Last year’s Covid driven mass move to homeworking has been well publicised, with many contact centre workers and their employers having experienced both the benefits and pitfalls of working from home. This urgent and necessary rapid drive to homeworking has meant that many organisations were forced into cutting corners, especially in relation to payment security, data compliance and working standards. Although the crisis is still very much upon us, many businesses are now starting to evaluate the long-term benefits of homeworking and the impact it may have on their staff, service delivery and bottom line.

Coffee Table Conversations – Webinar 3 Wellbeing – keeping positive and productive teams Client and other companies: 12:00-12:45, 29 March 2021 Outsourcers: 13:00-13:45, 29 March 2021

Wellbeing has become a hot topic in recent times, as businesses have started to understand and appreciate the importance of maintaining a happy and productive workforce. The move to homeworking has thrown up a new set of issues and has made the management of staff wellbeing particularly challenging.

In the third of our Contact Centre Homeworking ‘coffee table conversation’ style webinars, we will discuss the challenges faced by many contact centre businesses with leading mental health and worker productivity specialists. Who will provide guidance on how to achieve and maintain positive and productive teams.

The webinar will include an audience Q & A, where you will get the opportunity to ask the panelists questions.

Expert panel

Andy Barker: Co-founder, Mind Fitness Learning Ltd and former European Director, Sony Computer Entertainment Europe

Andy is a certified coach, trainer and author with a wide experience in senior corporate management. He is a Mental Health First Aid England Instructor Member and is co-founder of Mind Fitness Learning, who specialise in mental health, wellbeing and personal effectiveness training. Andy is co-author of Unlock You, published by Pearson, which was shortlisted for Business Book of the Year in 2020.

Eileen Donnelly: Director, Ripple & Co and former Head of Values & Ethics, The Co-operative Bank Plc

Eileen is a senior leader with experience at Director level within FTSE 250 businesses. Her career has focused on supporting companies to build purpose-driven business strategies and workplace cultures, by responding to, and investing in, the most relevant issues, from climate change to mental health. Eileen is now a Mental Health First Aid England Licensed Trainer and set up Ripple & Co to help organisations to recognise their responsibility to maintain and improve wellbeing in the workplace.

Nick Bishop: Founder, Nick Bishop Solutions and former HBOS Contact Centre Manager

Nick has a strong business background gained in FTSE 100 organisations, managing high performing teams of up to 250 heads. He is trained in a number of coaching methodologies and uses his skills to generate best performance from both teams and individuals. Nick speaks at events on topics covering customer service, performance management, staff motivation and peak performance in both business and in sport.

Lynda Campbell: Director, Service Culture Club Ltd and former Director of British Gas (Wales), BA Global Contact Centres, British Airways

Lynda was a Director for British Gas in Wales and Head of Smart Metering Customer Services and more recently the Head of Transformation for BA Global Contact Centres. The latter role involved many aspects of transforming BA Global Centres. She set up Service Culture Club in 2016, to work with organisations on their service ambition, culture and leadership skills. Lynda has an MBA in Business & Organisational Psychology.

Topics for discussion

1. Creating and maintaining productive teams
   Tips on how to motive remote workers
   Spotting the warning signs of a distressed worker
   ​How to avoid isolation and creative collaborative working
2. Creating a successful working culture
   Steps required for success
   Tips for onboarding new starters
3. Remote management
   The do’s and don’ts of managing from afar

Clients and other companies:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/1316165803446/WN_W7WKawhpTxmamuyuWMp0ZQ

Outsourcers:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/6016165803799/WN_-szhg9ZjTfuZnMU6BWQkZw

Last year’s Covid driven mass move to homeworking has been well publicised, with many contact centre workers and their employers having experienced both the benefits and pitfalls of working from home. This urgent and necessary rapid drive to homeworking has meant that many organisations were forced into cutting corners, especially in relation to payment security, data compliance and working standards. Although the crisis is still very much upon us, many businesses are now starting to evaluate the long-term benefits of homeworking and the impact it may have on their staff, service delivery and bottom line.

Coffee Table Conversations – Webinar 2 Homeworking health & safety considerations and legal risks Outsourcers: 12:00-12:45, 12 March 2021Clients and other companies: 13:00-13:45, 12 March 2021

Traditionally, when we have considered health and safety in the workplace and working conditions it has been in relation to the office environment. The mass move to homeworking has turned this on its head, with employers opening their businesses to new legislative risk and health & safety regulations.

In this webinar, leading legal and health & safety experts will give an overview of what is required and have an open discussion into the pitfalls and how to them avoid them to reduce risk. It will include an audience Q & A, where you will get the opportunity to ask the panellists questions.

Expert panel

Samuel Ellerton: Regional Claims Leader, Senior Vice President, Lockton Companies LLP

Sam is a highly experienced complex and major loss personal injury and property damage lawyer with extensive cross-class experience. He is a qualified solicitor and non-practicing barrister and has experience of working in a broking capacity, in private practice and in-house within risk and claims management functions.

Alexandra Farmer: Head of Team & Solicitor, Ellis Whittam

Alexandra is a qualified solicitor and employment law expert. Prior to joining Ellis Whittam in 2013, she worked as head of employment law for a legal practice – gaining a wealth of experience supporting clients over a range of sectors including retail, beauty, pharmaceutical and charities. She heads up the Partnerships team at Ellis Whittam and her team support over 30,000 employers across 14 partnerships with employment law and HR issues.

Steve Sullivan: Head of Regulatory Compliance, Contact Centre Panel

Steve is an expert in regulatory compliance and has delivered operational change projects for many well know global brands. He has an in-depth understanding of the regulatory requirements on sales, marketing and customer service. Steve is Vice-Chair for the UK Data & Marketing Association’s Contact Centre Council and lectures on data privacy for the Institute of Data & Marketing.

Julie Goddard: Business Continuity Specialist, Humanex Resilience

Julie is a business continuity expert with over 15 years experience. She is a professional member of the Business Continuity Institute (FBCI). Julie has also operated within a multi-agency response environment, including arranging counter-terrorism training and trauma training for hundreds of staff and management. She is currently an ‘industry Sector Leader’ on the ‘Cross-Sector Safety and Security Communications’ (CSSC) hub, which is a NaCTSO initiative with the objective of facilitating partnership working between private sector and public sector and security bodies.

Charles Spencer: Principal Health & Safety Consultant, Ellis Whittam

Charles is a health & safety specialist with over 12 years experience working across multiple sectors and covering all aspects of health & safety. Although he has expertise in all spaces, he specialises in food safety, leisure, hospitality and retail providing best in class advice and recommendations to some of the UK’s largest organisations. Charles is also a Chartered Institute of Environmental Health representative for the BSI committee for Occupational Health and Safety Management Systems (HS1).

Topics for discussion

1. Key legislative risks
   • Overview of health & safety regulations and associated legislative risk
   • Contractual obligations and considerations of changing to homeworking or hybrid working
   • ​Identifying areas your business may be at risk
2. Reducing your risk exposure
   • ​Protecting your workforce within the homeworking environment
   • The do’s and don’ts
3. HR implications
   • Options for dealing with employees refusing to return to work for health & safety reasons
   • Contractual amendments required for long-term homeworking or hybrid working
   • Best process to bring about changes to terms and conditions of employment

Outsourcers:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/4616147142616/WN_edYbU0xsT6CohzNjxjnLUw

Clients and other companies:

https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/9816122649314/WN_nofta9YuSP-xv4sK8xAh9Q

We are running a series of joint webinars with UKCCF on outsourcing. In the first webinar, titled ‘an introduction to outsourcing’ we hear the thoughts and experiences of seasoned industry professionals – Dave Cleaver, former Head of Operations at Centrica and Lynda Campbell, Head of Transformation BA Global Contact Centres, British Airways, and Debbie Glenister, former Head of Customer Care, Etihad Airlines, as well as our joint host and outsourcing expert Phil Kitchen, Managing Director, Contact Centre Panel.

The session will include a Q&A to help answer any questions or queries you may have and allow the panelists to provide expert advice on specific outsourcing challenges.

Topic overview

For most businesses running an in-house contact centre, without outsourced support, is not straight forward. Forecasting customer demand and flexing resources, particularly in the current climate, is an art and can be difficult for organisations that have changing needs.

Outsourcing part or all of your customer contact requirements could be the answer. It can give your business the flexibility it requires to deliver a consistently professional and efficient service. Having access to additional agents, when required, means you can easily ramp services up or down without exposing your business to additional overheads. Outsourcing is also a great way to introduce new communication channels, Automation and AI into your business, without taking on considerable capital expenditure and risk. However, identifying and onboarding the right outsourced contact centre or technology provider can be tricky though. Particularly, if you don’t have experience of outsourcing and full visibility of the market.

In this webinar, our panelists will discuss this topic sharing their in depth experiences and highlighting the do’s and don’ts of outsourcing. They will provide tips on how to get the most out of a partnership with an outsourcer.

Expert panel

Dave Cleaver: Former Head of Operations at Centrica

Dave has over 23 years experience of working as a senior operations leader for a FTSE 100 Company. He was involved with key outsourcing projects whilst Head of Operations at Centrica. Over that time, he was responsible for building customer-centric business models, developing winning leadership cultures, optimising customer service operations, implementing cost efficiencies and turning around business performance.

Lynda Campbell:Former Director of British Gas (Wales) and Head of Transformation, BA Global Contact Centres, British Airways

Lynda is the former Director for British Gas in Wales and Head of Smart Metering Customer Services and more recently the Head of Transformation for BA Global Contact Centres. The latter role involved many aspects of transforming BA Global Centres including their outsourcing strategy. She has in-depth knowledge and experience of Contact Centres and Customer Services, including working with outsourced contact centre partners.

Debbie Glenister: CX Specialist, Contact Centre Panel and former Head of Customer Care, Eithad Airlines

Debbie is an expert in contact centre operations, with extensive outsourced and insourced multi-channel customer service experience across various sectors. She has worked in senior operational leadership roles for global industry leaders and had responsibility for up to 1500 employees. Across her career she has worked for many leading brands including American Express, BMI International, Bosch, BT, Department for Work & Pensions, Disneyland Paris, EE, Etihad Airways, Microsoft, Nectar, Sky, The Daily Telegraph and Trainline.

Phil Kitchen: Managing Director, Contact Centre Panel

Phil has a deep understanding of the contact centre industry, having worked within it for over 25 years. In 2006, he jointly set up VOICE Marketing Ltd, a successful outbound contact centre, which he sold to Capita Plc in April 2015. Phil set up Contact Centre Panel the same year, to help match businesses with the right telemarketing, call or contact centre partners and then support with the onboarding process. Phil’s working mantra is to provide a ‘safe pair of hands’ – he uses his vast experience, market knowledge and deep operational understanding to consistently deliver against clients’ requirements.

Topics for discussion

1. When and when not to outsource
2. The key benefits of outsourcing
   Cost reduction
   Risk reduction
   Post Covid business model adjustment
   Post BREXIT business model adjustment
   Digital transformation
   How to gain alignment to existing business goals
3. The role of technology Blended services/part outsource options
4. Do’s and don’ts
   Challenges faced
   ​Lessons Learnt

Watch the play back…

With homeworking becoming a daily reality for many workers who had traditionally been based from the office, the parameters by which businesses need to be managed and protected has changed.

From early on in the pandemic, most large organisations have made it possible for their staff to work from home, only visiting the office when necessary. Although this new flexible way of working has had many benefits, it has also led to a far wider variety of data security and personal health risks across the distributed workforce.

A recent BBC article highlighted the main cybersecurity issues, although none of which come as a big surprise. The most interesting facts and statistics were:

• One in three workers are now based exclusively at home
• One in five workers has had no cybersecurity training at all
• Two out of three workers who print work documents at home do not shred them after use
• Almost 3 out of 5 IT decision-makers believe that remote workers will expose their firm to risk of a data breach

In addition to this, many organisations have successfully moved their workforces into the home, after adapting or redesigning their business processes and corporate systems to enable productive working, are up against a potential legislative ticking time bomb in relation to remote workplace safety.

Where there’s blame…

The UK claims industry has not had an easy time of it recently. With only a few exceptions, the door is now firmly shut for PPI claims and planned changes to the whiplash claims process will further curtail revenue opportunities.

What is next for the claims sector? Will it be class actions against companies by groups of employees who have been forced to work in unsuitable home environments?

While the home environment has, before 2020, been the homeowner’s domain, it is now the workplace. Any accidental damage caused by trailing cables, poorly placed computers, unsuitable seating might now fall on the employer to address. Then add to that the potential mental damage caused by having to balance work and family commitments within a confined space. The claims industry could have a field day!

What should your business be doing about it?

It is essential your business acts now and puts your company in a defendable position.

The failure of organisations to fully document a ‘risk assessment’ against not being able to meet your organisations obligations under the Data Protection Act 2018 and the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, may not be an easy position to defend.

Both these pieces of legislation make very clear what an organisation’s responsibilities are for them to comply with the Act and keep both data and people safe.

Recording decision making actions, particularly at Board level, that are reasonable, proportionate and timely will help create the defendable position that insurers will look for when defending a potential claim.

Do not believe for one minute that the claims industry are not preparing themselves for this and do not think that your organisation is immune. Ensuring that your organisational risk documentation is complete and that words and actions are aligned to what could be considered a reasonable timeline, will be essential components of a defendable position.

Help your team to work with you

In short, homeworking is here to stay. Businesses have shifted and employees have become accustomed to the ‘new norm’. However, it’s not plain sailing yet as mistakes are being made and so far, most organisations are getting away with them. Don’t be the organisation in the first batch of ‘class actions’ because of lack of timely decision making and appropriate, proportionate and timely actions.

By working with your team to provide a safe and productive homeworking environment, with protected systems and structured support, your business can be a home-based success. Your team can grow and thrive, knowing what to do if problems occur and feeling supported in their work.

If you’re unsure how to assess the risks posed by homeworking and how to equip your business to deal with them, get in touch. We can advise you on what areas need to be considered and how to mitigate risk. We can also provide tips on how to work with your staff to maximise their health, happiness and productivity.

With tight restrictions being enforced across the UK and businesses trying to maintain performance, homeworking has once again become a daily reality. In this article, we ask how can your business create a genuinely safe, secure and flexible work environment for its teams so they can flourish and achieve wherever they work?

The accelerated move to homeworking

The Covid response forced many contact centres into having to rapidly adopt the homeworking Contact Centre model. Although as a concept homeworking is nothing new, with around 13% of the UK’s workforce based from home prior to the pandemic. What has been new is the volume of homeworkers and the proof that the concept could really work at scale for contact centres.

The foundations for success

Before Covid struck, global digital transformation with the parallel transition to cloud-based technology platforms was already creating the foundations on which truly flexible working arrangements could be built.
The WFH model is proven, with a strong set of benefits including improved flexibility for team members, less reliance on large offices, reduced impact of forced changes (including pandemic lockdowns!), the potential for improved staff loyalty, faster communication and rapid response to market and demand fluctuations. While there are some challenges, the benefits outweigh the drawbacks for most Contact Centre organisations.

Growth of cloud-based businesses

Adopting cloud platforms and tools can be much easier than their site-based predecessors. Capital costs are usually much smaller or absent; expensive tailored development is minimised; implementation can be tested and delivered in parallel and as a result, the capability of following a more rapid ‘Test – Analyse – Improve – Implement’ model vastly reduces the risks of system failure.

Scaling these technologies up to a whole-business level, when implemented correctly, can deliver huge benefits whilst supporting the need to keep personal data secure.

On the other hand, not having the appropriate technologies in place to support people, processes and performance whilst maintaining data security and corporate governance obligations can be problematic and lead to serious risks.

The risks of getting it wrong

In the fast and forced Covid-19 response, organisations will have opened themselves to risks without necessarily having the knowledge or tools to deal with them. While most businesses have now successfully moved to a WFH model, at least in part, how many have done this in a truly planned way?

To ask a specific question, how many have implemented WFH knowing that their organisation is compliant with the Data Protection Act 2018? Have you?

Compliance is just one issue with serious consequences, but there are more which need to be considered.

Cyber attacks and cyber fraud are now considered among the top 5 global business risks. Cybercrime is a huge, State-sponsored, organised business sector. Hidden marketplaces for valuable data are maturing, with SLAs for data validity offered by the criminals who work very professionally to obtain good quality stolen information. Alongside this, 2019’s IBM Security & Ponemon Institute Report into security found that on average it took 243 days to identify data breaches. That is a lot of time for stolen data to be in circulation before any action is taken to make data more secure or to enable individuals to take action with their own data.

Telephone payment risks

Taking payment details over the phone is an apparent and immediate commercial risk. Moving this to home-based workers multiplies the probability of that risk becoming an incident.

By listening to card data over the phone, your organisation becomes exposed to fraud-related chargebacks, higher transaction charges and PCI compliance failures.

As far back as 2011, DCI Derek Robertson of Strathclyde Police identified a simple problem: “We know of organised crime groups who are placing people within the call centres so that they can steal customers’ data and carry out fraud and money laundering. We also know of employees leaving the call centres and being approached and coerced, whether physically, violently or by being encouraged to make some extra money.” Allowing people to listen to payment data, in the office or especially at home, puts your business at risk.

How can you systemically reduce risk to protect your homeworkers?

To make our colleagues more secure we need to remove the possibility than they can be compromised. We need to take the temptation of fraud away, not to implement security measures which make them feel like they are criminals. By supporting them, we make it easier for them to have meaningful, useful and positive communications with our customers.
In short, removing card data from your agents’ voice interactions with customers removes most of the opportunity for fraud. Your agents may still be approached to sell data, or coerced in some other way, but their absence of exposure to the valuable data will massively reduce their vulnerability.

If your Contact Centre takes payment details, take a very critical look at how this information is taken and processed. Are you confident that your processes are compliant with the relevant industry standards? If you are not sure how the PCI DSS applies to your organisation, talk to us today. We can help you to assess your risks and avoid potential problems in the future.

The most important steps to take now

The World Economic Forum has identified the ‘three most worrisome risks’ for companies over the next 18 months. These are:

1. Prolonged recession
2. Surge in bankruptcies
3. Cyberattacks and data fraud

The first two phenomena are largely outside our organisational control; we must adapt to them and if we are successful we will survive beyond the effects of the pandemic. However, the third is driven by the first two: reduced opportunities to earn will force an increase in illegal behaviour and the involvement of our employees in that behaviour.

So as a business, you must mitigate this risk. You can do this by protecting your staff from exposure to the information that criminals want.

1. Change your risk and fraud profile

There is already regulatory pressure to put risk-management processes into law. However, rapid action to improve your own exposure to risks will not only make your staff more secure but will give your business a competitive advantage.

2. Put data governance and security on the Board agenda

GDPR was passed into law in 2016 and has applied since 2018. However, 2020 has changed many businesses processes and data protection may already have suffered enormously. Make sure you are aware of your organisation’s risks, not just of non-compliance but of potential data breaches. Moving payment data outside your voice conversations not only protects your customers, but it makes your employees safer too. Remove this opportunity for criminals to look for data in your organisation.

3. Analyse your WFH arrangements

Working from home is now a critical part of your business model. Do not treat it as a temporary measure, or outside the scope of your business analysis. It is possibly the part of your operation which carries the greatest probability, and the greatest consequences, to open up a breach of customer and/or payment data.

By keeping your people safe and your data secure, your business will cope better with the realities of working beyond 2020. Implementing the systems and processes which facilitate this required planning and thought but most of all, it required achieving the right balance between customer experience, costs and risk. Make sure that balance is in your favour.
If you would like to understand the options and the advantages in more detail, talk to us here at CCP. We have a team of contact centre experts who can advise you. We can help if you need it, or we can reassure you if your organisation is ready to move ahead in the post-pandemic world.

The most important questions to ask for a winter of slow recovery

As different parts of the UK have been plunged into Tier 3 lockdown, and we’ve put our clocks back to welcome in Winter 2020, businesses across the UK are facing up to an immediate future of continued uncertainty.

Earlier this year, business leaders optimistically hoped that there would be a moment when the recovery from Covid-19 began; a time when we could welcome our teams back to the office and implement the lessons we’ve learned over a summer of hardship and accelerated change. Now the nights are drawing in, the truth is that this isn’t going to happen any time soon. The reality is that the contact centre industry is looking at a slow return to a new normality, and we’re not sure how that normality will look yet.

Setting up your business to get through this winter?

As winter is now officially with us, this is the time to ask difficult questions and make plans to emerge in Spring 2021, full of energy and enthusiasm as the sap rises and the green shoots hopefully emerge. We can’t be certain that recovery will happen in Spring or whether we will have to wait longer, but when it does your business needs to be ready.

Preparing to get through the winter months will build the new foundations and platform on which your business will be able to grow when optimism and stability gradually return. In this article, we ask some of the most important questions on how to help your business get ready for future success.

What is your core business?

When businesses are growing, there is an inevitable and natural momentum that results in non-core activities being fulfilled in-house. It’s often faster to solve a problem using your own resources than it is to seek expert help from outside the business. When times are more difficult, these non-core activities can appear as unnecessary costs or unavoidable evils.

Ask yourself:

• What is your core business?
• What are your fundamental processes?
• What do you HAVE to do, that you’re not good at?
• What processes can you afford to do without?

Answering these questions will enable you to identify parts of your business which may be disposed or divested relatively painlessly, or which you could outsource to reduce direct costs and improve agility. Outsourcing also gives you the opportunity to find true expertise for the processes you are having to complete through necessity, enabling your business to focus on its core strengths.

Identifying key team members and helping them perform

The role of an employer has changed massively in 2020. With key team members having an increased influence on your results, especially if you’ve had to slim down and decide who works when and where. Additionally, your HR team will have learned new skills whilst having to deal with your employees under new circumstances.

Many businesses in our sector will already have faced incredibly challenging times as employers. Imposed self-isolation of healthy and high-performing agents can be very frustrating, especially if you don’t have the tools to enable them to work well from home. Even worse for employers, can be the results of the NHS Covid app’s recommendations that teams of people who have worked together must isolate at the same time, due to a single positive test. Despite the laudable aims of reducing infection rates, a team checking out of the office for 14 days can have a disastrous effect on productivity.

Consider the following questions:

• What’s the demographic of your agents? Are they in a higher-risk Covid bracket from a health or a cross-infection point of view?
• How are they going to be affected by Covid self-isolation? Ask your staff how they really feel about working from home. You might be able to maximise productivity by being flexible about how individuals work for you.
• Have you had an incident where team members or an entire team has had to take time away from the office yet? If so, did you have a plan, and did it work?
• How will you retain your best employees if they are forced to isolate?

Arguably, there is a moral responsibility to make it possible for your agents to continue working whilst in self-isolation. In contact centres, rates of pay are generally relatively low compared to other sectors. If this is the case, paying Statutory Sick Pay may not be viable if you want to retain staff – isolation may force team members to realise that they need to look for a different job with better sickness benefits. Of course, there is also a strong productivity argument to enable agents to work from anywhere.

Have you found your best infrastructure to deliver customer service?

Throughout the course of the summer, most businesses have been finding ways to facilitate effective homeworking for their staff. The coming months are an opportunity to experiment to find the ideal mix of home and office, not just for Covid safety but for productivity, property costs and flexibility reasons. With the costs of maintaining city centre facilities, businesses can reduce their expenses by making better use of the technologies that have enabled them to simply keep operating in 2020. The future shape of your business might be slimmer, more agile and more flexible.

Take a look at your business today and think about these issues:

• Do your systems enable your people to work from home productively for long periods of time?
• Which processes need to be done in your main offices?
• If you process payments, how do you do this securely and compliantly?
• Where is your customers’ data stored and accessed?

Your systems may allow your work to continue but be careful: compliance with payment and data regulations might be compromised by the way you allow people to work remotely. So far, the consequences of this haven’t been obvious but, in our view, it’s only a question of time before a serious breach of customer data or payment information is caused by a weakness in systems used for remote access.

Where can you get help with the results?

With a little luck and a lot of good planning, your business will be in great shape to cope with this winter and emerge prepared for the recovery when it happens.

On the other hand, if the questions we’ve asked raise issues for your business, we can help. Contact Centre Panel has built up a network of over 150 partners who can provide answers for a huge range of challenges including business process outsourcing, flexible agent availability, technology solutions for remote working or payments processing, expert data compliance help and a comprehensive list of issues facing the contact centre industry.

Most business leaders have not yet had a chance to take stock in 2020. Crisis management has been the overwhelming priority, having to deliver customer service to a demanding customer base during a time of huge fluctuation in volume across all channels. In an article earlier this year, we talked about the need for good Business Continuity Planning for a considered approach to getting back into the office as lockdown eased.

A summer of discovering the very real challenges of mass homeworking and having to deal with them has accelerated the learning process for the entire sector. It is now clear that working from home is a viable technical option for many more employees than most businesses imagined, although some critical processes such as payments still carry significant risks if dealt with incorrectly when handled outside centralised business systems. New ways of communicating with colleagues and teams via Zoom, Microsoft Teams and similar tools have complemented remote data networks to enable services to be carried out without massive disruption. At the same time, customer expectations have begun to align with the realisation that things have changed in the world of work.

We saw as national restrictions eased that businesses started to bring workers back into their offices and contact centres. Then the threat of a second wave has brought on tighter government restrictions, which has, in turn, created a new set of challenges for managers and leaders to deal with.

New challenges

Many businesses have successfully put social distancing measures into their places of work to protect staff, ranging from hygiene regimes to split working patterns and more regular, complete shift changes. Coupled with homeworking, this has allowed businesses to maintain links with employees, whilst monitoring their welfare and performance. It has also facilitated safer working practices.

Social distancing and strict hygiene recommendations are likely to remain well into the future, so it has been important to build these new working routines to make work not just possible but productive.

However, the reality of the pandemic continuing whilst people return to work means that there are new challenges to face. For example, lack of availability of testing in times of high demand is resulting in additional time off for many people. What were once simple issues like minor illnesses and routine medical outpatient procedures now require employees to be tested and, in many cases, periods of self-isolation. How does your business deal with a workforce where many employees need to take 2 weeks out of the office unexpectedly?

The upgrade of recommendations and guidance into statutory instruments means that businesses who fail to account for Covid protection are now liable for fines up to £10,000 (as this article is written), so it is essential that your business keeps up to date with the laws relating to your workplace.

A policy for essential workers?

Recent changes to regulations and guidance say that people who can work from home, should do so. ‘essential workers’ are permitted to attend the workplace. What is your policy to define essential workers? What are the consequences of not having a policy?

For many businesses, the period between March and July 2020 was spent finding ways to provide a viable service from teams who were forced to work from home, then to improve productivity by investing in new or existing systems and refining processes. Since restrictions were eased, bringing employees back into the office safely has been the priority for some businesses. Now that the government is asking only ‘essential workers’ to go to work, how do you decide what proportion of your workforce is needed in the office and what defines an ‘essential worker’ within your organisation?

There is a dilemma – how do you reconcile all the effort in finding ways to facilitate people working from home and then counter that by telling them they ‘need’ to work from the office? What will you do if team members challenge your decisions? In smaller organisations, flexibility can be a positive experience in times like this. However, with larger teams and contact centres, there is a need for a considered and robust policy to provide some governance and guidance for your management team to follow.

Practicalities of returning to the workplace

During the period of complete lockdown, when the furlough scheme was fully active, most staff were either working from home or put onto enforced furlough leave. Now businesses need to decide who should be in the office and who should work from home. For example, are there teams who need to be in the office every working day? Or can you successfully split your workforce into teams who rotate office time?

If you have regular office workers, what is the business’ liability if they contract or pass on Covid-19 after being asked to come into work? On the other hand, are you fulfilling your duty of care to employees in terms of mental health if they are working from home? You might consider that some employees are not only more productive but healthier if they are encouraged to spend more time in the office.

There is no doubt that team leaders and managers need to give staff liaison a higher priority than before this pandemic hit. Employee health will likely emerge as one of the major victims of the Coronavirus pandemic, and businesses that fail to check in with their team members may face the consequences with high churn, poor performance and potentially even health-related claims.

Where hands-on work is essential, this is already causing headaches for employers. Thankfully in the customer service sector, there are practical solutions available.

How do you resolve these challenges?

As usual, there is no single magic bullet. However, a combination of strategies can minimise the disruption caused by working through the pandemic.

Firstly, there are technology solutions available that can enable your workforce to transition easily between working in the office and at home. They can help your business to manage staff self-isolation, split shifts and flexible working to cope with childcare and school issues. Systems can be rolled out rapidly and effectively using cloud-based platforms, which need not render your existing data handling regimes obsolete. Such systems can also handle payment processing in a compliant way, minimising your exposure to fraud and potential intervention by regulatory authorities.

If you need help finding the right systems for your business, we can help. CCP has built a technology network of over 40 leading providers and is able to use their deep understanding of contact centres, CX and technology to accurately assess your requirements.

Secondly, having access to flexible outsource solutions gives you the option to rapidly deploy additional personnel resources to meet fluctuating demands or to cope with planned initiatives to raise sales or deal with enquiry backlogs. CCP has a large network of specialist contact centre outsources, experienced in precisely this sort of work across multiple sectors.

Finally, in terms of the wellbeing of staff who work remotely, we have produced a series of guidance videos in which Nathan Dring offers powerful advice on how to cope when working from home, including tips for managers on how to get the best out of individuals and teams who work remotely. Watch them here.

According to the research, a crisis creates three psychological states of mind. The first is a state of emergency, when an event comes from nowhere or catches us off guard and we find a clear sense of purpose, grow in energy and become more productive. How long you stay in this state varies by person, for example a crisis junkie, like myself, often enjoys spending time in this mindset so may prolong this period.

The next phase we move to is regression. When the uncertainty of a situation makes you lose purpose and can lead to withdrawal, irritability and a drop in productivity.

The third and final phase is the recovery. We start to reorient ourselves, check with our goal, adjust if necessary, and then get our heads into how we move on.

Individuals move through these phases at different speeds, which you may have witnessed when observing your colleagues’ behaviours as they have dealt with the Covid pandemic.

How have ‘we’ coped?

Many contact centres were very quick to prepare their staff for homeworking, with equipment and technology made available so people could work and service could be maintained. Non furloughed staff had clear objectives and knew what they had to do to make things happen. Rooms in the house were turned into working spaces and new daily patterns established…all with the intention of ‘making homeworking operational!’

After several weeks in lockdown, many people will have naturally started to drift into regression. The uncertainty of how long the crisis will last had kicked in, with the lack of interaction and normal patterns of communication starting to impact on how people felt. Work started to feel laborious and customers (who were also going through the same behavioural patterns) became a bit more irritable. Family were not as understanding as they were, which created its own problems.

All in all, things began to feel much harder.

Then we moved into ‘lockdown lifting’, which may or may not change your working arrangements. With some homeworkers heading back into the office and others remaining at home. That said, there is a potential for staff to see ‘light at the end of the tunnel’.

Supporting staff in the transition to the ‘new norm’

As a leader with staff working from home, what can you do to help support team members and your customers as we tiptoe towards recovery?

Keep up the staff communication

Firstly, on a human level, check in with your teams. How are they getting on? How are they feeling? What is happening in their personal life? Show them that you care about their wellbeing and as people, not just ‘doers’.

Secondly, give your team insight into the business. What is happening within the organisation? How is it performing? What is their part to play? Given that they may well have felt a loss of purpose, now more than ever is a time to direct them back to that and be sure to make it clear. Connect the dots very obviously, thereby creating a renewed sense of purpose in what they are doing.

Set expectations for customers

According to research, many people have had mixed experiences dealing with contact centres during Covid. I personally found it infuriating being told my wait time was 5 minutes (due to demand) and then waiting 45 minutes before giving up as had to join a meeting. Conversely, my bank has a message in its IVR explaining that they are doing their best and that their staff are working from home. My expectation had been set so I understood that I might hear noises in the background due to family life still going on. I was happy with this. Not only did it set my expectations, but I had immediate empathy with the person on the other end as I too have had that struggle.

My advice for leaders is to keep up your communications with homeworkers, both on a personal and organisational level, to remind them that they matter and that they have a purpose. Help your customers to be aware of what you are doing to help and how your teams are operating. Bring a personal level and some empathy to your conversations. Keep up the encouragement and give regular gratification. Life will get easier as we head towards recovery so remain positive and focused on your goals.

Concerned with staff wellbeing and productivity?

If you require help improving team member wellbeing and productivity, we can assist. At CCP, we are skilled at assessing and implementing progressive cultural change. Our extensive experience of working with a large range of clients, including large multinationals, SMEs and charities, means we have the expertise to help any business. For further information click here or get in touch for a chat.

The impact of the Covid 19 pandemic on business operations has been unprecedented. No one could have predicted the rapid move to home working and the enormous impact the virus has had on business volumes and customer service provision, with some companies having to ramp up operations and others drastically ramp down.

With restrictions gradually easing in the UK and with the furlough scheme expected to end in October. It is essential that businesses, if they haven’t done already, make definitive plans to get their workforce fully operational.

Social distancing and strict hygiene recommendations are likely to remain well into the future, so it’s important to plan how your organisation will make work not just possible but productive, as 2020 moves through its second half.

Returning to full operation – why is your Business Continuity plan critical?

Most businesses were not ready to send all their staff home when the UK’s pandemic response was announced in mid-March. However, with a huge amount of hard work and adaptability, many contact centres and customer service operations managed to keep operational throughout the crisis. There were certainly big challenges and some major brands struggled to cope with demand from their customers. After several weeks of improvements and a lot of late nights for many people, the industry appears to have dealt with the crisis admirably overall.

Getting employees back into the right routines will be the next critical stage of the industry’s response to the Covid 19 pandemic, and now is the time to make sure your organisation is ready to embrace the future.

How will your business be viewed after the pandemic is over?

In PWC’s Global Crisis Survey 2019, 95% of CEOs said that they expected to face a crisis in their working lives: now 100% of them are facing that crisis. Most crises are not preceded by a warning, and the swift spread of coronavirus was no exception.

Your customers, staff and suppliers will judge you based on how well you handle this pandemic. If you do not believe that, look at Wetherspoons, Virgin and JD Sports and the damage that their decisions have made to their reputations in a few short weeks. Poor choices about how to deal with staff, as activities were put on hold, may have far-reaching effects on what happens when things get back up to speed.

The coming weeks are an opportunity to redesign aspects of your operation, not only to react to changes in the business caused by Covid 19, but to improve your business generally. In years of ‘normal’ business, changes have often been incremental and difficult to implement. The radical changes to working practice forced on many businesses by the pandemic have opened up opportunities for companies to make positive long-term changes to their working processes to adapt to ‘new’ ways of working.

What does this mean for your Business Continuity plan?

Many Business Continuity professionals, myself included, love the adage ‘never waste a good crisis’. Your business has probably made errors in handling the current situation. Hopefully, they’ve not had a negative effect, but if this is the case make sure you take away any learnings. Use your new-found insight to build an effective Business Continuity plan for the future. Making sure whatever the next crisis is, your business is fully prepared and has reduced its exposure to risk.

Your Business Continuity plan may not have been appropriate for the type and scale of the crisis caused by this pandemic. For many organisations, Disaster Recovery planning has been limited to flood, fire and failure of data & communications systems. It is important to build a plan which enables you to cope with several different scenarios, some of which will be happening at the same time. For example, relocating everyone to work from home whilst protecting customer data and moving all office systems into the cloud probably had been legislated for by many companies three months ago. Now every business needs to be ready to do that again, with very little notice.

How can we get back to office working?

There are several critical questions to answer before you start to move staff back into the office. Among the most important are:

• How Covid-secure is the work environment? This includes social distancing measures in the office – welfare facilities including kitchens and toilets, sanitation stations; signage and traffic control measures
• Deep cleaning – Make sure the workplace not only LOOKS like a Covid-secure space but that it is. A deep clean and regular checks will almost certainly be needed. Remember you have a Duty of Care to your teams
• Communications – Reminding your staff of their obligations and how you are supporting them, plus reinforcing safety at work will be of utmost importance
• Staff numbers – What percentage of your teams can you safely and realistically bring back to the office?
• Personal welfare – Some people may be more productive working from home, others may not be able to return to the office because of health risks or childcare issues. For those who can return to work, how will they get there? Will you provide parking or focus on those who are closer to the office so they can avoid public transport?

Write a Return to Work Policy if you don’t already have one. If you do, check it, and make sure it allows your business to make sensible decisions in a procedural way. Inconsistency may cause further problems down the line, not just in employee relations but potentially in liability for your company. Employees value consistency and a written policy should increase trust and give your managers good guidelines to make fair decisions.

Clearly communicate

Clear communication with your teams is essential. Many peoples’ lives have been turned upside down by the effects of this health crisis. It is important that they are valued and kept in the loop about how the easing of lockdown restrictions might affect them and their work. Making communication two-way also gives your staff an opportunity to voice any concerns or to highlight any unusual cases which need to be dealt with. Solve problems now to avoid bigger problems later.

Are you ready?

I hope that your business is well prepared for this next crucial phase of the country’s Covid response. If you are unsure about how robust your Business Continuity plans are, or if you need a structured approach to your Return to Work Planning, we can help, simply complete our ‘get in touch’ form and we will be in contact shortly after.