck in a rut says May. "It's a kind of horizontal development rather than the traditional vertical progression," he explains, adding that those in the scheme are 25 per cent more likely to stay with the company than other agents.
David Rigney, head of building society Nationwide's call centres, says the company shook up its training three years ago and introduced more opportunities for career development. It now has five levels of responsibility, starting at entry-level agent right up to financial consultant.
Quality of calls
The programme for its 800 staff scooped the Personnel Today Award for Excellence in Training last year. "We wanted to get away from agents leaving their personalities at the door when they arrived and to give them more freedom in how they worked," says Rigney.
This meant instead of strict targets, such as each call not lasting more than three minutes, agents were measured on how much time they spent talking to customers, regardless of time per call. More emphasis is spent on assessing the quality of calls and customer satisfaction.
Agents have also received more training in selling Nationwide products in a 'softly-softly' manner, says Rigney. "The changes have helped us reduce staff turnover from 20-25 per cent to 14 per cent."
He believes the role of team leaders as coaches is crucial, particularly listening to taped calls with individual agents, who are also given a CD illustrating good and bad examples of calls. "Team leaders work 37 hours a week and they know that half that time is assigned to coaching," he says.
Colin McKay, of the CCA, says that as the industry continues to grow so will the need for training. A growing number of business schools are offering call centre content in their MBAs but training needs are much broader than that. "We are talking to the e-skills NTO about giving the CCA a role in accrediting in-house training and developing a professional standard for call centre staff because that's something that is lacking," he says.
Under the CCA's plan there would be sector standards based on the NVQs and on standards developed at Nottingham Trent University, which has been offering courses at university level for team leaders and managers.
McKay argues that soon it will no longer be true that there are limited career prospects in the industry, pointing to the huge growth in the sector in recent years.
"That growth will continue and will mean more opportunities for managers," he says.
"If I were a young person interested in management, one of the first sectors I'd look at is call centres because there's such growth going on."
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