9 Steps for Coaching Call Center Agents

The call record method is, in my opinion, one of the best approaches to coaching agent phone calls and ensuring quality. Heres a 9-step plan for effectively coaching call center agent phone calls:

1. Randomly record 2 3 telephone calls. Random recording is important. Do not record 3 calls back to back or on the same day, as your employee may be having a bad day and this may be reflected in all of one afternoons calls, but is not necessarily reflective of their typical performance.

2. Review the calls and note strengths and opportunities. Before meeting with your employee, listen to the calls and note what they did well and identify 1 2 opportunities for performance improvement.

3. Play one tape and let your employee listen. During the playing of the tape, you do not need to respond.

4. Have your employee respond to the tape. After the tape is played, ask your employee to respond. Most employees will be overly self-critical. Your employee will likely note many opportunities for improvement and struggle to articulate what theyve done well.

5. Coach the call. Use the sandwich approach. Tell your employee what s/he did well, followed by constructive feedback, and then end with positive feedback. When offering constructive feedback, share only one opportunity for improvement. The employee has likely observed and stated several improvement opportunities so there is no need to bring these up again Try to mention one thin g the employee did not bring up and offer this as your constructive feedback.

6. Gain commitment for performance improvement. Ask the employee, What specific steps will you take over the next 5 days to improve in this area? Write down what the employee states and repeat it to her. Summarize the session by reiterating strengths and offering a vote of confidence that she can improve in the identified area.

7. Repeat steps 2 6 with a second and perhaps third tape if necessary. The point of numerous recording is that an employee may respond defensively stating that was just a bad call. If that is the response, you may choose to review a second or third tape.

8. Follow-up before the next agent coaching session. Check with your employee in between coaching sessions to keep the commitment top of mind. You can touch base with your employee via email or a personal conversation.

9. Discuss improvement in next coaching session. Before listening to calls in the next coaching session, ask your employee how shes progressing toward the goal of the last session. Look for improvement on calls reviewed in this session.

This 9-step call center agent coaching model is simple, clear and it both praises employees and offers support for improvement opportunities.

When you follow this 9-step process, you will set clear performance expectations, coach effectively and consistently and at the same time you will be motivating your employees.

Myra Golden is an award-winning professional speaker and principal of Myra Golden Seminars, LLC, a customer service training firm serving clients in food and beverage, banking, healthcare, hospitality, and other industries. Her client list includes McDonalds, Johnson & Johnson, Coca-Cola, Frito-Lay, Michelin Tires, Pirelli, and Procter & Gamble, among many others.

For hundreds of ideas for customer service improvement for use in customer service training, visit the customer service training resource portal by going to http://www.totalcustomerservicetraining.com

Bilingual Answering Services
In recent years, more and more companies are deciding to engage the services of call centers that can provide them with answering services. This is because companies are now realizing that doing so can provide them with a number of benefits that can ...

Call Center Software and Telemarketing Issues
Just how important is having a top-notch call center with the right software, technology and agents in place to the overall effectiveness of your company?Imagine this scenario.A customer has a pressing question pertaining to your business that needs ...

Call Center Consulting Services
Call center services are thriving in most developed and developing countries, around the world. As a result of the growing competition, call center services require some aid to carry on their profitable business. This is where call center consulting ...

Inbound Call Centers
Call centers are becoming increasingly popular all over the world today, especially with companies now having a centralized customer service and support center. Call centers play a critical part in most modern companies, as they fulfill the need to c...

Long Distance Call Center Solutions
Long distance call center solutions consist of logically designed software systems that integrate the information stored in the database for providing easy accessibility to both call center agents and customers. The software helps in reducing the num...

Call Centers for Sale
Also known as monitoring centers, call centers are communication hubs where telephone calls and e-mails are effectively used for marketing products and services. These are primarily used by telemarketing companies, IT companies, mail-order catalog or...

Inbound Call Centers
The usual purpose of a call-center is to receive inbound calls for as many services that can be aided through telephone calls. Since there is much investment put into customer-care relationship by companies, call centers that have live agents answeri...

Call Center Marketing Solutions
Call center marketing solutions assist in the promotion and selling of products, so as to ensure the business success of the clients. Call centers are the contact centers or customer interaction centers of a company. They come up with prompt response...

Businesses Benefiting from an Inbound Call Center
When a business reaches the point where they can no longer handle all of their customer requests it is likely that an inbound call center will be used. An inbound call center is often made up of a group of individuals who answer phone calls that com...

Online Call Center Solutions
Online call center solutions are indispensable in modern era data management to maximize market opportunity. Online call center solutions provide immediate solutions that ensure customer satisfaction. Call centers are the customer service departments...