For many call centre managers, providing feedback to their phone agents is considered one of the hardest parts of the job. That’s because they know that, in many cases, the feedback they provide may hurt the feelings of the recipients. However, that’s life. And, more importantly, it’s your business that’s at stake if its employees are not performing at the standards required of them.
At MeloTel, we’d like to argue that all feedback is positive feedback. What we mean is that “negative” feedback is meant to help employees improve. As long as the feedback generates a positive outcome, it is necessary. Feedback, by the way, should go both ways. When you accept constructive criticism from employees, it helps to foster a culture of positive feedback in your call centre. And there are many ways to pull this off.
Inform your phone agents their calls are recorded.
This is pretty commonplace in every call centre throughout North America. However, simple reminders that your company records all calls should encourage your agents to perform at their bests. However, more importantly, recorded calls are necessary tools for strong feedback sessions. Not only can you listen to them, but you should play them back for your agents as well. There is arguably no better way for them to correct mistakes than for them to hear their mistakes themselves.
“Making call scoring and monitoring a cornerstone of the agent evaluation, training and feedback process will help to cultivate an environment of learning and progression within the call center,” writes Shauna Geraghty on Talkdesk.com, “When agents understand that their calls will be monitored and they will be provided feedback based on this, they will understand that it is in an effort to enhance their training and development, not to ridicule or punish them.”
Make feedback a regular thing.
When feedback sessions happen often enough, they will help to alleviate any trepidation that employees may have entering the sessions. Each session should also play out more like a back and forth conversation than a lecture. Give your employees the opportunity to share their feelings about how they’re doing. Believe it or not, most workers actually want to receive feedback on a regular basis.
“According to Officevibe, 65% of employees surveyed said they wanted more feedback and it is not hard to understand why,” reports Playvox.com, “Creating a regular system of feedback benefits everyone involved. Employees want to improve themselves, and they want recognition for their hard work. Companies want their employees to be committed to a culture of tenure and be more engaged at work.”
Take advantage of Monitor/Whisper Control Panel.
The way we see it, there’s no better way to provide feedback than to utilize MeloTel’s Monitor/Whisper Control Panel. It allows call centre managers to “monitor” calls live while being undetected. That way, they’re able to easily keep track of call compliance while establishing powerful training tools.
The service also lets you “whisper” suggestions or jump into conversations whenever a reps are in need of assistance. In the event that an interaction requires a supervisor’s intervention, you quickly “barge-in” to immediately assist and resolve any pending issues your rep may be unable to fulfill.
For more information about Monitor/Whisper Control Panel, please don’t hesitate to call us at 1-888-MELOTEL. You may also use the Live Chat feature on our website!
