As the integration between human and technology becomes increasingly more unified and the bottom-line efficiency evolves by the day, it’s essential to understand where and how this has happened. Many industries have embarked on an aggressive consolidation play to gain a larger share in the existing market.
To increase market share, software companies commonly provide end-to-end solutions to cover all aspects of a workforce’s operation. This has become a widely adopted trend in the industry. However, while integration across different parts of a solution is crucial to a contact centre’s performance, the value in pushing the boundaries of the ‘possible’ by employing best-of-breed technologies in each separate area appears to be taking a back seat.
Workflow
The common saying, “a chain is no stronger than its weakest link”, is true in the current consolidation of technology providers in the contact centre industry. For instance, if your contact centre has acquired an end-to-end solution that lacks the strength it needs to have in one area, the impact will be noticeable.
Commonly end-to-end solutions result in sub-optimal performance compared to those where best-of-breed solutions have been sourced and pieced together to deliver an overall stronger solution. The idea that end-to-end solutions outperform all other options on the merit of integration is all a façade.
Impact on Employees
The employees of a contact centre are the backbone of its performance. Happy staff lead to happy customers. Thereby agents’ motivation and enjoyment at work should not be overlooked, and different factors that influence their engagement, including internal factors such as how they view their schedule and apply for leave can be significant when managing performance and employee retention.
A recent study by G2 indicates that more than half of employees are unhappy at work due to the software tools they are using and about a quarter of employees said they have considered leaving their jobs due to the software tools they are using. This study shows the importance of implementing software solutions that are designed to meet your requirements.
Employee Performance
The saying of “a chain is no stronger than its weakest link” comes in again, as the total output of a system is limited to the abilities of the weakest part.
A very traditional approach to managing a contact centre is to assume that employees struggle to increase their performance purely due to their respective effort input, when in fact, it’s more likely to be the software. Thereby, a proficient contact centre manager looks at an agent performance holistically and evaluates every aspect of their agent’s interaction with your workplace.
The State of Software Happiness Report 2019 shows that 95% of employees agree that the right software enables them to be more productive at work.
Contact centre solutions such as those from Call Design illustrate the power and performance capable, when sourcing the best software solutions and integrating them together to deliver a complete solution more capable than the industry’s traditional counterparts.