contact center management mastery series mastering... · mastery series 3 benchmarking is a...

Mastering Benchmarking

Contact Center Management

Mastery Series

Bruce Belfiore

https://www.benchmarkportal.com/


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Contents

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Benchmarking Defined The Value of Benchmarking Follow-Up Measurement Conclusion

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Some of the following material is adapted from Bruce Belfiore’s book, Benchmarking at its Best



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Benchmarking is a structured, analytical approach to identify, display, and review best practices to gain and maintain a competitive advantage. In the contact center context, benchmarking involves comparing your key performance metrics, which are discussed in my eBook on KPIs, to the averages for your industry. The following graphics provide an idea of what benchmarking looks like for contact centers (Note, the metrics shown below are illustrative only and not real)

Insight 1 Benchmarking Defined


Learnhowwecanhelpyourcenterachievemaximum

profitability.Don'twaitcontactustoday!

[email protected]



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As you can see from the graphic on the previous page, benchmarking provides rich data on a wide variety of critical metrics and can shed light on where the soft spots are in your center’s operations. It provides you with key contact center information that: •  gives you exceptional insight into the complex operations of your center, •  shows competitive performance vis-à-vis your peers, and •  points the way to improvement initiatives that increase financial results, while

enhancing workplace operations and customer satisfaction. It is important to benchmark against your own specific industry sector. It is generally not good enough to benchmark against the “Financial Sector”, for example. It is better to benchmark specially against banks if you are a commercial bank, or credit card companies, brokerage companies if you are a credit card call center, etc., which are in your competitive space and which take the same types of calls you do. I have created a simple workbook for this eBook to make it more useful and interactive. Download the workbook, then go to the first tab (labeled Chapters 1 & 2) and write down information on your industry sector and Key Metrics.


Insight 2 The Value of Benchmarking


https://www.benchmarkportal.com/public/pdf/ebooks/Workbooks/Metrics%20Questions.pdf


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Insight 1

Benchmarking Defined


It is becoming increasingly recognized that benchmarking is an essential function for a properly managed customer contact center. The insights, efficiencies and aids to decision-making that are offered through benchmarking are so compelling that managers cannot do without it and still consider themselves in line with professional standards. Consider the following: •  Among publicly quoted companies, there is growing awareness that contact

centers are a great, untapped source of revenue enhancement and cost containment - - and thus improved shareholder value. Even some equity analysts are showing interest in evaluating the competitive position of the contact centers of the companies they analyze.

•  Privately held companies are searching for ways to improve financial returns and are finding benchmarking to be a powerful tool in optimizing customer relationships and customer lifetime value.

•  Government contact centers are reacting to mandates that they benchmark their activities against the private sector and find ways to improve service to citizens.

•  Contact Centers in the education and not-for-profit sectors are also increasingly looking to benchmarking for feedback on their performance.

This represents a major change from the past. Contact centers have traditionally been under-funded, under-appreciated and misunderstood by top-level executives and by the world in general. Today’s emphasis on the customer experience - - creating it, improving it and measuring it - - is putting a spotlight on contact center benchmarking. This revolution is also resulting in a new breed of contact center professionals: better selected, better trained and more part of the executive decision making process.



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Getting Started As with most things in life, the first time you benchmark is both the most difficult and the most instructive. The recommended process is as follows: •  Have strong backing from senior management, and form a committee of people to

implement the process. Make the committee as small as possible but as large as necessary. In some organizations, one person may be enough to collect the data.

•  Hold a kick-off meeting to explain the process and its purpose. It should be underlined

that this is the start of a continuing improvement process, not a one-off initiative that will end after the report arrives.


The Value of Benchmarking

Insight 2

•  Divide the survey questions among the committee members, according to their areas of specialization and information access.

•  The timeline you

set is important, as is use of the glossary of terms.

Bethebossofyourmetrics!Wecanhelp


https://www.benchmarkportal.com/contact-center-manager-certification-training/



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Submitting Your Data

•  Two days before the due date, remind everyone that they need to submit the information.

•  Look at each metric you receive from your team members and reports. Make sure

the metric makes sense to you before you proceed to input the number into the survey. In some cases people get minutes and seconds mixed up – something that is usually easy to see. Make sure all of the metrics pass the basic sanity test. If they don’t, go back to the submitter and get clarification. You will end up saving time in the long run.

•  Next, you need to define your industry peer group. This definition is central to an

accurate benchmarking exercise. •  When you have all of the data input, you can press the button and submit.



Insight 2



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When the Report Arrives When your benchmark report arrives, sit down with it and read it over once from beginning to end, before you delve into analysis. Get a feel for the information contained in the report before you fixate on specific performance metrics. Once you have gotten an overview of the report, review the metrics by section. Contact Center classification metrics will include: Contact Center Profile Metrics, including volumes, number of agents, etc.

•  Where Agents Spend Their Time, •  Contact Types, and •  Contact Center Costs.

This review will give you an idea of how your center appears in terms of size, contact types and expenses compared with others in your industry.



You can then look closely to your Performance Metrics, shown in Insight Chapter1. In BenchmarkPortal’s reports you will also find a Performance Matrix (like the one on this page) that computes an index for your Efficiency KPIs and a separate index for your Effectiveness KPIs. This boils the Quality related metrics down to one coefficient, and the Cost related metrics down to the second axes of the Performance Matrix, showing you how you compare relative to your selected peer group industry average. The goal is to have your star appear in the upper-right quadrant, meaning that your center is superior to the average for your industry peers for both costs and quality. If your center is multi-channel, your review will include comparison to industry averages for channels like Email, Web Chat, Social Media, Postal Mail and Fax. To make this more interactive and useful go to this eBook’s workbook (tab for Insight Chapter 2) and fill in your answers.

Insight 2

Howdoyourankagainstyourpeers?Don’twait!Findoutnow


https://www.benchmarkportal.com/public/pdf/ebooks/Workbooks/Metrics%20Questions.pdf

https://www.benchmarkportal.com/benchmark-your-contact-center/


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AutomatedInputOp.onsAnewopHonisnowavailable:benchmarkingonanautomatedbasis.ThisofferingwillallowyoutofeedinformaHonfromyourACD(andalsoothercomputerizedsystems),rightintoourbenchmarkingdatabasewithouthumanintervenHon.ThiswilleliminatededicaHonofHmeformanualinputsandeliminatesaswellthepotenHalforhumanerror.TheseopHonswillmakebenchmarkingevenmoreaccessibleanduser-friendly.BenchmarkPortalholdsapatentthatcoversthisopHon,whichiscallediBenchmark™[email protected]

“What If” Calculator and Identifying Low Hanging Fruit for Action At BenchmarkPortal, we have developed a tool called the “What-If” Calculator that will help you identify which metrics can most easily be improved to positively impact your star position. See the calculator in the accompanying benchmarking eBook workbook. Go to the tab marked “What if Calculator” for some plug and play with just two KPI’s. This will give you an idea of the power of a complete benchmarking methodology. Clients of BenchmarkPortal use the full “What If” Calculator in their engagements. Mapping the negative gaps in your metrics to specific people, process and technology issues is an exercise best done with some expert help. People who have seen similar situations dozens of times can quickly help identify the things you need to do to improve your metrics, such as: •  Your high turnover might be traced to your recruitment and training practices

•  Low customer satisfaction might be traced to poor routing or a clunky IVR

•  Under-utilization of agents might point toward the need for a Workforce Management system upgrade

•  A negative gap in First Call Resolution might be indicative of a poor Knowledge Management system that doesn’t give agents the answers they need to help customers.

With this information in hand, you can prioritize initiatives and select the “low hanging fruit”, i.e. the easiest initiatives that provide the most benefit for the lowest cost. In this management mode, you are being pro-active, not re-active. You are building value according to plan, which is the way management should be!



Insight 2


https://www.benchmarkportal.com/public/pdf/ebooks/Workbooks/WhatifCalculator%20-%20Benchmarking%20eBook.xlsx


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The best test of your improvement initiative is the follow-up benchmarking measurement. There are few things more satisfying for a manager than planning an improvement initiative that improves competitive performance, executing the plan with the collaboration of valued colleagues, and then seeing the results in numbers, black on white (or even better, in colorful graphics!). Your follow-up measurement meeting should include: •  a copy of your pre-initiative benchmarking results and “pain point” analysis, along with

the solutions analysis you did, and the process you followed to get to your decision

•  comments relating to the improvement initiative itself that may be relevant to your follow-up report

•  a copy of your follow-up benchmarking results, with a spotlight on those metrics that were expected to improve as a result of the improvement initiative

Insight 3 Follow-Up Measurement




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In most cases, contact centers will experience substantial, even dramatic, improvements in key metrics as a result of well-targeted improvement initiative following benchmarking. The best way to demonstrate this to yourself and to senior management/company ownership is to translate the improvement into money terms, computing an ex-post ROI (return on investment) and, where applicable, an ex-post improvement to income and to EPS (earnings per share) The next step, of course, is to use the follow-up benchmarking results to determine your next focused improvement initiative. This makes continuous improvement benchmarking part of the DNA of your contact center management.


Follow-Up Measurement

Insight 3



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Continuous Improvement: Benchmarking at YOUR Best Contact center managers get the biggest improvements in operations, the greatest increases in customer satisfaction, the biggest boosts to their careers (and the careers of their contact center colleagues) and the largest increases to their company’s bottom line when they make benchmarking part of a continuous improvement process, in which they are able to demonstrate measurable improvements in competitive performance quarter after quarter, year after year. The commitment to benchmarking has numerous advantages, including the following: •  A rigorous benchmarking program assists center managers in getting the attention

and support of their top-level managers. Senior managers will react positively to a well-structured program that gives them quality information about a vital corporate function.

•  By emphasizing a journey over time toward world-class excellence, this approach admits up front that the first attempts may show more problems than strengths for a contact center. You are not expected to be perfect from the start! You are expected to be working towards best in class, balanced excellence over time. Your company will reap the rewards and you will have something to show senior management at bonus time for yourself and your people.

Go to the workbook for this eBook on Benchmarking. The tab marked “Chapter 3” allows you to input your experience with benchmarking, and record your improvements. It is not always easy to do, but experience shows it is very worthwhile.


Follow-Up Measurement

Insight 3

LetushelpyoudiscoverthevalueofBenchmarking!


https://www.benchmarkportal.com/public/pdf/ebooks/Workbooks/worksheet%20benchmarking%20Chapter%203.pdf



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Benchmarking of contact center KPIs is an essential management activity. It is the starting point for analysis and the necessary first step in identifying improvement initiatives. Properly employed, it will lead your center to performance excellence. Make benchmarking your friend, and it will become one of your keys to success.

Conclusion


Myadviceistoalwaysstayclosetoyourpeople,yourcustomersandyourmetrics.Meander,mentor,measure…andmakefriendseverywhere.Somedaysyoumayfeelthatthefloorislikeaminefield,soyoujustwanttoputyourheaddownandretreattoyouroffice.OtherdaysyouareonarollercoasterofposiAvesignalsinterspersedwithnegaAvefeedback.Thentherearethedayswhenyourleadershipshinesthrough.YouinteractposiAvelywithyourpeople,solvesomeproblems,reviewyourmetrics,analyzeyourbenchmarkingreportsandsaAsfacAonsurveys,andgohomecomfortedbytheknowledgethatyouhaveservedyourcustomerswell,connectedwithyourcolleaguesandbroughtvaluetoyourcompany.Thosearegooddays.Mayyouhavemanyofthosedays!BruceBelfiore,BenchmarkPortal



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Benchmark Portal is the global leader in Call Center Benchmarking, Certification, Training and Consulting. Since its beginnings in 1995 under Dr. Jon Anton and Prof. Richard Feinberg of Purdue University, Benchmark Portal has grown with the contact center industry and now hosts the world’s largest call center metrics database. Now led by Bruce Belfiore, the Benchmark Portal team of professionals has gained international recognition for its call center expertise and innovative approaches to best practices for the call center industry. BenchmarkPortal’s activities include The College of Call Center Excellence™, a leader in call center training, and CallTalk™, the first on-line talk show specifically focused on the call center industry. Benchmark Portal also hosts Call Center Campus Week. This annual, unique call center industry event presents attendees the latest in practical research plus the tools and inspiration to drive their call centers’ performance to the top. Our mission is to help customer contact managers in all sectors to optimize their centers in terms of efficiency and effectiveness. Visit us at BenchmarkPortal.com

Your SOURCE for Contact Center Success. We Bring Results!

14 Mastering Benchmarking



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