 |
 |
 |
(originally published in Call Center Magazine) Service Delivery: How Fast Is Fast Enough?Callers don't call because they want to -- they call because they have to. For them, a five-minute call is better than a 15-minute call because it provides them with 10 more minutes of their life back. One of the great benefits to staying in an industry for 20 or more years is that you have the opportunity to see changes take place regarding key assumptions that impact success. Often, the basic concepts that brought an industry into prominence change over time, and the call center industry is no exception. Back in the mid-1980s, when I was just starting out in call centers, one of the key assumptions we worked under was that customers choose phone contact because of convenience, and that for us to fulfill that obligation, we had to embrace the concept of speed. It makes perfect sense when you realize that service options outside of the call center at that time were face-to-face contact and postal mail. Our options today, of course, are far greater. In a world of Web-accessed FAQs, text-chat, speech-enabled IVR systems and even customer-generated knowledge bases, agent-assisted phone contact is not always the king of convenience among support options. Call center leaders with fewer than eight or 10 years of industry experience have lived with this reality since first coming on board, and it changes the view of what we need to deliver in order to satisfy customers. As an example of the changing viewpoints, I recently had a discussion about the origin of the "80/20" service level with a director who was new to the call center profession. The question was prompted from a viewpoint that it was a dated objective, and that today's call center customers no longer expect such quick service. The assumption about customer expectations is certainly debatable, but let's first address the background of the 80/20 service level. While I have no research to prove it, my theory on the popularity of the 80/20 service level stems from our handling of incoming calls way back when calls were delivered directly to agents rather than to an informational recording. In lieu of messages informing callers of our monitoring program and how much better it would be if they went to the web site for help, we had no choice but to deliver the call to a human being (or to a queuing message, if all agents were busy). To "buy a little time" when agents were not available, we would send the caller four cycles of artificial ringback. Each ring cycle lasted around five seconds, so this strategy would buy us 20 seconds or so to free an agent. In other words, from the caller's perspective, any call answered in 20 seconds or less sounded like an immediate answer. Therefore, our 80/20 goal translated into four out of five callers thinking that the call was answered immediately. Think back to your recent experiences attempting to reach a call center. Would you say that four of the last five times you were answered immediately? Probably not. Every element of call handling takes longer now than 10 to 20 years ago -- that includes menu navigation, waiting for agents, talking to agents, getting placed on hold (more often and for longer periods of time), getting transferred (more often) and, finally, closing out the case. The reasons for this increased time commitment include the following:
To this list, some might add internal factors, such as high turnover rates and lack of expertise at developing menu options. And certainly, specific industries and individual call centers have other issues that have caused increased call time. Whatever the list of reasons, the end result is that customers need to invest more time to contact us to have their needs addressed. And while some of it is out of our control, we can't explain away all of it. And here's the truth that gets obscured when we try to justify confusing menus, long queues and high talk times: Your customers don't want to spend time with you. I know that's a bitter pill to swallow, especially when the well-intentioned among us have generally done a terrific job transforming call centers into places where customer relationships are established and enhanced. Yet the vast majority of our callers do not call us because they want to -- they call us because they have to. For them, a five-minute call is infinitely more appealing than a 15-minute call because it provides them with 10 more minutes to do the things they want to do, from writing the great American novel to playing with their kids to watching Beavis and Butthead reruns. And, frankly, if you can eliminate the need for the call in its entirety, you give them five more minutes of their lives back. When you accept this, it helps to galvanize the approach to speed. Whether the call center is or is not the quickest support option, the need for speed is still there. It's one of the few opportunities you get to truly "walk the talk." If we really do care passionately about our customers, there are few better ways to show it than to respect their time. And yes, one of the great by-products to faster overall service is lower cost. But when you treat it as just that -- a by-product -- you keep the organization focused on win-win opportunities. One final consideration: speed never trumps quality. Our mission in the center is to provide friendly, complete service to all of our callers. A five-minute call is, in no way, better than a 15-minute call if crucial information is missed, proper follow-up is not taken, or the customer feels that he or she received a rude brush-off. Great service must be a given, but within that mantra are options that impact the time investment of our customers. Give them the great service they deserve in as little time as possible, and they'll love you for a lifetime. - Jay Minnucci
|