Honing the Skills of Your Supervisors and Team Leaders
1 Jan, 2007
By: Suzanne AgriosFor those of us who work in the contact center industry, we have seen an ever-increasing awareness of the potential for the call center to be a great profit center for the company. The call center is a key touchpoint with customers for many companies. Customers often make decisions on whether they stay loyal to the company or leave based on the experience they have with the contact center. To create a “best-in-class” experience for customers requires that the best choices are made in selecting the right systems, processes and, most important, the people.
Investing in the people, especially the call center leadership team, is an important component in achieving that exceptional experience for your customers. At 21st Century Insurance Company, we have had a long-standing commitment to provide our employees with the support, training and development they need to excel in every aspect of their jobs. We offer a full curriculum of professional development.
In the call center, our representatives, team leaders, supervisors and managers are all licensed insurance agents. We provide them with ongoing insurance training to increase their knowledge as insurance experts.
Building customer satisfaction through exceptional service is the job of every frontline agent in our call center. The reps have been taught that every call, every e-mail is a “moment of truth” where we can communicate to the customer how much we value his or her business. Our supervisors and team leaders are key in working with their reps to achieve this level of service. We have provided the leadership team specialized training in the area of coaching their representatives on their customer service skills. We have a Master Coach who meets regularly with them for one-on-one coaching sessions and also in regular group calibration sessions to hone their skills in providing effective feedback.
A recent addition to the training we offer to the call center leadership is the Call Center Industry Advisory Council (CIAC) Certification Program. This program is an accredited professional certification program in the contact center industry that has four designations: CIAC Certified Strategic Leader, CIAC Certified Operations Manager, CIAC Certified Manager Apprentice and CIAC Certified Management Consultant.
We have found this certification program to be extremely comprehensive. It covers all aspects of running a contact center. Four modules are presented: Operations Management, People Management, Customer Relationship Management and Leadership and Business Management. The certification candidates must successfully pass a knowledge assessment for each module to complete certification. Those working toward the Strategic Leader and Operations Manager designations are also required to complete a Work Product and a 360 Review. Each module covers valuable information for operating an efficient call center.
In People Management, topics such as organizational design, strategic staffing, hiring and retention, training and development, and measuring and improving performance are covered.
In Operations Management, the candidates learn about service level and response times, key performance indicators, forecasting and scheduling, call center technology, and facilities and disaster recovery.
In Customer Relationship Management they covered customer relationship dynamics, measuring customer satisfaction, supporting technologies and processes, relationship building strategies and building effective cross-functional processes.
In Leadership and Business Management some of the topics included business management and financial principles and practices, vision, mission and strategies, and call center business environment.
We have a facilitator come on-site to present each module in a two-day session. The training sessions are very lively and the participants are able to ask questions and get feedback on real issues they deal with in their own areas.
Our first group of candidates began the certification program in January 2005. We had 47 individuals successfully complete certification. In 2006, we had 59 candidates going through the program. In 2007, we have decided in addition to supervisors and managers, we are going to also offer the program to team leaders. Our candidates come from all areas of the call center.
We recently asked certified participants for their unbiased evaluations of the program, and all were very favorable. We believe that should really be the gauge in determining the value of any training program. The training should provide the participants with additional knowledge and skills they can apply to their jobs that will have a positive impact on the goals and mission of the organization. Hopefully, the training will also provide them with personal growth on their chosen career paths. We believe this training will be invaluable in raising the expertise and professionalism of our leaders.
