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Training Design & Development

Overview of Training Offerings

Call Centres require interactive dependencies of key performance factors within people, process, and technology. Call Centres are your front line contact with you customer- sometimes daily.

Our offerings include agent training for call/contact centers involved in order entry, customer service, technical support, Help Desks, and e-Business operations.  Our Training Development and Delivery are not  stand alone processes. Process Mapping is an integral part of the our time tested  approach and the Training Program and Quality Development.  All of our training is conducted on-site by experienced senior staff.

We offer customized training programs that we design, develop, and pilot for agent staff.

Example of Customized Training Design

The graph illustrates a custom training design that involves various levels of agent skills, career charting, and skills-based compensation
An Integrated Quality Systems Approach

Our customer service skills training is an integrated quality systems approach, consisting of:

  • Quality Standards;
  • Monitoring Process; &
  • Agent Performance Evaluation Program.

Ours is a proven approach to ensure the transfer of customer service skills back to the job for the most effective customer contact.

For more information about our quality assurance program, including customer contact standards and monitoring policies as well as coaching, feedback and calibration

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Hands-On & Experiential

Our customer service training design is based on “hands-on” experiential learning theory.  Agents learn the skills required for effective customer contact through role-plays and practice.  Successful demonstration of skills is recommended for course completion.  This is a proven technique to ensure that agents develop the skills to deliver “superior” service.

 

The foundation for our Customer Service Skills Training is the Customer Contact Quality Standards.  We use our proprietary Quality Standards Template and work with clients to develop and/or refine their Customer Contact Standards.  We collaborate with your team to “customize” the Quality Standards from the Template to build the agent training and call monitoring processes.  We conduct the initial training sessions on-site for your staff.  At the client’s option this may include a “train-the-trainer” session so that your team can conduct the program themselves in the future.

The customer service skills training includes:

  • Facilitator Guide – Leader Guide, Role Plays, and Practice & Proficiency Exercises
  • Trainee Guides – Notes, Helpful Hints, and Study Guides
  • Proficiency Exercises, and
  • Agent Certification Exercises
  • Quality Standards & Monitoring Form.
How is Our Methodology Different?

Our methodology is different because it is based on the Customer Contact Quality Standards as
the basis for developing the customer service skills training.  Quality Standards are “behavioral statements,” which define various aspects of customer interactions.  The Quality Standards form the foundation for customer contact monitoring, coaching and feedback.  As such, every time monitoring occurs, training is reinforced.

Benefits of Our Approach

The benefits of this approach are several.  First, we use a template of “best practices” customer contact standards to design the skills needed by your agents to improve overall customer satisfaction.  Second, the training is reinforced by a call monitoring process that ensures agents receive coaching and feedback to reinforce the “best practices” service skills learned in training.  Finally, we tailor both the training and monitoring standards to your unique customer requirements based on our “best practices” skills template.  The result is a customer service skills training program designed to meet your business needs at a fraction of the cost of a training program developed from scratch.

We take responsibility for getting everything together – all you need to do is make time for input and to review the final product.  We typically get that input via conference calls.  Additionally, we spend one or two days onsite in your center, prior to the actual training, we meet with your staff to finalize any details of the training design and/or program.  This may sound like it takes a lot of time and is expensive, but it is not.

Customized Training Design & Development

We have the expertise to develop customized new hire and product training for your call/contact centre.  Our methodology involves documenting and analyzing the business requirements and customer contacts handled by your center.  Exisiting call flows are mapped using our proprietary methodology.  We work with your team to design suggested  future processes as needed, then develop the required agent training and monitoring processes.

Some common examples when processes need to be redesigned include:

  • Adding eService/Web-enabled services to a centre;
  • Consolidating centres resulting in centralized and/or expanded product and service offerings;
  • Systemizing new hire training for efficiency and consistency.
How Customized Training is Designed & Developed

Customized training includes the development of specific product training that includes customer information access, specialized help sources, and the appropriate “soft” skills.  Typically, customized training includes the design and development of the following:

  • Curriculum
  • Quality Assurance Program:
    • Quality Standards
    • Monitoring Form
    • Coaching & Feedback Process
    • Linkage to the Center’s Performance Evaluation Program
  • Facilitator Guide
  • Trainee Guide
  • Role plays
  • Skill Building Exercises
  • Proficiency Exercises
  • Agent Certification Exercises
Project Steps Example

Examples of the project steps required to design, develop, and/or refine a the agent training program are shown below:

  • Document the existing customer contact processes;
  • Conduct a detailed analyses of documented customer contact process;
  • Identify “best practices” process improvements and new business requirements;
  • Redesign customer contact processes for the suggested future environment;
  • Develop and/or refine the customer contact standards;
  • Define the monitoring process and agent performance/certification requirements;
  • Design the training curriculum;
  • Develop training program:
    • Facilitator Guide, Resources, & Handouts
    • Trainee Guides & Study Aids
    • Role-Plays
    • Navigation Exercises
    • Skill Building Exercises
    • Module Proficiency Exercises
    • Agent Certification Exercises
  • Define agent training performance standards and requirements;
  • Conduct “Train-the-Trainer” sessions for client staff on-site and coach.