Why Collaboration Is Essential in Today’s Contact Center

Ever interact with a contact center agent who relied heavily on a script? Odds are, it wasn’t the best experience. Scripted interactions tend to lack personality, even if the agent inserts your name at the right points. Such interactions can also be frustrating if the script doesn’t align with your needs and the agent can’t adjust.

Despite the limitations of this approach, many contact centers rely upon scripts and set procedures. Contact centers use scripts and checklists to ensure consistency and prevent agents from making inaccurate statements.

In so-called “adherence” environments, reps are rewarded for handling calls quickly and checking off a list of requirements — using an approved greeting, apologizing for any delays, thanking the customer for their business. Agents aren’t encouraged to use their own judgment or get input from colleagues.

However, studies have shown that these techniques aren’t as effective as contact center managers might believe. In fact, adherence environments performed poorly compared to contact centers in which reps were encouraged to collaborate.

Benefits of Collaboration

One study found that collaborative contact center environments perform 50 percent better than average and reduce the risk of error by 25 percent. In addition, reps in collaborative environments demonstrate 54 percent greater discretionary effort (going above and beyond what is required). They also expressed a 17 percent higher intent-to-stay. Engaged agents who stay longer increase the team’s collective knowledge, which helps improve performance even further.

GDS has a proven track record of success in the design, implementation and support of contact center solutions.

These results correlate to a shift in the types of requests contact centers receive. In the past, many calls involved the transfer of basic information — checking a balance or updating an address, for example. Today, most customers can handle those kinds of issues themselves via self-service mechanisms.

If a customer reaches out to the contact center, odds are they have a complex request that’s not well-suited to a scripted interaction. A collaborative environment enables agents to respond to those requests efficiently by drawing on the knowledge and experience of others.

How to Create a Collaborative Contact Center

Organizations that invest in multichannel contact center solutions can use built-in chat features to enable collaboration. Another approach is to integrate the contact center platform with the corporate unified communications (UC) system so that agents have full access to instant messaging and presence capabilities. Agents can use these tools to collaborate with other agents and supervisors and locate subject-matter experts outside the contact center to help handle a customer’s inquiry. If it makes sense for the customer to speak to the expert directly, transferring the call is simple.

Without these tools, the agent would have to put the customer on hold, transfer the call to someone who may or may not be available, or take down the customer’s phone number and call back later. None of these scenarios facilitates a quality customer experience.

Enhance Service Levels with Contact Center Solutions from GDS

GDS has a proven track record of success in the design, implementation and support of contact center solutions. Our cloud-based contact center platform delivers enterprise-class capabilities without capital investments in on-premises equipment. Support for voice, chat, email and text messaging streamlines communication for both customers and agents.

The GDS solution has the flexibility to support work-from-home agents and enables agents to collaborate with colleagues regardless of location. Real-time dashboards and wallboards give managers deep insight into contact center performance.

Conventional wisdom suggests that rigid procedures and scripts provide the recipe for an efficient contact center. It turns out, however, that a collaborative contact center environment achieves the best results. By giving agents collaboration tools and greater flexibility, organizations can improve contact center performance and enhance the customer experience.

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