Demystifying the secrets behind phone answering service

The phone answering service industry is obsessed with performance. Some of the questions that still exist are how to get it, improve upon it and achieve it quickly. It is imperative to learn how to apply our in-depth knowledge in our very own business. There are many service providers that have served hundreds of business entities in a multitude of industries. It has given those service providers an opportunity to take advantage of the great ideas they have acquired over a period of time.

Let us now examine some of the important aspects of the industry that has made it worthwhile for many of the leading service providers.

Accountability

One of the prominent things that call centres delivering phone answering service is to create an environment of accountability. Virtually everything that the employees of these call centre units do can be easily monitored. It can also be measured objectively. Performance reviews in such an environment doesn’t have to be subject to vague impressions of the manager or how much they have a liking for a certain employee. Performances and accomplishments can easily be quantified with actual numbers.

While business units in other industries may not be armed with as many tracking tools as these call centres do, every business is bound to have a handful of key metrics against which their employee’s performance can be measured. In an ideal scenario, employees need to get a monthly report to showcase them as to where they stand thus far. It is advisable for companies to not wait for an entire year before they get a clue about the quality of their performance.

There are some important words of warning to bear in mind before we actually implement such level of performance review.

1.       Don’t make it overly complicated- Employees in a call centre unit need to be easily able to make out performance reviews and the numbers they are based on or they cannot make desired improvements.

2.       Don’t set benchmarks that are too high-Almost every call centre unit tends to be guilty of this on their first attempt. It is recommended to have a close eye on the performance of good steady performers, not just a couple of superstars, before we set the bar. 

3.       Don’t go too overboard in creating a new performance review mechanism- It is recommended to roll out test month so that employees of our call centre have an opportunity to see where they are falling before their numbers officially count on their review.

Training and development

Training and development is one of the quickest mediums to enhance phone answering service, and virtually every other company to improve overall performance of an organization. However, the unfortunate part is that at many organizations, training consists of watching someone to something for a specified period of time and then leave the employees on their own to swim or sink. In the call centre industry, it is extremely expensive to hire new employees. The quicker we can get them up to speed, the lesser they cost and the more productive they become. This practice generally requires a training manual and tests to determine what they retained and what needs to be reinforced again.

Motivation and feedback

The phone answering service industry have tried every possible form of motivation one can possibly imagine-contests, bonuses, perks etc. Most of the industry experts have one really significant truth. We don’t have the power to motivate someone; we only have the power to demotivate them. Call centre entities have never been successful at motivating an employee who doesn’t come to the table already with a rigor to perform a job effectively. Incentives and other perks can only make a good employee to push further and become a better employee. It can never be considered as a mechanism to turn a bad performer into an overnight success.

We can interpret from the above discussion that despite the fact that every individual is looking to get a good job and be successful at it, which is not always the case when it comes to actual performance on the floor. The employees in the excellent phone answering service industry are not always as motivated as they look from the outset and do not always possess the attitude and drive to perform well at their jobs.