Charles was a panelist on our recent Homeworking webinar and was the ideal person to speak to about the risks facing customer service and contact businesses as they embrace hybrid working models as we ease out of the pandemic.

As we are emerging from the pandemic. What has Covid meant to Health & Safety professionals?

Charles recalls the past year: “Covid was a surprise to most health & safety professionals. The pandemic fell upon us and many people thought that it would be a temporary situation, with working from home as a short-term fix but as the pandemic became a fact of working life, Health & Safety professionals have had to consider some more permanent solutions: can people realistically do their jobs at home? And from the professional standpoint, can they do it safely?”

He continues: “In over a year since the first lockdown, we’ve all become very familiar with the ways that home and hybrid working have been made possible. Most people think of the software solutions like Teams, Zoom and so on, but from a Health & Safety perspective we have to think much more widely.”

Charles concludes: “From a health & safety perspective, working in a home environment is very different to an office.”

So as people have got used to working from home and are now returning to more flexible, hybrid ways of working, what are the big Health & Safety considerations?

Charles explains: “The workplaces we are used to will have had Health & Safety Risk Assessments in place, which recognise hazards and provide ways to mitigate and control the risk. These are generally standardised and can be made available to managers and workers relatively easily and centrally. Workstations in offices, especially contact centre environments, tend to be similar and provide a good level of safety to team members. Allowances can be made for individuals on a case-by-case basis depending on their needs, which can be easily talked about during the working day.”

He states: “It’s completely different when people find themselves relocated to working from home at short notice. We have experienced enormous variations in the suitability of workspaces, equipment and challenges which we had very little time to prepare for or adapt to.”

Charles points out: “Under Health & Safety laws, employers have an obligation to ensure that their staff are kept safe. This applies to wherever the workers are fulfilling their roles.”

He continues: “Bad workplaces can result in serious problems for workers. Lighting, ergonomics and comfort, as well as the immediate physical safety of appliances or tools, are more difficult to control away from the office but are equally important wherever your team members are working and using them.”

How can customer service businesses deal with the new risks?

Charles states: “If you have team members who are spending any time working from home, your obligations as an employer cover both the office and the home workspace, or anywhere your staff regularly work. In practical terms, this means completing a risk assessment for hybrid and homeworkers in their homes. These risk assessments should be used to establish what our workers have in place, versus what they should expect.

He continues: “In short: If your workers’ spaces cannot be made safe, then those workers should not be working from home.”

Charles adds: “There are more detailed requirements too. PAT (Portable Appliance) Testing is a well-known control measure in the workplace. Equipment used elsewhere must be kept safe, one of the more easy-to-understand difficulties with basing people away from any centralised location.”

He concludes: “Businesses can use standardised tests to identify many risks in non-standard workplaces, though. A DSE Workstation Assessment can be completed by employees with minimal easy to understand,  training and support. An electronic assessment sent to the HR department or an independent Health & Safety consultancy can be used to collate a company-wide view of the main risks. This view can be analysed for the organisation as a whole and used to prioritise actions and mitigate risks, as well as demonstrating a commitment to looking after your teams.”

What about individual needs?

Charles starts: “A company’s obligations extend to all employees, not just the workforce as a whole. Where an individual team member has an issue, it’s up to the employer to decide what action should be taken.”

He explains: “Some people find homeworking difficult, so an extra effort should be made to make communication regular and as easy as possible for your teams. One good example of this which we’ve seen clients enjoying during the pandemic is a weekly online social lunch, where teams spend time together, from home, without a business agenda. Events like this can maintain a sense of togetherness during difficult times and might help hybrid workers long into the future.”

Charles says: “Stress is an adverse reaction to pressure. Pressure can improve performance in some people but too much pressure can have a seriously adverse effect on not only results, but the health of your people.”

He continues: “If we think of stress as water, everyone has a different-sized jug for their ability to deal with the flow of it. Employers bear a responsibility to alleviate and manage the pressure, to reduce or control the flow of that water. It’s important to be aware that pressure not only flows from work, but from everywhere else in an individual’s life too.”

Charles states: “Hybrid working is a good example of the flexibility now available to employers. Remember that the same flexibility can be used to offer employees a less stressful way of working, something that suits their own life and challenges more effectively.”

 He explains: “With less organic interaction between your teams, try to encourage more mentorship and informal training to allow your employees to develop their skills as well as their social interactions. Support knowledge-sharing, wherever possible, to replace those conversations which many of us used to have in the office every day. Mentoring can be a vastly underrated and highly effective method of informal training for the whole business.”

 Charles concludes: “It costs around £10,000 on average to replace an employee, so businesses should be aiming to retain their team members, not least for simple economic reasons.”

With many offices now opening, what should businesses be thinking about in terms of Health & Safety?

Charles states: “If there’s one thing to take away, it’s that a person’s workplace is everywhere they work. That means that employers have a duty of care to take account of working conditions in more than just the office. If you can’t do that for everyone, then you might have to enable some of your team members to come back permanently to the office.”

 He concludes: “Outside the legal point of view, forward-thinking employers will also be communicating with their team members much more frequently than they used to. There are more factors at play now than ever before, with the lines blurring between home and working lives, so as employers we need to be more mindful of the health of our teams. We can help to keep the business healthy by working hard to keep our people healthy too.”

If you’d like to discuss how your organisation can be more effective in implementing hybrid working successfully, our expert team can help, this includes providing guidance on how to work with your employees to maximise their health, happiness, and productivity.

What will be the main changes for businesses in 2021 and beyond?

Sam states: “Businesses need to think of every work environment as an extension of the workplace. This means that for employees who will continue to work from home, either permanently or part-time, the employer needs to be fully engaged to ensure mitigation of the major areas of risk, particularly employee health, wellbeing, ensuring fair employment practices, cyber and information security.”

Sam continues: “Ideally, individual home-based risk assessment documents should be issued to home workers to complete for their working space at home. Employees should be supported in completing these documents, so businesses might need to be adaptable in how this support is provided. Cost-effectively, video overviews could be used to assist individuals or remote meetings along with home visits reserved for the most complex cases. Every employee must be treated individually with consideration of their specific needs.”

Sam concludes: “Following individual risk assessments, action must be taken to mitigate the risks identified. This might mean supplying equipment to provide a safe and comfortable working space for your team members. Failure to address known risks will not be viewed positively should a claim arise.”

How can employers manage disruption and costs from the necessary changes?

Sam answers: “Make sure that your business has a Homeworking Policy and adheres to it. Consult with your employees on the policy and review it regularly. Following a structured approach will maximise consistency and highlight opportunities to foresee repeatable tactics to address your employees’ issues in the home workplace.”

Sam points out: “Your policies will help your business to adopt managed procurement strategies. This means that you can purchase equipment in an effective way, helping your colleagues whilst enjoying the economies of scale and consistency that good purchasing behaviours deliver. It also means that everyone is treated fairly, with equal treatment of similar situations for your workers. Being able to evidence a reasonable and consistent approach will be key to the defence of any claim that may arise as a result of increasing volumes of home working. ”

What about looking after staff wellbeing and development?

Sam voiced: “Increase the amount of communication you have with your staff. By ramping up the interaction, people can feel more connected to the workplace and enhance your corporate culture. At Lockton, we have teams who work with video calls switched on even when they’re not in meetings: that ability to interact whilst working mimics the social aspects of working together.”

Sam goes onto illustrate: “Regular virtual training sessions using the wealth of online material is easy to set up and offers great opportunities to learn in a relaxed environment. Why not watch webinars together as a team from home then follow with a Q&A to share what you’ve all learned? Simple techniques like these can encourage a culture of shared learning and recognise your team members for their engagement.”

Sam adds: “Mentoring is another winning strategy for remote teams. Putting structures in place where more experienced colleagues are tasked with helping others and being available to answer questions not only gives the more senior team members a position of responsibility and recognition, it gives your less experienced staff permission to ask for the help they need.”

Sam was keen to point out that working from home is not for everyone, though. As we move through 2021 and offices can reopen, there is pressure on businesses to find the right mix of working styles for their people.

Sam explains: “Before planning your office layouts for the return back to work, check that your people are happy with the new arrangements. If you can be flexible, then adapting to the ways your teams prefer to work might deliver great productivity results. Put simply, some people work better from home, others are at their optimum in the office, and still, others may love a mixture of the two. The key is to offer flexibility and engage to the greatest extent possible, ensuring that all staff members are given the same opportunities wherever they choose to work.”

Sam concludes: “The businesses that share in the benefits of hybrid working will perform better and reduce their exposure to claims from employees.”

What are the other business benefits of getting hybrid working right?

Sam explains: “Employers who move now to identify how much office space they need can take the opportunity to reduce office costs. By reducing space, they can seek reduced rents. Use some of those savings to make working from home better for your employees and protect your business from future claims risks.”

Sam continues: “By building a supportive and flexible hybrid working model backed by mentoring and team building your business can feed a positive culture and your employees will feel supported. This will be reflected in low dissatisfaction, increased productivity and a comparatively lower risk of claims from your staff. Research of course also confirms that where employees are happy then this benefit is passed on to the client by way of enhanced customer service.”  

 Sam adds “An extra benefit for the medium to long term is that a good, flexible hybrid working structure makes it easier to recruit. Your team will no longer have to be based exclusively in the towns where you have offices nor will they need to stay nearby – people who leave the area can stay with you where before 2020 they might have had to find a job in a new location. This simply makes it easier to retain and recruit the best talent as your business grows.”

So finally, what are the main takeaway messages for businesses adapting to hybrid working?

Sam summarised his thoughts very succinctly: “The businesses that put employees at the centre of their hybrid working plans will do well, making the most of opportunities to decrease overhead, widen recruitment, lower staff turnover and absence, enhance productivity and reduce claims exposures. The key will be to ensuring that engagement and investment in culture is at the centre of the strategy; all employees must be brought on the corporate journey to ensure fairness and success. Those who cling on to a jackets-on-chairs mentality may face the negative side effects as staff demand flexibility and look to competitors who can offer it to them. They could also fail to make the most of this once in a lifetime opportunity to improve their competitiveness.”

“‘By building a business which rewards people for results and supports staff development in a responsible way, companies now have a chance to deliver excellent service, attract and keep the best people, and reduce cost. For most this will be an opportunity that is too good to refuse.”

If you’re unsure how to assess your claims risk exposure and how to equip your business to handle new working conditions, the expert team at Contact Centre Panel can help. We can also help you to learn how to work with your employees to maximise their health, happiness and productivity.

There’s no getting away from the fact that the world has changed, but with good planning and adaptability, a prepared organisation can react and succeed where others may fail.

A change in our way of thinking

Julie highlighted major alterations in how we think about the risks in our business. “We’ve gone from being worried about our offices to worrying about homeworkers. In many cases productivity has gone up and people are reporting that they are happier, but many people are now missing the human contact and support that an office environment provides, so senior leaders need to work harder to support their people.”

Julie continues: “Those issues also extend to business continuity risks, which are now distributed in nature due to remote working, whereas in the past risks were largely centred around the main offices. Many systems which were implemented to cope with homeworking were rolled out very quickly, to solve an urgent business need. This approach may have lead to gaps and issues with both the resilience and security. Now that the situation looks more permanent, it’s important to check Business Continuity and Disaster Recover plans to account for the totally different risks.”

What does business resilience mean in 2021?

“Business resilience isn’t just having a Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery plan in place” explains Julie. “Although these things are important, the businesses that are most likely to do well in 2021 and further into the future are the ones who have changed their models to suit the new realities.”

Julie concludes: “Resilience isn’t just recovering, it’s thriving in changing times.”

Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery in practical terms

Julie explains: “One key example is your telephony systems. They may have been adapted to cope with the new normal when your people began working from home. These changes may have inadvertently introduced (sometimes hidden until it fails!) issues. Your contact centre is your shop window, especially while many physical shops have been closed for so long. Despite the reopening of the high street, your contact centres play a huge part in representing your business and brand.”

Julie adds: “If people can’t contact your teams effectively, you’re restricting access to your shop window. If your telephony systems fail or perform badly, it reflects on your business. If your online systems fail, telephony might be the only way your customers can get in touch so the ability to talk to somebody is a huge priority.”

So Julie recommends that telephony systems are tested regularly, say every 6 months. A plan for Disaster Recovery is needed in case your telephony fails. What will you do if your customers can’t get through? 

Cyber Security

Julie suggests asking two questions of your IT and Cyber Teams when assessing cybersecurity. If you don’t understand the answer the IT/Cyber team give you, or if you don’t even know what these questions actually mean don’t worry, but ask them to explain in plain English what it means for the business and the risk to data or systems. The two key questions are:

• Are you patching our systems for vulnerabilities and gaps?
• Do we have defence in depth built into our IT systems?

Irrespective of the IT/Cyber teams explanation, you should to take an urgent look at your Business Continuity plans and update them (with help from the IT/Cybr team) so that they can cope with a cyber attack. The plans should also be tested and rehearsed regularly with the business and IT/Cyber.

“There must be security at every level of your IT Infrastructure ” explains Julie, “Your central servers, within your technological partner solutions environments, and your end users including those at home. This includes educating your staff, who may be targeted by cybercriminals. They need to know how to recognise they are being  targeted  – i.e., what ‘red flag’ warning signs to look for – and most importantly what to do about it, and what not to do (e.g. not clicking on suspicious looking emails or links).”

Julie continues: “Testing is an important step. Penetration testing (or ‘Pen Testing’) is essentially paying experts to try and break into your systems. Even if you only do it once a year, this can uncover flaws and vulnerabilities in your security, and your security team or partner should then draw up an action plan to address the issues urgently – thus leading to better protection for your business.”

Julie adds: “Larger or regulated companies are more likely to carry out penetration testing, but smaller companies and outsourced partners might not be doing it. This might be because they think they’re too small to be at risk (they simply think it won’t happen to them!) or because they think they can’t justify it in terms of cost, or even because they’re worried about the potential results! In the event of a successful attack, none of these excuses will help.”

Julie explained that the key to introducing a good penetration testing regime is board support. Explain the risks in plain English to your board. Using IT jargon usually doesn’t help them to understand why they need to do it, how easy it is to break the company’s IT systems, and the significant risks of losing the battle against cybercriminals.

Julie continues: “Don’t believe it won’t happen to you. The criminals are running a numbers game and they may be just as likely to attack a smaller business as the biggest international brands and financial institutions.”

Julie concludes: “The pandemic has created a much more unstable world and global economy. Criminals will continue to look for new exploits so it’s important to try and stay one step ahead. Be agile, be flexible. Learn to adapt to the new world with its new sets of customer demands and business risks.”

What can business do now?

Julie suggests three questions to think about for your business today:

• What are your top 10 business continuity risks now?
• How do you plan to mitigate them?
• What can you build into your business now to shield yourself from future risks?

Which business will succeed in a world of new business risks?

Julie answers: “If you’ve taken your resilience seriously and have a proper Business Continuity plan in place, your business has a much better chance of coping with the next major disruption that comes along – and let’s be clear, something will happen. It’s just a case of when”

Julie explains: “Get the principles right and set your accountability and business framework for dealing with the risks, and your business should be able to succeed while others flounder. You will of course be nee to carry out training and exercising, which in turn will give you the confidence to be adaptable.”

Julie concludes: “The pandemic has actually given Business Continuity and Resilience professionals an opportunity to scan the horizon and hone our skills. Now is an ideal opportunity to engage with an expert partner if you haven’t done so already.”

How Contact Centre Panel can help

If you’re unsure how to assess your businesses risk exposure and how to equip it to handle any new risks posed by changeable working conditions, we can help by advising you on the risks you need to consider and the best way to mitigate them. We can also help you to learn how to work with your employees to maximise their health, happiness, and productivity.

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…

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.

Building a competent contact centre team, whether for customer service or sales, is not easy. Thankfully, with over 6,200 contact centres operating across the UK, making up over 4% of the country’s workforce, there is a wealth of resource to attract talent from.

How do you attract the right candidates?

When recruitment specialists Launchpad, who work with brands such as AXA, Microsoft and Three Mobile, introduced a new innovative recruitment method, which focuses on behaviours rather than experience, they noticed a positive impact to their clients’ team building. They found that having an appetite for new technology, empathy for customers and great listening skills were more important traits for agents than having had previous experience. These selection techniques have also been adopted by businesses who have contact centres, with some using online questionnaires and novel interview styles to find the right attributes in candidates.

A guide called ‘Recruiting Special Agents’, published by assessment specialists Cut-E, highlights that many contact centres replace up to a quarter of their workforce every year. Such high attrition rates are clearly not good for business. The CEO of Cut-E, Andreas Lohff says “The bad news is that the people who apply for agent positions are often unsuited to the job… This not only has significant financial impact but can harm your metrics and performance indicators.”

Giving potential candidates a realistic view of the role before they apply plays an important part in setting expectations. “When they find out that the role wasn’t what they thought it would be, they’ll either become bored and unproductive or they’ll leave” says Lohff. To avoid this, some organisations use online self-assessment tools, which let candidates see how they match to the job requirements before completing a full application.

Ian Lasplace, Director, Longreach Recruitment, identified in this CallCentreHelper.com article, a number of key points to think about when recruiting:

• Recruit staff against your organisation’s values and culture
• Identify successful traits in your best performing staff and look for these when recruiting
• Recruit to suit the different disciplines in your business i.e sales will require different characteristics to debt collection
• Match your recruits to the culture of a department. Is it a fast paced technology-driven environment? How important is humour, or communication skills and empathy?
• Consider who your recruits will interface with and how
• Understand your competition – try to become an employer of choice within your industry to attract the best candidates
• Once you have recruited the right people, do whatever you can to develop and retain your best staff. Losing good team members costs money, time and sometimes customers.
• Keep people driven, motivated and wanting to excel. Creating a culture of excellence will help deliver a fulfilling, competitive working environment
• Build your teams – team building helps improve your team member relations , knowledge sharing and skills
  Other techniques and tools which can add huge value to your recruitment and help you to attract and keep great team members include:
• Test your interviewers – make sure your recruiters fully understand your requirements including key personality traits
• Psychometric testing – use scientific methods to identify and rank the personality traits which you both value and want to avoid
• Recruit for motivation and attitude – train for product knowledge
• Consider flexible working – if your organisation can support remote and flexible working, you can open your search to include candidates who require flexibility.
• Internal recruitment – don’t overlook talent within your business, whose knowledge of your business and its products and services will give them an advantage

Agents of the future – what are the challenges?

As customers become more used to self-service, via apps and websites, agents will be required to handle only the more complex enquiries. Therefore, it’s important that tomorrow’s customer service teams are capable of handling detailed questions, meaning that staff with training and experience will add real value. By recruiting agents who fit your business well, the chances of retaining them and building well-trained loyal teams for the future are vastly enhanced.

What are the alternatives to running your own recruitment?

There are many ways to get help recruiting the right people for your organisation. Using a reputable recruitment agency, that fully understand your industry area and requirements, can really help when trying to find the right candidates. When vetting agencies it’s important to find out how they operate and the levels of experience they have within your sector and area of business.

If your needs are short term, seasonal or sudden, outsourcing some or all of your contact centre needs can provide a solution. Established contact centres or telemarketing agencies have already invested resources in recruiting strong teams, which means they might be a perfect match for your business needs. By ‘recruiting your outsourcers’ carefully your business can avoid many of the pitfalls and costs of the recruitment process.

So, in summary, building a skilled, loyal and dynamic contact centre team can be tricky. However, using the right tools and techniques you can avoid many of the pitfalls which may come your way. Having clearly defined job role requirements and focusing on personality fit as much as industry experience will pay dividends. And there is always the option to outsource your contact centre or telemarketing, if and when required.

We spoke to two industry stalwarts from very different Contact Centres and asked them about their approach to B2B work. Anne Bagnall is Managing Director of Phonetic Limited, a flexible Contact Centre with a core of B2B and some B2C clients amongst the client list, allowing her to give an all-round perspective. Paul Fletcher is MD of CC33, a boutique Contact Centre focused on inbound and outbound B2B calls including appointment setting and lead generation, working hand in hand with clients to deliver and end-to-end solution. These two industry leaders shared their experience and honest opinions with us.

B2B versus B2C – How is Business to Business Contact different from Business to Consumer?

When most people think of Contact Centres, they think of B2C outbound contact and customer service. There’s no doubt that Consumer contact is a huge and important slice of the industry, but Business contact remains a consistent and rewarding area for Contact Centres possessing the right mix of skills, experience and tools. We put three key questions to our B2B experts to identify what it takes to provide a top-level outsourced B2B Contact service.

What are the biggest differences between your approach to B2B Contact, compared to your experience of B2C work?

Anne Bagnall talked about the sheer lack of knowledge and familiarity of B2B brands and buyers with regard to potential outsourcers: “The biggest B2C brands have used Contact Centres for years – they know the outsourced providers and the outsourcers tend to know them too. B2B clients tend to be nervous because the business has tried and failed to do the work before and is looking at outsourcers to fix the problem. Quite often the clients look for a Cost Per Acquisition or some other kind of risk & reward model, because of this nervousness.

“Typically B2B work uses a much lower number of seats than a B2C contract: 8 seats can be a large team for B2B! Despite the smaller teams, much more hands-on management is used than for B2C teams because the approach tends to be less formulaic and more flexible. Smaller, more targeted audiences mean that a very proactive approach is needed. It’s not an easy environment but with a high ratio of management per agent and a close relationship with clients, we can achieve great results.

“On a positive note, good B2B clients enable you to put roots into their organisation. We have a list of very long tenures, ultimately down to building relationships on trust and performance. This means we can deal with challenges together, like last year’s introduction of GDPR for example. The close working relationship that’s needed to achieve good results can really help to grow successful partnerships with clients.”

Paul Fletcher’s experience is slightly different, but there are definite common threads in the conversation: “We find it important to be extremely realistic with our B2B clients. We’re very heavy on our management ‘mothering’ clients but by working closely, we can really improve the results clients receive compared to initial expectations.

“Working with B2B clients on a closely-managed cost per hour basis, we can build a value-led quality assured operation, which isn’t often possible with the cost-per-acquisition model.

“One huge benefit of working in B2B markets is the availability of enhanced data. GDPR has helped, but in B2C sectors you can’t usually obtain extra data about the risk of a contact. For B2B data, on the other hand, we can check for financial indicators which can be very important when it comes to leads moving through our clients’ sales funnels… by checking for financial risk information up front, we can maximise the convertibility of leads we pass through.”

Why do you think more organisations don’t outsource B2B Contact work?

Paul from CC33 echoed Anne’s earlier comment when we asked this question: “Fear. Many buyers have been burned before. What most buyers don’t know is that the industry has changed a lot from a ‘bums on seats’ model with high client churn between Contact Centres, towards a much better appreciation of what really works for B2B clients.

“Potential clients aren’t always aware of the extra things a good Contact Centre can do to help a B2B brand achieve better results. Great data quality, transparency and working hard together with the clients to find the right approach can all make a big difference. Being up front with the client about how they can influence the results is important, too. It’s our job to make our buyers look good!”

Anne Bagnall identifies some different reasons that B2B operations have for keeping things in-house; “Some brands may have already built a specialist in-house team. If they’ve done this, there are barriers to disbanding this and if the work is done well, it can be cheaper than outsourcing. On top of this, there can be perceived loss of control when thinking about moving an in-house operation to an outsourcer.

“On the other hand, some clients already have a good in-house operation but don’t have capacity to expand or handle spikes in activity. This is where a good outsourced Contact Centre can help by adding a layer of lead generation, passing or hot-keying leads to the internal team and improving their success rates.

“As outsourcers, it’s our job to educate B2B organisations about how the right outsourcers can enhance an in-house team, rather than offering a complete alternative to it.”

Is there such a thing as a perfect B2B agent, as opposed to a B2C agent?

Anne from Phonetic uses agents on both B2C and B2B contracts, so she should be in a good position to compare the best characteristics needed to succeed in each area. “For B2B work the perfect agent shares many traits with a good B2C agent, but some are more important for business contacts. Someone who is intelligent and has a lot of common sense will work well in both B2B and B2C work, but an ability to listen and communicate well is great for B2B work because agents need to rely much less on scripts and more on a less structured call guide. The flexibility to adapt to training and guidance is more essential in B2B environments as conversations tend to be more exploratory and less scripted.

“Talking to business contacts whilst they are working can actually be much less stressful than B2C work when it’s done well, as the business people a B2B agent is calling are in their work environment rather than at home trying to avoid calls. A polite and articulate agent might have to arrange another time for a conversation, but finding a better time can result in a positive outcome, so it’s often worthwhile establishing a rapport over a longer timescale.”

What Does This Mean For B2B Organisations?

With B2B-specialist skills in evidence in some established Contact Centres, outsourcing is definitely an option for B2B brands who are considering a new approach, or who need additional capacity to help their existing team to meet demand. Adding a layer of lead generation or qualification is also a real option to improve the performance of an already-successful internal contact team.

Knowing which Contact Centres possess great B2B competence and infrastructures shouldn’t be expected, thankfully here at The Contact Centre Panel it’s our job to make sure that Brands and businesses find the best Contact Centres to meet their needs. An in-depth knowledge of the sectors we work with, coupled with our rigorous selection process and network of over 80 outsourced Contact Centre providers, means that we can work with brands in B2B environments to find the right partners.

We offer a free, no-obligation assessment of your current Sales and Customer Service Contact provision, so just contact us by email or call 0114 209 6120 to talk about your needs. We won’t push: we will only help if you need it.

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To find out more about working with the perfect partner for your business, give us a call here at Contact Centre Panel on 0114 209 6120 or contact us using the form on our website.