Purpose
 

Leaden Associates provides Contact Center expertise to large enterprises. Whether an enterprise is considering a replacement of Contact Center technology or needs a review of their existing environment, we are here to help.

The Overall Purpose of Contact Center Optimization - is “To implement a Contact Center quality improvement process that meets and exceeds your customers’ expectations, and will result in financial benefits and community loyalty.”       

The Overall Goal of the Contact Center Optimization - is to “Design a Call Center environment for maximum efficiency and productivity to improve

 

• Organizational Structure

• Supervisory Skills

• Technology Usage

• Product Knowledge

• Training

• Employee Satisfaction

• Customer Experience”

 

Our Contact Center Optimizations are best in class, and result in significant improvements to those clients we serve. Results from our Optimizations result in the following:

 

• Contact Center Optimization - Operations efficiencies resulting in 5% improved staffing models

• Centralization Strategy - Operations efficiencies resulting in an additional 7% improved staffing models

• Intelligent Routing (IVR and Skills Based) – Improvements of 20%

• CTI – Reductions in call lengths by 20% typically 26 seconds off talk time

• IVR-Self Service – Improvements in self-service models of 15-30%

• Workforce Management – Improved staffing models from 4-20%

• Outbound Dialers – Improved call volumes from 10-300%, including appointment reminders at 25%
   

Areas Covered

 

We will meet with your management team and review and target the following

 

Targets, Goals –

• Define and establish realistic objectives and strategies, link improvement strategies to customer needs, define performance/Service Level measurement systems, set targets for improvements

• Review current performance objectives, mission statement and corporate goals, customer demographics, services offered, call types, call processing standards, current forecasting, staffing and scheduling procedures and technology used, telephony/host processing systems, job assignments, work flow, time required to complete by task, management reports

 

Mission, Technologies Used, Current Customer Experience, Growth –

• We will discuss and review the mission of the customer and specific objectives, Contact Center technologies and tools purchased matching to customer objectives, customer experience and customer feedback with the current areas of satisfaction and dissatisfaction, seasonal variations and growth plans

 

Customer Service Requirements/SLAs –

• We will review components of customer service requirements and SLAs, both from a business objective and operations view.  We will review Average Speed of Answer, Abandoned Call Rate, Skills Based Routing, Phone Trees, Greetings, Call Routing to site and to multiple sites. We will understand the Contact Center technologies utilized, including routing, reporting, call recording, wallboards, IVR, CTI/Screen Pops, Workforce Management, speech recognition, predictive dialing, callback, Customer Survey options, remote worker capability, multi-channel (voice, web chat, email, web queries, fax, video, social media)

 

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) - Identify

• Service Measures – Blockage, Abandoned Rate, Self-Service Availability, Service Level/ASA

• First Contact Resolution - Transfer Rate, Communications Skills, Surveys

• Efficiency Measures - Agent Occupancy, Staff Shrinkage, Schedule Design, Schedule Adherence, Average Hold Time, Average Calls Waiting, System Availability First Contact Resolution

• Profitability Measures - Conversion Rate, Cost Per Call

• Employee Measures - Staff Turnover/Retention, Employee Satisfaction
   

Report on Contact Center Operations for Immediate Improvement -

• "Quick-hit" changes will become evident

• This will demonstrate to employees that their participation and commitment to the process will yield tangible results

 

Customer Satisfaction –

• Tie into customer satisfaction and feedback of responses from the patient community

 

Baseline for Future Departments and Applications –

• Use the new model as a baseline for future departments models

 

Design Alternate Models -

• Facilitate operational designs that will reflect better operational phone trees, routes, vectors, skills-based routing, overflow, logging on and out, wrap up time, and other components towards a successful Contact Center environment

• Consider in the design operational effectiveness, business objectives, technology applications, growth plans, work flow enhancements, Contact Center tools to be utilized mission critical data, Contact Center components already purchased, Service Level Agreements (SLAs), redundancy/resiliency, vendor reliability, contract term
   

Costs, Savings, Efficiencies, Budgetary Costs –

• Consider cost infrastructure and help facilitate possible cost savings through improved phone trees and call flows, improved Average Speed of Answer, lower Abandoned Call Rates, shorter call lengths, improved staff models, use of self-service tools, call blending, revised trunking, cross-training personnel, cost of lost customers, improved real estate and Contact Center licensing, and include budgetary costs for features/functions available not already purchased
   

Recommendations –

• Provide recommendations based on proposed design and design alternatives, leveraging the client’s business objectives, technology applications and growth plans, operational recommendations that will immediately improve the environment. Meet with client key staff to review findings, observations, recommendations – including Immediate, Short Term (3-6 months), Medium Term (6-18 months), Long Term (19-36 months)
   

Provide An Implementation Plan –

• The implementation plan will include prioritization of operational strengths and weaknesses, and recommendations for improvements for Human Resources, Organizational structure, Hours of Operations, forecasting/staffing/scheduling, telephone training, customer fulfillment, Service Level objectives, quality of call, customer needs, trunking requirements, management practices, reports, levels of staff empowerment, improvements to phone trees, call routes, call blending, and other areas

 

RESULTS

 

Results of our Contact Center optimizations are significant. For example:

• For a Major Healthcare Provider - We helped improve a patient abandoned call rate from double digits to low single digits within several weeks by identifying multiple operations practices that could be improved on, creating a dramatically improved patient experience.

 

• For a Financial Services Group – We identified ASAs of over 2 minutes and provided recommendations for IVR, capitalized on customer feedback surveys, facilitated call transfer issues, embraced the multi-channel user experience, facilitated performance measurement statistics for improving the customer experience, utilized staffing issues at their IT Help desk, introduced wrap up codes, and utilized CTI to reduce call lengths. Our recommendations facilitated reduction of call lengths, improved staffing models, and best practices to improve on ASAs, resulting in higher customer feedback and loyalty.

 

• For a Major University – We facilitated staffing models and improved SLAs with new customer service models and helped manage staffing levels down from 65 to less than 30. We also identified a 12 month rollout plan and budgetary costs associated with improved technologies available and a 12 month timeline for introducing operational enhancements.

 

• For a Major Utility – We provided recommendations on improving their Contact Center environment, including script changes, training program recommendations, better utilization of call routing, IVR scripts, and better use of staffing models during peak emergency periods, resulting in staff and scheduling efficiencies. During peak periods we provided solutions for managing staff models from 90 FTEs to less than 60 FTEs.

 

• For Another Major Healthcare Provider – We analyzed the current environment that, prior to our engagement, patients were threatening to go to another healthcare provider based on poor Contact Center service levels, and complaints escalated to the CEO’s office. Our client wanted validation whether the issues were technology or operations related. We were able to substantiate that better scripting and routing were needed, as well as best practices around call flows. The projected revenue loss avoidance due to better service levels is valued at $4.3M annually.

 

We Are Here To Help

 

For enterprise customers, we provide best-in-class services that make a significant, tangible improvement to your Contact Center environment through our optimization process. We make recommendations that will not only improve your processes but improve your bottom line by leveraging the Contact Center tools you have already purchased and planned for desired technology tools available.

We would be pleased to discuss with you and your team challenges you may be experiencing in your own Contact Center.