Contact centres continue to look at ways to reduce call volumes and improve customer experience and first call resolution, but this needs an improved culture to go with it…
According to Martin Hill-Wilson, founder of Brainfood Extra, there are three major types of contact centre culture:
- Adherence
- Individual judgement
- Network judgement
But which works best for your contact centre?
Adherence Culture
In an adherence culture, advisors rely primarily on company policies and procedures when making decisions.
This often results in advisors being discouraged from coming up with creative solutions for the customer and instead choosing to handle the call “by the book”.
Management often reinforce this culture when they enforce strict rules on what an advisor can and can’t say, encouraging them to adhere strictly to the script. Another example would be a contact centre that bans advisors from using certain words, which would likely be enforcing a culture of adherence.
Individual-Judgement Culture
Individual-judgement cultures involve advisors who rely on their own judgement and personal experience to help them make decisions.
Martin says that many contact centres will find themselves in this bracket, if they have tried to do more to empower their team and trust their decision-making ability.
A contact centre will likely have an individual-judgement culture if it has tried involving the team in big decisions, taken away scripting and/or actively encouraged advisors to go the extra mile.
Network-Judgement Culture
In a network-judgement culture, advisors rely on advice and guidance from colleagues to inform their own decisions.
Martin says that this culture is great, as the team can really connect with one another and “tap into the collective wisdom of colleagues, to make the most informed decisions for the customers.”
This culture can be promoted in training, through tools like the Johari Window, while a shared communication platform for the team can also do the trick, as long as it is managed efficiently.
Which culture do advisors and customers prefer?
According to The Harvard Business Review’s report, the network-judgement culture is the most effective culture in terms of its positive impact on team performance and customer happiness.
In fact, a contact centre with this culture is up to 50% better than the other two culture types in terms of customer effort, customer satisfaction and productivity.
