by Martin Taylor, Deputy CEO & Co-Founder at Content Guru…

The months since March 2020 have been a catalyst for the proliferation of remote working across every conceivable part of the economy. Now, thanks to cloud technologies and agile methodologies, one sector synonymous with densely-packed industrial-revolution-style working conditions – the contact centre – has effected a miraculous self-transformation from dark satanic mill to beacon of enlightened homeworking.

According to research from the UK’s Office of National Statistics, published prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, 50% of British employees were already set to work remotely in 2020. Yet as we entered the pandemic, research showed only 27% of contact centres had systems in place to utilise home-based agents as part of their workforce mix. 82% of contact centres said they anticipated having some form of remote-workforce model in place by 2029.

As the UK settles into a second national lockdown, and even taking into account the recent optimism around a potential vaccine, driving the homeworking agenda to the next level has become more important than ever. In the contact centre world, for those organisations that have not yet implemented a robust distributed working model, the consequences in terms of both loss of business and worker health are already clear. As one of the largest employment sectors in the UK, the contact centre industry needs to ensure home working for staff enables them to remain operationally effective for the current climate and beyond.

From contact centre to contact-free centre

Contact centres around the globe were caught out by sudden government-imposed lockdowns and social distancing measures: a scenario exacerbated by many firms’ lack of capability to implement distributed operations. Contact centres that had already moved to modern cloud technologies, found it easy to transition from a traditional on-site workforce configuration to a remote or hybrid homeworking model. Cloud-powered solutions can be deployed in a matter of days and reconfigured in seconds, from anywhere. They provide the flexibility contact centres require to cater for agents to work securely and compliantly from home, and enable intelligent automation across multiple channels of communication.

All that remained for cloud-equipped contact centre management teams was to initiate new internal working procedures. These outline the responsibilities and chain of command that enable remote workers to continue providing an excellent experience to customers.

Providing support where needed

One of the age-old, key concerns around working from home for the contact centre was trust: can agents work as effectively, and to the same level of quality, without direct supervision? Many employers worried that if they couldn’t physically see their employees working, they weren’t working at all. What’s more, the distance between employees and employers left both sides anxious for their support and wellbeing. What happens if a contact centre agent working from home receives a threatening or distressing interaction?

A vital component, therefore, for homeworking to function effectively is continuous communication and monitoring between agent and supervisor. Screen recording, for example, enables both supervisors to keep an eye on their agents in real-time, and agents to feel supported in their work while away from the centre. Screen recording, auditing and performance management can provide exactly the same insights to supervisors as when agents are in the contact centre itself. This ensures that supervisors know that the same excellent standards of customer experience are being delivered, even when they cannot physically look over an agent’s shoulder.

These remote monitoring capabilities also free homeworking agents from the suspicion that they are not working as effectively at home as they do in the contact centre. The chance for contact centre workers to demonstrate their skill and efficiency accurately can work wonders for happiness and ‘engagement’. These concepts have been well linked to reducing leaver, or ‘churn’, rates. Granting supervisors the ability to see agents working also enables managers to provide real-time support to their team. For example, if an agent has had a disgruntled customer on the phone, supervisors may be able to step in and offer support and consolation. Technologies currently in development will even ensure that such a worker is not served too many ‘difficult’ calls in a shift.

A changed workday to match a changed workforce

With cloud solutions being browser-based, and agents able to access the system wherever they are, whenever they want, homeworking has given contact centre employees more flexibility and control over their working hours. This can make it easier for employees to fit their career around busy schedules in a way that benefits both themselves and the organisation. Their working schedule can fit in more easily around family and home life as they have the opportunity to log in while the children are at school, or drop off for 40 minutes to go for a run during a quiet period of precious winter daylight.

Introducing intelligent automation and smart scheduling makes flexibility profitable by ensuring that resources are optimised. Artificially intelligent Workforce Optimisation (WFO) systems run automatic checks to ensure that schedules are always kept at peak efficiency, whilst also giving agents maximum control over the hours they want to work.

Cloud-based Contact Centre as-a-Service, or ‘CCaaS’, can also alleviate any concerns over additional costs of training needed for agents to work at home. Quality Assurance capabilities mean that agents and employers alike can benefit from increased flexibility without losing any of the quality of work or impacting the customer experience. Analysing recordings of key interactions between call agents and customers allows trainers to identify best practice and gaps in knowledge. Meanwhile AI-powered Natural Language Processing (NLP) can listen to what a caller is saying, determine their intent and post information from a Knowledge Management system straight to the agent’s screen while a call is in progress.

The ‘next normal’

As we march into 2021, and with COVID-19 still shaking our world, will organisations make the most of the long-term decisions they have taken in 2020 to create the contact centres of the future? What the consumer has seen (literally, in the case of on-demand mobile interaction) cannot be unseen, and organisations who withdraw features and benefits will be punished. The coronavirus crisis has offered contact centres an unprecedented opportunity to accelerate digital transformation. This will enable their transformation from joyless cost centres into value-driven customer engagement hubs, ultimately future-proofing business models against further situations like COVID-19.

Martin Taylor is Deputy CEO & Co-Founder at Content Guru, Visit https://www.contentguru.com/ for more information.