What It Takes to Get Training Right in the Contact Centre

Every person joining a contact centre (at least on some level) needs to be trained, but there are some common underlying flaws in the process that can undermine training for everyone involved. So, what can be done about it?

Here, Dr M. Dave Salisbury, COO at D&C Consulting LLC, shares key findings from his qualitative descriptive study on the role of the corporate trainer as applicable to contact centres – including why this topic is important, alongside tips on applying this research to the contact centre.

What’s the Problem With Contact Centre Training?

Here are the key findings outlining some of the core challenges in delivering corporate training programmes in the contact centre:

Confusion Exists About How Leaders View Corporate Trainers and Corporate Training

The problem is that confusion exists about how leaders view corporate trainers and corporate training and whether that trainer can be pointed to as an influencer in behavioural fit in a business. A business leader told me, “A trainer’s job is to train.”

However, trainers reported that they neither have an organizational role nor resources and they feel looked down upon because all they do is train.

Worse, both the trainer and the business leaders have discussed how they never obtain value from corporate training.

We Need to Understand What Training Is Intended to Do

To understand the role of the corporate trainer, we need to understand what training in corporations is intended to do.

Corporate training is not about learning new information but adapting behaviours, attitudes, and identities to a business culture. This is strategically referred to as corporate identity management (CIM).

Corporate identity management plays a critical role in business operations, marketing, community relations, customer service, and every other facet of a business.

Hence, the importance in understanding that the role of the trainer is more than “just to train”. It is influencing the entire company.

“Call Centre Helper Magazine was gracious in helping me reach an audience of call centre workers to conduct research, and I am incredibly grateful for their assistance.”

Conducting regular skills audits makes it easier to identify if there are any skills/areas that agents need help in. For advice on this, read our article: How to Conduct a Skills Audit and Coaching Plan

Agents Learn What’s Really Acceptable Through Observation

This brings us to the first major finding of the research: agents learn managerially acceptable behaviours most often through observation.

Agents can point to a single person (trainer) and relate how the observed behaviours changed their behaviours so the agent could fit better into the social atmosphere of the business.

Behaviour is learned, attitudes pass from individual to individual, and the motivation to change individual behaviours, identities, and attitudes is a personal sacrifice to remain associated with that society or business culture. The agents want to fit better in the social atmosphere of the company who hired them.

Policies Dictating Behaviours Should Serve an Organizational Purpose

Every contact centre is a self-contained society with individual values, requirements, and policies dictating behaviours, identities, attitudes, and mannerisms, which should serve an organizational purpose. If these items do not serve a purpose, the agent will know, and organizational chaos ensues.

A research participant mentioned how one business they were associated with demanded a specific way to dress, fix make-up (women), speak, and the attitude they needed to project to customers.

One of the requirements included participating in volunteer activities every two weeks. No explanation from leaders was ever given for participation, and agents churned on this single requirement.

Every contact centre is a self-contained society with individual values, requirements, and policies dictating behaviours, identities, attitudes, and mannerisms.

However, the business leader did not mind losing people who would not volunteer, and the participant stated that it took several years of working there to understand why volunteer activities were mandatory and their purpose to the organization as a whole.

Therein lies the power and connection between organizational design and the interest and value discussion: the intentionality of business leaders to know the “Why.”

The business in the example made more money and created more community goodwill through volunteer activities than they lost in agent churn. Moreover, the core agents, who stayed, were a higher calibre of agent and could be trusted when the leaders were not around.

It is also useful for a contact centre to have a Standard Operating Procedure. If you are looking for advice on this, read our article: How to Write a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP)

Leaders Fail to Understand How They Are Training Through the Examples They Set

Interestingly, what we also regularly see in corporate training is trainers who are not supported in continuing relationships because of poor organizational design, team leaders who refuse to engage in training, and business leaders who refuse to understand how they are training through the examples they set.

Here’s a personal example of working in a call centre. On the first day of class, everyone was dressed professionally, but the trainer came in with spikes on their motorcycle helmet, three-coloured hair, leather pants, and acted in a manner unexpected.

The following day the class was in holed jeans, and possessed a 180-degree different attitude, which was “acceptable” during training, but was not acceptable in on-the-job training or on the call centre floor. That entire class, 25 agents, churned before they completed three months of employment.

For advice on how you can bridge the gap to successfully engage new starters and improve customer experience, read our article: Going From Induction to Onboarding

Seeing Corporate Training as a “One-and-Done” Activity!

This culture of confusion opened the door for another finding: trainees want an ongoing relationship with a trainer. Corporate training is never a “one-and-done” activity!

Corporate training begins before hiring and does not end until that business is dissolved, or the agent chooses a different culture (business) to join.

Leadership Decisions Have a Ripple Effect on Organizational Culture

The importance of this research is found in improving cognitive recognition of the examples of leadership in a business.

Never forget: “A leader is a trainer, and a trainer is a leader, and we teach so we may learn more perfectly.”

A research participant related how a company hired a new mid-level director, who brought with them a new manager for a department.

Shortly after hiring, the new director and their manager were pressuring a contradictory culture onto the business.

The damage done, the time and monies invested, and the lost customers due to this poor hiring decision were incalculable and left an indelible impression on the agent relating this experience.

Leaders must cognitively recognize their role as a trainer, and, in recognizing this role, choose to communicate the corporate culture more correctly. Never forget: “A leader is a trainer, and a trainer is a leader, and we teach so we may learn more perfectly.”

Surprisingly, the research supported the conclusion that agents are aware that corporate training is more about behavioural changes to meet an organizational culture than new knowledge acquisition.

Because this is known, the importance of leaders cognitively recognizing they are trainers, the need for continually learning, and the all-in in an iterative approach to training must be enshrined in the organizational design to obtain proper fit (recognize value) through corporate training.

For advice on improving the culture in your contact centre, read our article: 9 Ways to Create a Thriving Contact Centre Culture

How to Turn the Situation Around

Based on these research findings, here are some top tips to help any contact centre leader turn their corporate training around – for everyone’s benefit:

Start Today!

Start today to cognitively recognize your role in learning and teaching corporate culture through individual behavioural modification.

Exemplify the Behaviours You Want to See in Your Agents

Act more cognitively, exemplifying the behaviours you want to see in your agents that demonstrate the corporate culture.

Move Training and Trainers out of HR

Reorganize your company, moving training and trainers out of HR and giving them a seat at the table where decisions are made.

Make Sure the Trainers Know Their Role

Make sure the trainers know their role, encouraging them to model and exemplify what is desired strategically in CIM through tactical application.

Measure Training on Agent Fit

Measure training on agent fit – not knowledge acquisition as resembled in test scores measuring task knowledge. If the training improved behaviour in the trainees, then that training was successful.

Intentionally Hire Trainers to Understand Their Role

Intentionally hire and train trainers to understand their role in behaviour adoption.

To improve your recruitment, take a look at your job adverts. For advice on this, read our article: Are Your Job Ads Holding Back Your Contact Centre Recruitment?

Recognize the Trainer as a Leader

Recognize the trainer as a leader and provide the resources and encouragement to build relationships for iteratively building agents.

Provide the “Why”

Lead your team leaders, managers, supervisors, and operational agents in being part of and recognizing their role in the operations of organizational culture. They need the “Why”. Provide them with this, and encourage learning through observation and even failure.

Written by: Dr M. Dave Salisbury, COO at D&C Consulting LLC, and edited by Megan Jones, Editor at Call Centre Helper

For more great articles to help you improve your contact centre training, read these next:

• 5 Soft Skills Every Agent Needs Before Taking Their First Call
• 10 Initiatives to Improve Induction Training
• How to Keep on Top of Training in a Short-Staffed Contact Centre

Author: Dave Salisbury
Reviewed by: Megan Jones