Simulated service
To get its call centre employees up to speed, First Union turned to Web-based simulators that mimic customer calls. The result? Fewer errors and more sales.
Problem: Your call centre fields queries on everything your company sells. Botched calls mean unhappy customersâ€"and fewer sales.
Solution: Teach service reps people skills and school them on your product line with simulated customer calls.
Your service department is often your customers' first and only point of contact. All it takes is one encounter with a surly or uninformed agent to send a client packing. But call centresâ€"which don't generally require staff to have lots of previous experienceâ€"are notorious for high turnover. In this department, training starts at square one.
Call centre employees at First Union used to have it relatively easy. Before 1995 they could memorise everything they needed to know in training class. Back then, call volumes were lower, each call centre had its own toll-free number and computer system, and customer service representatives dealt with only one product line. "They didn't have to know as much, and they didn't have to be all things to all people," says Ronald Garrow, senior vice president of the bank's consumer college within its First University training department.
Then First Union consolidated its 60-plus toll-free numbers into one main toll-free number, which resulted in five call centres. Suddenly, service representatives were taking calls about credit card accounts, IRAs, and loans. First, the bank overhauled its call centre system so that reps had instant access to information about all of First Union's financial services. But all 6,000 service representatives still needed to know how to respond to the most common types of service calls.
Most customer service programs separate their new-hire curriculum into discrete modules such as product information, systems skills, and customer service skills. But teaching these things separately and then asking trainees to pull it all together on the job is a "nightmare," says Michael Korcuska, senior vice president of professional e-learning solutions at Cognitive Arts, an e-learning developer.
A better way? Web-based simulators that mimic customer calls. Cognitive Arts organised First Union's training program around the types of calls agents typically handle: providing basic account information and making credit limit adjustments, for example. Trainees answer callsâ€"basically just recorded questions or problemsâ€"but they can't speak back to the caller. Instead, they "choose responses or compose responses so that we can hear what they're saying and give them coaching based on that," says Korcuska. With simulated practices, reps learn enough to start taking real calls during training too. "We start from the old apprenticeship model where you're doing something and an expert is looking over your shoulder and providing you with coaching and advice."
First Union spent about $350,000 to train half of its 6,000 agents. In the pilot test of the intranet-delivered program, training time dropped by 16 percent, from six weeks to five, and the new course graduates made 40 percent fewer errors than other new hires and 20 percent fewer errors than experienced employees. Add to that the potential for increased revenue: Web-trained agents transferred 20 percent more calls to the sales department.
