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viewpoint paper

Improving Contact Centers Through Operational Processes

Contact centers remain the crucial touchpoint in customer relationship management. To

help their companies win additional customers and market share, they must give customers

superior service while delivering measurable business value at low cost. Optimizing operationa

processes in addition to customer delivery processes helps contact centers meet these

goals. This paper describes how organizations can use this approach to achieve top box

performance in customer delight while signicantly reducing costs and improving enter-

prise competitiveness.

>>Contact Centers eds.com


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Author

Brian Hughes

Manager

EDS BPO Customer Interaction

Table of Contents

Introduction 1

Operationalprocessview 1

Operationalprocesses

bestpracticeslinkage 2

Theprocesses 3

Contact center planning 3

Employee retention

and growth 4

Operational management 7

Customer contact

management 8

Making it happen 9

Sizeandscope 10

Challenges 10

Technologyoptions

andopportunities 10

Results 11

Successstory:leading

U.S.newspaper 12

Conclusion 12

Abouttheauthor 13


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EDS viewpoint papercontact centers

Introduction

Is your contact center performing in ways that maximize protability and market share for your business? Sharply reducing costs

and improving employee satisfaction are important success factors. The ultimate goal, though, is to delight your customers and

win more of them as a result. Yet in todays environment, these goals seem to compete with each other. Employees fear layoffs,

offshoring and frozen salaries; managers face increasing client expectations with diminishing resources and budgets.

To meet their objectives, contact center organizations have focused primarily only on customer delivery processes such as handling

customer requests and initiating contacts. Through our work with clients, EDS has discovered that another area operational

processes demands equal attention. These processes are often twice as numerous as delivery processes, and thus have a

signicant impact on the business. In fact, operational processes are the infrastructure that supports the business, client care

and customer delight.

Specically, its crucial to ensure that the same operational processes and tools are used both within individual contact centers

and across all sites. By implementing such optimized, globally consistent delivery and clearly measuring processes quantitatively

and qualitatively you can achieve your goals.

Operational process view

We divide operational processes and

associated measures into four categories:

planning, retention and growth, operational

management, and customer contact man-

agement. (See Figure 1.) These categories

drive one another as a cycle.

Within each category, there are a series of

specic, linked processes with associated

tasks and steps that should be dened and

managed as a set. Investing the time to

identify the tasks and steps within each

category and connecting or driving

performance measures from the tasks

and steps provides the power of full

optimization.

Planning

Retention &Growth

OperationalManagement

CustomerContact

Management

Processes

Figure . Process diagram


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EDS viewpoint paper contact centers

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Operational processes

best practices linkage

Figure 2 depicts how to link operational

processes (and related customer delivery

processes) to achieve top box performancewith low cost. It also shows, at a high level,

how a successful contact center functions.

By formalizing, documenting and optimizing

operational processes through this model,

EDS has discovered the key for creating

successful contact centers that focus on

operating within budgetary allocations

while ensuring employee care. Top box

customer service is still the primary driver

for success, and the idea is that satised

employees satisfy their clients.

EDS has 24 patents pending for the opera-

tional support processes (shown in Figure 2

as dark blue boxes).

Figure . Operational processes best practices linkage

The processes shown in the model should

be a starting point for every contact center.

The model is not one size ts all, though.

Your organization may require additional

processes for its industry- or business-specic

needs. And there are alternatives for optimizing

processes. For example, your organization

may decide not to implement a student

intern program or an internal help desk

staffed by high performers.

CustomerDelight

Recruiting/Selection

Acclimationand

Training

Link to R&S

occurs only

when first

staffing CC

all other, link

to WFM

ProjectManagement

ChangeManagement

Resource/Contingency

Planning

Student

Intern &Part-time

Work ForceManagement

WorkloadPlacement

CapacityPlanning

EarnedHeadcountBudget

PerformanceEval-Scorecard

& QualityMonitoring

PerformanceManagement

Program

Career Planning and Leadership Development

Balanced LifeAccount

RecognitionAnd

Appreciation

Promotion/Job Change

Separation/Admin. Exit

Compensationand Benefits

PerformanceImprovement

Training (Agent, Supervisor, Manager, Client Partnership Model)

EmployeeSurvey

ClientContact

Management

FinancialTransactionProcessing

CustomerInquiry

Management

CustomerInteraction

Management

Quality Assurance and Management

ServiceLevel (SLA)

Management

CustomerSurvey

EscalationLegend:

Light blue box = Deliver (directly andconsistent touching customers)

Dark blue box = Support (necessary operationsindirectly or infrequentlytouching customers)


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The processes

Following are detailed descriptions of the

four categories of operational processes. For

each category, weve included denitions of

the related processes and the benets youcan receive by optimizing them.

Contact center planning

Based upon EDS experience, organizations

can realize signicant cost reductions

potentially up to 50 percent ROI by

optimizing contact center planning. While

reducing costs, the processes listed in

Table 1 can also yield improvements in

service levels and your ability to meet

customers other requirements.

Table . Contact center planning

Capacity Planning Provides prole of organizational stafngrequirements based on strategic businessforecasts

Considers staff required to offset turnover, satisfyincreasing volumes and support new initiatives

Decreases costs through effective planning Delivers costs savings of up to 10% (based on EDS

experience and EDS/A.T. Kearney contact centeroptimization benchmarking)

Process name Denition Benets

Workload Placement Provides management of call/contact volumeload balancing among contact centers

Reduces stafng costs by balancing workloadsacross sites

Delivers savings of 5%15% (EDS conservativeestimate)

Work Force Management Enables matching work schedules to stafngrequirements based upon workload (contactvolume) and forecasting, including intradaymanagement

Decreases salary costs through efcient stafng Delivers 10%25% savings (estimate by EDS and

our partners based on use of revised businessprocesses with supporting technologies)

Earned Headcount Budget (EHB) Enables preapproved hiring ability and account-ability at the site level, matching headcount withvolume forecasts.

Facilitates local leaders managing appropriateagent productivity at the account level

Illustrates whether stafng levels are appropriate(at the business level)

Improves stafng efciency by reducing staffapproval time, ensuring sites are staffed appro-priately and allowing sites to react quickly to newclient demands or add-on business

Contributes to Work Force Management savings(see above)

Recruiting and Selection Enables consistent recruiting and selection prac-tices, from proling the candidate requirementsto preparing for the applicant to start work

Provides several job aids and checklists, andelectronic rsum collection

Improves quality by providing qualied candi-dates as quickly as possible

Improves performance by reducing performanceproblems and attrition

Resource and Contingency Planning Facilitates identication of stafng strategies toachieve customer expectations

Encompasses strategic and tactical work forcemanagement

Optimizes productivity results by developingcontingencies and alternatives for stafng peaks

Contributes to Work Force Management savings(see above)

Student Intern, Part-time Planning Provides guidance for managing employees who

do not work full time or are working for academiccredit and/or experience

Provides guidelines for skills development,supervisor attention and management for thisgroup of employees

Reduces salary expense by ensuring stafng peaks

will be covered by co-ops and part-time agents Develops a pipeline of talented resources for

future employment consideration Delivers 1%3% savings (EDS estimate)


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Employee retention and growth

Attrition rates of 4090 percent per year

make retaining and developing staff a high

priority for most contact centers.

Table 2 lists the processes that fall within

the employee retention and growth cat-

egory and the benets of optimizing them.

Table . Employee retention and growth

Acclimation and Training New Agent EssentialSkills Program

Provides collateral and skills for orienting newagents, their customers and their jobs

Can combine with sites current best trainingpractices

Reduces attrition and improves measurableperformance expectations by reducing ramp-uptime for new agents


Career Planning Provides employees with management supportto identify career opportunities and plan theirdesired career path, and leaders with anopportunity to rene leadership skills

Facilitates coaching in identifying employeesdesired career path

Motivates contact center employees to improvetheir skills, continue their education andcross-train

Improves skills and personal growth Promotes employee satisfaction and increases

retention Increases retention by improving skills and

career goal motivation

Leadership Development Program (LDP) Provides an apprenticeship program for non-supervisory employees so they can determinewhether a supervisory role is a career interest

Provides a pool of experienced candidates forsupervisory roles

Reduces attrition and improves employee satis-faction by offering high-potential employees anopportunity to learn management responsibilitieswith guidance

Training Supervisor Provides training curriculum and delivery methodfor acclimating and training contact centerdelivery employees at the supervisory level

Continues support to further develop knowledge,skills and abilities around a set of identiedrequirements

Includes training for soft skills, contact handling/processing and systems support, as well asselective training to introduce new initiatives(systems, procedures and projects)

Equips supervisors with performance andcoaching skills needed to align agents skills andknowledge to organizational goals

Reduces time required to reach performanceexpectations

Increases average calls handled over time Reduces/controls turnover

Training Manager Provides curriculum and delivery methodsfor acclimation and other training at themanager level

Assists managers in translating broad businessobjectives into day-to-day targeted action thataligns with business needs and client expectations

Training Client Partnership Model Provides training in partnership and win-winconict management techniques

Enables leaders to introduce best practices

to their clients, and partner with them in a con-sultative manner, so they can providebest-in-class service offerings together

Improves customer retention and satisfactionthrough a proactive, consultative leadership style


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Table . Employee retention and growth (continued)

Performance Evaluation and Quality Monitoring Ensures adherence to established processes, pro-

cedures and customer service standards basedon customer service level agreements and othercontractual obligations

Reduces administrative time and expenses

Satises customer and contractual obligations


Performance Evaluation (Scorecard) Measures employee performance based ondened performance metrics

Facilitates leaders ability to provide feedback,rewards and recognition, and coaching

Ensures consistent performance in meeting clientobligations

Facilitates consistent and focused feedbackto employees on performance, using industrystandard metrics for contact center excellenceand client SLAs

Quality Monitoring Facilitates monitoring and evaluating workperformance of agents, recording calls and datatransactions, and providing feedback to agents

Optimizes agent performance through coachingand identication of opportunities for reward andrecognition

Provides an objective, external viewpoint

Improves performance against service levelstandards and customer expectations

Performance Management Program Provides a measurement and feedback programspecically focused on agent performance

Facilitates consistency between scorecardsand agent performance management programmeasurements

Rolls up monthly performance data into anannual performance report for agents

Reduces expense and administration timethrough a streamlined process

Improves employee satisfaction through consistentand focused performance management

Recognition and Appreciation Provides structure for developing a program torecognize employees achievements

Includes a database of creative ideas from allsites for activities

Promotes achievement of business goals byrecognizing desired results

Capitalizes on sharing ideas between sites

Balanced Life Account Provides common procedures and tools thatassist employees in managing their time off

Encourages agents to manage their own time offeffectively

Reduces attrition by offering solutions to agentswho may need help managing their time

Performance Improvement Provides guidelines to assist leaders inconsistently addressing problem performance,attendance and/or misconduct by employees

Facilitates early recognition and documentationof problems

Provides uniform method to conduct improvementplans


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Table . Employee retention and growth (continued)

Compensation Enables contact centers to incent and reward

employees with more frequent merit andperformance-based increases through a pay-for-performance strategy

Provides various differentials for special skills,accomplishments and work schedules

Supports discussions of wages and nonwagecompensation for employees

Can comprise base salary, bonus/incentives, stocks/bonds and benets in the form of health/welfare,time away from work and retirement plans

Supports focus on business goals

Increases retention and improves morale throughcompetitive pay practices and pay-for-performance

Ensures competitive wage structure explored Continues to improve morale and attrition


Benets Provides employee benets on par with marketbest practices

Allows employees and business to pay only forbenets they use

Allows benets for part-time employees

Reduces expenses for employees and the business Improves satisfaction and retention of management

and nonexempt employees

Promotion/Job Change Offers change in job responsibilities to providegrowth opportunities

Addresses upward advancement in career ladderwith increased responsibilities

Enables employees to change jobs for variety or ifthey are not performing well in one area

Ensures eligibility for promotion tied toperformance

Retains employees and helps employees nd asatisfying work environment

Separation Administrative Exit Provides procedures and guidelines for managing

voluntary or involuntary separation of an employee Ensures consistency in management of separations Provides data on reasons for leaving used to

reduce further attrition Allows for analysis and action plans for negative

trends


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Operational management

Operational management is the third

category that yields high results. Imple-

menting and maintaining standardized

Table . Operational management

Change Management Provides a framework, methodologies andtraining for managing operational and systemchanges

Reduces costs by enabling contact centers tofocus on and effectively manage change

Reduces attrition through a controlled approachto managing change


Project Management Provides a formalized process and training tomanage a project within the contact center

Reduces costs through a consistent, prescribedproject management methodology

Client Contract Management Manages contracts between business andprovider of services

Can be between multiple contact centers withina business and the associated business units, orbetween the business and a service provider

Develops consistency between centers thatprovide service to the same client

Builds client satisfaction

Service Level Management Establishes, manages and monitors service levelmeasurements for customer satisfaction (e.g.,80% of calls resolved in 30 seconds)

Ensures contractual obligations are met,facilitating long-term relationships with clients

Improves customer satisfaction

Quality Assurance and Management Provides a framework and structure for implementingCustomer Operations Performance Center (COPC)standards and certication when required

Improves consistency and quality throughcompliance with COPC standards

Employee Survey Administration Provides a process for measuring employeeengagement and satisfaction by effectively

managing the Voice of the Employee surveyprocess

Reduces attrition and improves employee andcustomer satisfaction

Facilitates development of plans to addressnegative responses

processes and tools in this category enables

consistency, quality and cost control.

Table 3 lists the processes that fall within

operational management and the benets

of optimization.


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Customer contact management

Customer contact management, the fourth

category of operational processes, includes

customer delivery processes.

Table . Customer contact management

These customer contact management

processes are listed in Table 4.

Customer Interaction Management Denes and manages customer interactionto create and enhance the desired customerexperience

Includes training on tone of voice, empathy,timeliness, etc.

Ensures contractual obligations are met throughquality scores and resolution on rst contact

Improves customer satisfaction Reduces customer attrition


Financial Transaction Processing Uses organizational infrastructure and changemanagement strategies to fulll customer requests,perform research and execute required transactions

Builds consistency between centers that servicethe same client

Customer Inquiry Management Addresses working with customers to handleinquiries and service requests, ordering andproblem resolution

Supports incoming and outgoing contacts Identies appropriate routing strategy to eliminate

customer frustration Ensures request resolution by performing required

services or redirecting to appropriate resources

Provides quick resolution in a customer-focusedmanner

Immediately routes contacts that need additionalexpertise for resolution

Escalation Process & Structure (internal) Provides process for agents to seek advice onrequests without sending all escalations tosupervisors or managers

Provides an internal help desk driven by service

levels, available 100% of the time, staffed withleadership development program candidatesand/or high performers

Provides process to evaluate trends and developplans to address deciencies

Reduces need for management escalation andimproves customer satisfaction through efcient

resolution of requests Facilitates tracking of complaints to offercontinuous improvement opportunities

Provides job growth opportunities for high-potential agents

Service Level Agreement (SLA) Management Establishes, manages and monitors service levelmeasurements for customer satisfaction (e.g.,80% of calls resolved in 30 seconds)

Ensures contractual obligations are met, facilitatinglong-term relationships with clients

Improves customer satisfaction

Customer Survey Provides survey instruments to obtain validopinions and fulllment data from customerson their interaction experience

Facilitates performance benchmarking Enables leaders to address deciencies and build

new offerings Improves customer satisfaction

Customer Delight Establishes and monitors metrics for customer

satisfaction based upon performance managementobjectives and quality monitoring

Facilitates quantitative and qualitative measurements

related to customer satisfaction


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Making it happen

EDS recommends a structured, four-stage

approach for optimizing operational

processes. (See Figure 3.) This approach

provides the exibility for organizations

to adjust procedure tasks and steps based

upon regional laws and regulations,

contractual deliverables, or industry-/

business-specic needs. Most important,

it enables your contact center to achieve a

culture of high performance while control-

ling costs.

Figure . Four-stage approach for contact center optimization

Prioritize the management processes that create

customer, employee and shareholder value

Benchmark the high-priority operations

Develop gap assessment for the high-priority

management processes

Define three reasonable solution alternatives that

align with operations strategy and bridge the gaps

Determine the best fit solution from

among the three alternatives

Build the implementation plan

for the best fit solution

Build and present the business case

for implementation

Build a transition plan, focusing upon

gaps and organizational change

management activities

Implement new processes with a

strong training and

communications program

Measure change and identify

barriers to success

Remove barriers to success

Ensure mandatory yearly audits

to verify compliance

ObjectiveStage

Define

Solution

Implementation

Implement

Solution

Plan

Define,

Measure,

Analyze

Measurable Improvements in

Customer Delight, EmployeeSatisfaction and Productivity


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Size and scope

All contact centers, regardless of size or

number of sites, should focus upon optimizing

the operational processes weve described.

The centers relative size and complexitydo, however, help determine how long the

optimization project takes and what

resources are required.

In most cases, a single-site, single-customer,

single-language contact center can complete

the job in only threesix months and with

twosix dedicated resources. A multiple-site

center that supports many customers and

languages might need nine12 months and

1020 resources. In all cases, project duration

depends in part on contact center readiness

how close the sites are to optimization and

how ready they are to embrace change.

Challenges

Challenges fall into three categories

people, processes and technologies. The

most challenging aspect of any project is

managing people through the change.

People challenges include:

Resistance to change

Lack of sponsorship for the change

Backlash against a command-and-

control approach

Lack of compliance to change

Undened or underdened

accountabilities for the change

Inappropriate depth and breadth of

communications

Difculty in obtaining commitment to

change from the contact center senior

leadership down to the supervisor level

Process challenges include:

Lack of formally documented and

dened processes

Undened or underdened accountabilities

for the processesUnidentied process owners and

subject-matter experts

Inability to obtain appropriate time and

attention from the process subject-

matter experts

Technology challenges include:

Lack of systems and tools to support

the processes

Lack of skills to develop appropriate

systems and tools

To manage these challenges effectively,

its essential to ensure that rigorous

organizational change management and

project management practices are in place

and followed.

Technology options and opportunities

People are obliged to spend time and

money maintaining a new car engine to

ensure it a longer, more efcient life; in

the same way, companies should invest intechnology that makes it easier to maintain

and improve the redesigned processes.

Numerous software programs and vendors

support a majority of the operational

processes. Organizations need to determine

their pain points, the amount of support-

ing technology they can afford, and their

highest-priority items.

One of the biggest impacts can come from a

work force management system. Automating

many aspects of work force management

such as forecasting, planning and scheduling

components (with shift allocations)

signicantly reduces manual errors and

time to reforecast.

Other technology options include quality

assurance and scorecard evaluating software,

as well as systems that support the appropri-

ate training and education environment.

Each organization should evaluate its

needs, priorities and budget allocations.

This will help determine which supporting

tools and technology to invest in rst.


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Results

Research documents signicant quantiable

and qualitative benets of moving to rigorous,

standardized and optimized operational

processes. The experience of EDS and ouralliance partners shows that full optimization

of work force management and contact

center planning processes can reduce contact

center costs by 2550 percent. Weve also

found that high attrition (the primary burden

on almost all contact centers) can be reduced

to best-in-class numbers if all these

operational processes are implemented

and managed.

Direct results of implementing these

processes are:

Reduced negative (or unwanted) attrition

Increased revenue

Improved service levels

Increased work force productivity

Reduced shrinkage or wasted time

Indirect results include:

Targeted, skilled work force

Improved planned attrition

Improved client satisfaction

Improved employee satisfaction

Figure 4 depicts the cost elements and

related objectives that drive the need for

process optimization as well as the perfor

mance improvement goal you can achieve

once the transformation is complete.

Figure . Transformation to optimized operational processes

Objectives

PerformanceImprovement

Goal

Transform the contact center to ensure

customer delight while delivering superior

business value at an acceptable cost level

Trim current operationscosts

Reinvest cost savings/ ROI forimprovements to business

CostElement

Reduceattrition

Standardize practices/

tools for cross-contact-center leveragability

Deliverservices

efficiently

Enable rapidcontinuous

improvement/redesignto meet customer and

business needs


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Success story: leading U.S. newspaper

Recently, a leading U.S. newspapers

advertising contact center faced a discon-

tinuous production cycle for the placement

of employment ads in the newspaper. Thecontact centers operational processes were

breaking down due to large production cycle

spikes and crisis-management activities.

As a result, advertisements were not being

produced quickly with full quality reviews.

The newspaper kept trying to change the

operational processes to address the problems,

but with minimal effect. It was difcult to

measure success and all parties couldnt

agree on the best approach.

The contact center then teamed with EDS.

Based on our joint review of current

processes, we recommended process,

procedural and technology improvements

aimed at resolving the problems.

Through high-level business process

reengineering, the team provided a detailed

baseline of the current environment,

identied quick hits and made radical

recommendations for streamlining businessoperations. We then implemented the

recommendations and measured their

success in the contact center environment.

The results? EDS services and support

helped the contact center achieve measur-

able business improvements:

Quality reviews reduced adjustments

from 1% to less than 0.3% of revenue.

Implementation of appropriate training,

organizational redesign and work forcemanagement cut after-hours contact-

request processing from 98% each day

to less than 2% eliminating the need

for any temporary staff.

Immediate conrmation of advertising

details, information received and a

quote for advertising space improved

dramatically from 35% to 99%.

With appropriate support processes

(including training, quality, contingency

planning, scorecard and performance

improvement processes), outbound

contact volume increased 16% without

any increase in the employee base.

Return on investment is approximately

$500,000 annually.

Conclusion

To achieve excellence and maximize

protability, a contact center business

depends upon its people to function as a

single team focused on a common goal.

That takes consistent performance by eachindividual and site. Implementing an

operational process model ensures consis-

tency and institutionalized excellence in

customer delight, employee satisfaction

and productivity, which in turn drive prots.


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About the author

Brian Hughes

Brian Hughes manages

the process and train-

ing team in EDS CRM

Service Delivery. He

is responsible for

development, design

and deployment of

contact center procedures, processes and

best practices in workplace learning for the

customer relationship management market.

Prior to joining EDS in 2002, Brian had more

than 20 years experience in managing

contact centers and serving on corporate

contact center project support staffs for

two major industry leaders, JCPenney and

Alliance Data Systems. Hughes teams

have reduced operating costs and increased

protability and growth while standardizing

operational activities to ensure market

competitiveness.

Contact

Brian Hughes

Manager, EDS BPO Customer InteractionProcess and Training Team

A1-1E-24

5400 Legacy Drive

Plano, Texas 75024-3199

972 604 6544

[email protected]


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AboutEDS

EDS (NYSE: EDS) is a leading global technology services company delivering business

solutions to its clients. EDS founded the information technology outsourcing industry

more than 40 years ago. Today, EDS delivers a broad portfolio of information technology

and business process outsourcing services to clients in the manufacturing, nancial

services, healthcare, communications, energy, transportation, and consumer and retail

industries and to governments around the world. Learn more at eds.com.

EDS and the EDS logo are registered trademarks of Electronic Data Systems Corporation. All other brand or product names aretrademarks or registered marks of their respective owners. EDS is an equal opportunity employer and values the diversity of its people.Copyright 2006 Electronic Data Systems Corporation. All rights reserved. 07/2006 5GCPH5522

Contactus

Corporate Headquarters

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Canada

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1 800 814 9038(in Canada only)

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and Africa

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Regional Headquarters

EDS.Technologyservices.Businesssolutions.

We help clients improve their systems and processes so they can become moreproductive, manage change and grow.

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