Six Components of Effective Call Monitoring
Call monitoring, when performed effectively, is arguably the best quality
metric for evaluating call center front line employees. Six critical factors
for successfully implementing and maintaining a quality call monitoring
program are:
- Calls must be monitored representatively across all hours of the day, on
different days of the week and on different weeks in the month. The rate of
monitoring should reflect the volume of calls to the center. For example, if
30 percent of all weekly calls come into the center on Monday morning, 30
percent of the calls monitored should occur on Monday morning.
- Rate calls objectively. Any information that is used to rate calls other
than the behaviors the CSR displays on that call is considered to be bias
and threatens the objectivity of the assessment. An effective evaluator
maintains distance to be as objective as possible.
- Discriminate between competencies. On every call, there are behaviors
that are performed effectively and behaviors that are ineffective.
Monitoring results must reflect these distinctions to identify areas of
strength and weakness.
- Ratings must be reliable. No matter what the day or time or agent being
evaluated, you must apply consistent standards. This can be accomplished by
using the same, detailed, well-defined measurements and also by
"calibrating" measurements by having a team of employees listen to a call
and rate it independently to see if everyone is rating the call similarly.
- Ratings must be valid. This reflects the extent to which monitoring
scores actually correspond to customer evaluations of how they've been
treated.
- The ratings must be useful. The data derived from the monitoring must be
used to drive customer satisfaction and loyalty
-- From: SOCAP's Customer Relationship Management magazine, The Components
of Effective Call Monitoring, Nelson, Miriam Tracy, and Adler, Seymour
(1998) Vol. 3, #3, p. 19.
