Changing customer behaviour forces organisations to rethink their KPI strategy.

Managing a contact centre is no easy task. Managing a contact centre in an environment where both the customer and the contact centre are evolving rapidly can be likened to juggling swords while they’re on fire, one-handed, while blindfolded and riding a unicycle across a tightrope. At least, sometimes it can feel that way. And yet here you are. Hats off to you!

You wouldn’t take on this challenge if you didn’t deeply care about the experience your contact centre provides. And since your team is fast becoming the primary (if not only) channel that your customers can use to interact with your company, its performance matters (now more than ever). Why now?

The average customer will use 10 channels to communicate with companies.

This has put more pressure on contact centres to adopt an omni-channel approach to meet the demands of the customer and deliver exceptional customer experiences.

Providing customer service across the phone, live chat, email, social media and beyond; can win you loyal customers, create brand advocates and increase customer lifetime value. Not to mention, help you provide a more enjoyable workplace and create engaged, happy team members.

Sounds simple enough, right? But this drastic change in how customers interact with companies has brought about a new wave of issues for contact centres.

Evolving customer behaviour applies pressure on contact centre operations

Customers can be fickle, and not living up to their expectations will quickly result in them turning their backs on you (and they’ll probably tell their friends too), with 62% of customers sharing their bad experiences with others. In fact —

71% of customers ended their relationship due to poor customer service experience
61% of customers take their business to a competitor after a poor customer service experience

To put things into perspective, poor customer service is costing Australia $122 billion per year.

Customer service managers are left with an ultimatum — change or be left behind

One thing is for sure, you didn’t slog it through the trenches doing the grunt work to only give up here. Just to make sure, you’ve chosen to change, right? Ok. Good. We’re on the same page.

If you’re a contact centre manager or customer experience executive, you now have to decide:

What key performance indicators to use (that cater to new customer experiences)
What are you going to measure

And how will they contribute to creating a more efficient and effective contact centre that not only best serves its customers, but also maintains a happy and engaged team. You’ll be glad to know that you’re not alone. There are thousands, if not millions, of contact centre leaders going through the same changes and uncertainties all over the world.

What’s most important is you’re here now, and we’re going to help you take the first step.

Start with establishing your goals and objectives

The most effective way to align business performance is to clearly define the objectives you want to achieve, and the goals you want to set against these objectives. You need to know what you’re measuring data for so you can gauge how well your contact centre is really performing, and to avoid simply measuring for measuring’s sake.

By gaining an understanding of the relationship and differences between your operational successes or failures and your KPIs, you’re able to clearly implement action plans and demonstrate the business impacts that result.

Some examples of the objectives you might set during this stage may include:

Generate new sales
Boost customer satisfaction and service
Improve customer retention rates
Reduce customer effort
Boost employee engagement
Improve conversion rates

Once you’ve identified the core objectives you’re working towards, you can set tangible, measurable goals against each of these objectives.

For example...

If you set an objective to ‘Reduce Customer Effort’, then you may set a goal to reduce calls regarding a common call type by 5% each quarter, which is a clear demonstrable measure that contributes to the ultimate objective.

You may have multiple goals linked to one objective, and one goal may also be linked to multiple objectives. Feeling confused yet? Not to worry, it will all become clear soon! The next step is identifying which KPIs you will use to measure how effective your contact centre is delivering these objectives and goals.

2. Identify KPIs that make sense for your organisation

Taking a closer look at your contact centre, what will be the individual activities that will contribute to you achieving the defined goals and objectives? How will each role within your operation play their part to drive the desired result?

The reality is there is no secret formula or one-size-fits-all solution for defining KPIs. The KPIs you choose will help carve a pathway to achieving your objectives and goals, so they need to be focused on specific outcomes that each person and role can deliver to create the bigger result.

Example scenario

Let’s say you have an objective to ‘Reduce Customer Effort’.

One associated goal might be to ‘Reduce Repeat Calls by 25%).

Now it’s our task to set KPIs that align to and support the realisation of this goal and objective.

For the sake of this example, I’m going to assume that there are 2 things that are identified as contributing to repeat calls:

Training issues resulting in the wrong answers being given to customers
Team members feeling pressured during busy queue times and not identifying the root cause of the customer’s issue properly

To combat these issues and enable my team to achieve the desired goal, I’m going to create the following KPIs:

Team Leaders will have a KPI around completing additional coaching for those agents who have high repeat calls.
Workforce Planning will have a KPI to improve their forecasting accuracy in order to minimise busy queue periods.
Frontline Agents will have a KPI around completing an end to end process to fully identify and resolve the customer’s enquiry.

To support this objective and goal, I will also consider implementing other operational changes, such as turning off visibility of calls in the queue to agents, so they aren’t tempted to rush their calls. Implementing system protocols that must be followed ensures that agents complete all the steps required to effectively resolve the customer’s enquiry.

As you may have noticed, I have considered the part that each role plays in contributing to the issue to which I am seeking to improve. I have also given them each a KPI that leads to either prevention or resolution of the key issue at hand.

In this way, I can ensure that all roles in my contact centre are aligned and moving together towards the same objective.

3. Bring it all together

The objectives, goals and KPIs you set need to align with the larger objectives and goals that have been set for the organisation, which I’m sure you already know about all too well (revenue, profitability, sustainability, and so on). As a result, your contact centre goals and objectives should focus on metrics that quantify and enable these broader organisational focus areas.

This alignment needs to flow downstream as well as upstream, meaning:

Your contact centre’s departmental objectives and goals need to be designed to align with your organisational objectives and goals, and;
your operational leader’s KPIs need to connect to these, which in turn;
informs your Team Leaders and Support Teams’ KPIs, which;
ultimately flows down to your Frontline Agents’ KPIs.

In short, it should be easy to identify the connection that every individual’s KPI’s have on the overall organisational objectives, so that every individual is clear on the impact and influence they have on the bigger picture. Ensuring this alignment will ensure that your contact centre (and the organisation it supports) operates like a well oiled-machine.

With your KPIs clearly defined, next comes implementation.

4. Make sure everyone is on the same page

Who’s on the frontline dealing with customers on a daily basis? Your agents. Who’s affected the most by the introduction of new KPIs? Your agents. The reality is, your employees are the cogs that keep the machine running and no one knows the customer more than they do.

And unfortunately, they are often overlooked in the decision making process. Keeping your frontline staff in the dark while you methodically collect data on them may cause them to disengage. The same can be said if you introduce too many new KPIs to focus on at once.

Disengaged employees cost Australia’s economy $2 billion dollars a year.

Implementing change successfully requires you to engage your staff, take them on a journey and make sure they understand and have input into the process. Not only will you gain rich insights into the root causes driving poor results, but they will have ownership in the implementation of the improvements — which is vital when you’re trying to increase performance.

Unsure what KPIs your contact centre should be tracking?

At Athena Consulting, we help companies navigate transformation with the right skills, leadership techniques and technology. We understand that day-to-day management of contact centres requires a myriad of innovative solutions spanning how we manage and motivate people, to the integration and transformation of technology solutions and operational practices.

Contact us today for more information on what KPIs your contact centre should be tracking, and how to successfully implement these with your team.

Related articles: Best Serve Your Customers With 15 of The Most Important Contact Centre KPIs.

Download “How to define, measure and optimise call centre performance” free handbook here.