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Are call center consultants worth the trouble?
It seems to me my business can handle its call center needs and issues on its own. So why would I spend the time and money finding and hiring a call center consultant? Is it worth it?
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4 Answers
It really depends on the scale of your call center. Running a call center which handles10,000 calls per day is a real science.
Try to answer a few simple questions - How many phone lines your business needs? Can you calculate it and give exact number? How many agents should handle calls, so customers will not need to wait on the line forever or your agents will be browsing the Internet most of the day? How you should schedule your work force? 8 to 5 or somehow else?
Besides these simple questions you can try to answer more complex questions like is your call handling script is effective enough, are your agents cross-trained, so every person can handle multiple types of calls, do you have an adequate level of automation of the call center such as pop-up screens, pre-populated forms, customers recognition, entry menus, possible self-services.
Qestions, questions, questions...
Answers to these and other questions translate to better customer service experience, better sales and more jobs for people in your call center :)
Having worked with many consultants in a call center environment, I have to say that they are definitely worthwhile in some situations. A third party objective point of view on your business is never a bad thing. As operators and leaders we have a tendency to "drink or own koolaid" so to speak. The right consultant will quickly observe that and call us on it.
The size of your center, your current state of business as well as your willingness to think outside of the box all play a roll in your success with a contact center consultant. Having played the role of internal consultant on multiple occasions, the leadership teams openness to new point of views is what really makes a consultant valuable.
Basically, the right consultant, the right time and the right team can mean huge gains for you in your call center.
As a call center consultant, I can confidently say - it depends.
If you're doing fine, you might have other, more important business concerns to address first. About the only call center consultants you might consider are those who can provide significant improvements or cost reductions to your existing setup, and even then you might only want to look at commission-only consultants (who get paid on results, not hours worked) so you're not forking out thousands for potentially little return. Even then, there might be little drive unless the CFO is looking for quick cost reductions or the CIO wants to spruce up their portfolio.
If you're setting up a new call center, on the other hand, you might consider a consultant who specializes in that area. They can probably save you a fair chunk of time, money, and aggravation in the long run because they've seen it all before and can give you a customized solution representing the best bang for your buck.
Likewise, if you're looking to upgrade to support a sudden massive growth in business, it might be an idea to call in someone who's built call centers of a suitable size and can integrate the aspects of the original one smoothly.
And as another call center consultant, I agree with "it depends." We focus on call floor operations rather than technology or facilities and there are two reasons we're called in:
1. Something's not working right. For example, customer satisfacton isn't what it needs to be, your resolution rates aren't good, morale is low, etc.
2. Things are working just fine but you want to see if you can improve even more.
We hire consultants from time to time. It can be quite valuable to see how someone with expertise in a particular field sees your business and we always learn something we can put into practice. Does it mean we're not doing a good job managing our business? No. Can we always find something to improve? Yes.
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