We have all seen photographs of sinkholes that have swallowed buildings whole. Weak underpinnings can have tragic consequences; what you don’t see can really hurt you.
In the contact center world, organizational structure is often a weak underpinning that impedes success. It is not necessarily the first thing we see when we assess a center, but it becomes apparent when we review org charts, operations and reports. Most commonly, we see issues in the following contexts:
Growth situations: Centers that experience fast growth are like teenagers who undergo growth spurts and outgrow their clothes before these items have a chance to wear out. The organizational structure that fit when your center was smaller is not necessarily going to work now that it is bigger. Higher volumes may call for an overhaul of your structure to keep from being overwhelmed. One situation we saw recently resulted in increasing the size and capabilities of the organization’s training structure and quality monitoring group, along with upgrades on the technology side.
Shrinkage situations: The converse situation is one where declining business, a move toward outsourcing, or a customer shift toward self service results in lower call volume in the center. These situations also call for a reevaluation of resources and structure. They can be painful to deal with, in that well-performing people must lose their jobs or be transferred elsewhere in the organization. As unfortunate as this is, it is necessary to attain proper balance and productivity.
Functional change situations: We see these situations mostly where there has been a shift from the voice channel to alternative channels (such as email and chat), and more recently to social media, mobile or even video. Managers must be able to understand and analyze customer needs and volumes in these alternative channels, which may require additional talent in the areas of workforce management and contact analytics.
Mergers and Acquisitions: Many organizations these days are the result of numerous mash-ups caused by acquisition activity. These situations offer major opportunities for cost reductions and best practices sharing across diverse operations. Pitfalls may include very different cultures and a lack of understanding of the new, common mission of the combined enterprise. We recently saw the situation of a European company that struggled to absorb a North American acquisition. Getting the organizational structure straight was a key element in the process of realizing acquisition “synergies”. We have also noted that private equity investors are oftentimes focused on product and market issues, and fail to discover the trove of enterprise value that could be offered by restructuring the customer contact functions of the companies they acquire.
Outsource/insource decisions: The formulas we have seen involving third party providers have gotten more creative and tailored over the years. We assisted with one situation in which the third party provider ran the operations inside of the client premises with employees it had hired on behalf of the client. However, proper collaboration on new hire screening, and coordination on training functions, was lacking. It was recommended that there be more guidelines on the hiring side, and that ongoing training concerning new products be taken back by the client, which increased effectiveness of that function. Outsourcing does not mean your customer contact function gets wiped off your org chart. Your involvement with that function remains as vital as ever.
At-home Agents: Do I really need to structure differently for my at-home agent force? How much difference does it actually make? The answer is: it depends. While managing at-home agents is different from managing in-office agents, the difference depends on the characteristics of your program, including size, whether your at-home agents all start as in-office agents, etc. A center that dips its toes into the at-home pond by allowing 5% of its current agents to work from home is in a different position from Apple Computer, with over a thousand at-home agents who had never worked in a brick-and-mortar Apple center. In any event, you must be able to monitor performance down to the individual agent level and determine if changes are needed as time goes on.
Do you see yourself reflected in any of these situations? If so, we recommend that you take time out for some discernment on what you could be doing better, and then take action to make things better. Certainly, this can be a difficult undertaking for a couple of reasons. First, optimizing your org chart can seem like a soft, squishy, subjective undertaking at first. Where do you start? Second, it is likely that someone in your organization will end up taking offense at your conclusions. These are not reasons to shy away. If you arm yourself with an objective, rigorous approach, you will do your organization a world of good.
To organize yourself for the endeavor, consider the following pointers:
The results of these exercises can be dramatic when properly implemented. Consolidations in areas like recruitment / hiring, training, workforce management and quality monitoring and coaching can save large amounts of money and result in improved performance, as best practices are adopted across all operations. Bringing everyone up to the standards of the highest bar is very satisfying managerially – and extremely beneficial to the company’s bottom line.
Some final words of advice:
In sum, make sure you have the right bus for your company, and the right seating chart for the functions you need handled. Put the right people in the seats, train them appropriately, and enjoy the ride!
Bruce Belfiore
Senior Research Executive and CEO, BenchmarkPortal