Enhancing customer service: Perspective taking in a call centre

2007 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 141-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carolyn M. Axtell ◽  
Sharon K. Parker ◽  
David Holman ◽  
Peter Totterdell
Keyword(s):  
Customer Service ◽  
Perspective Taking ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Service Perspective

Articulation Work Skills and the Recognition of Call Centre Competences in Australia

2009 ◽  
Vol 51 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Hampson ◽  
Anne Junor ◽  
Alison Barnes
Keyword(s):  
Customer Service ◽  
Service Sector ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Work Skills ◽  
Articulation Work ◽  
Emotional Labour ◽  
Service Jobs ◽  
Interaction Management ◽  
Different Levels

Debates over whether customer service work is deskilled or part of the knowledge economy tend to focus on single issues such as control, emotional labour or information management. Call centre work, however, falls within a spectrum of service jobs requiring simultaneous and multifaceted work with people, information and technology, This activity, which we call `articulation work', is often performed within tight timeframes and requires workers, first, to integrate their own tasks into an ongoing `line' of work, and second, to collaborate in maintaining the overall work-flow. The requisite skills, of awareness, interaction management and coordination, tend to be poorly specified in competency standards that subdivide work into discrete tasks. We compare examples of call centre competency standards with case study accounts of the use of articulation work skills, arguing the need for a taxonomy allowing the recognition of different levels of these skills across the service sector.

Do They Always Have Wounded Selves: Moderating Impact of Job-worth on Burnout and Self-worth of Indian Call Centre Employees

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Tuheena Mukherjee ◽  
Kanika T. Bhal
Keyword(s):  
Customer Service ◽  
Negative Impact ◽  
Psychological Impact ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Call Centres ◽  
Self And Identity ◽  
Self Worth ◽  
Customer Service Representatives ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Relationship

Numerous researches in call centres indicate the negative psychological impact in the form of burnout experiences of the customer service representatives. The present study argues that burnout experiences do not always have a negative impact on the employee’s self-worth. The relationship is, instead, moderated by the impact of job-worth, which acts as a potential individual resource. The results of the present study conducted on 312 call centre representatives partially confirm our hypotheses. Results indicate that representatives who have high job-worth maintain their self-worth, even when emotionally exhausted. The results also show that employees possessing high job-worth, even with low personal accomplishments on their jobs, maintain their self-worth. We discuss the findings in the Indian call centre context from the perspective of self and identity literature and provide broader implications for practice and research.

scholarly journals Co-creating customer experience through call centre interaction: Interactional achievement and professional face

2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 257-277 ◽  
Author(s):  
Piotr Jagodziński ◽  
Dawn Archer
Keyword(s):  
Customer Service ◽  
Service Providers ◽  
Customer Experience ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Frontline Employees ◽  
Holistic Treatment ◽  
Call Centres ◽  
The Way

Abstract Many customer service institutions draw on the (argued over) notion of “customer experience”. Gentile et al. (2007) suggest that, at an optimum, the notion assumes a thinking and feeling customer who co-creates their customer experience together with the service providing institution. This co-creation is believed to comprise interactional involvement, personalization and the holistic treatment of the customer’s needs. Given the latter, we might expect service providers, such as call centres, to view language as a vital means of creating an experience with the customer. The extant linguistic call centre research, including our own, points to the fact that call centre institutions view language as fundamental to their functioning. However, heavy language regulation tends to be the most important - if not the only - means of achieving outstanding customer experience (Cameron 2000; Jagodziński 2013; Archer and Jagodziński 2015). There is a clear mismatch, then, between the tenets of customer experience and the way language is conceptualized, interactionally managed and regulated. Throughout this paper, we argue that the co-creation of customer experience must be accompanied by its linguistic co-construction, which can only be achieved by giving frontline employees more interactional freedom than they tend to have in practice.

scholarly journals Enhanced Customer Interactions through Customer-Centric Technology within a Call Centre

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (2(J)) ◽  
pp. 79-91
Author(s):  
Devina Oodith
Keyword(s):  
Service Delivery ◽  
Customer Service ◽  
Simple Random Sampling ◽  
Customer Experience ◽  
Ease Of Use ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Call Centres ◽  
Self Help ◽  
Public Sector Service ◽  
Sector Service

Customer call centres have become a critical form of service delivery for many organisations hence technological innovations serve as a critical point of contact between the organisation and its customers and can assist in raising the stakes in businesses in terms of customer service delivery (Burgess & Connell, 2004). According to the 2017 Global Customer Experience Benchmarking Report technology has been the number one enabler to positively enhance customer service experience in the last 5 years (Business Tech, 2017). Customers have become so empowered that they expect to have flexibility to contact a business however they choose; either via a telephone, email or Facebook. The key to ensuring satisfaction though is system’s efficiency and ease of use. This study was undertaken in EThekwini (Durban), South Africa and was directed within a Public Sector service environment comprising of four major call centres employing a total of 240 call centre agents. Using simple random sampling, 220 customers were drawn from all consumers subscribing to e-billing in EThekwini (Durban). Data for the customer sample was collected using a precoded, self-developed questionnaire whose psychometric properties were statistically determined. Data was analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics. The results specify that in terms of customers’ perceptions of the influence of technology, on call centre effectiveness the majority of the customers found it challenging to use the technology and to understand the self-help options that were provided to them by the call centre. There were problems encountered with logging in customer queries and complaints and most customers were dissatisfied with their overall customer experience. Based on the results of the study recommendations have been made to manage the interactions between the customers and call centre’s more proficiently and powerfully.

scholarly journals An Organisational Study on the Effects of Intrinsic Customer Service Demands: A Perspective from Emotional Labour Theory

2016 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 5-18
Author(s):  
Akanji Babatunde
Keyword(s):  
Customer Service ◽  
Service Encounters ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Emotional Management ◽  
Emotional Labour ◽  
Significant Research ◽  
Phenomenological Methodology ◽  
Research Findings ◽  
Strict Compliance

Abstract The purpose of this research is to examine employees’ views on adverse consequences caused by strict compliance to display rules of intrinsic labour demands as against its appropriate necessities within a call centre context. Using an interpretative phenomenological methodology for the study analysis, 25 semi-structured interviews were conducted with telephone agents working in a call centre outlet in Lagos state, Nigeria. Based on the emotional labour theory, enquires were made about general outcomes experienced from conforming to organisational rules of emotional management during customer service encounters. Findings confirmed that the adversarial impact of affective conformity tends to threaten the positive intentions of these mandatory components of service work. Thus, a proposed theoretical model emerged from the study’s interpretive accounts Based on these significant research findings, detailed practical implications were discussed on ways in which call centre businesses operating in a non-Western context can extenuate poor affective deliveries arising from mismanagement of emotional labour.

Calling on Compensation in Australian Call Centres

2003 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 62-76 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gary Crone ◽  
Lorraine Carey ◽  
Peter Dowling
Keyword(s):  
Customer Service ◽  
Negative Correlation ◽  
Employee Performance ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Significant Negative Correlation ◽  
Telephone Call ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Full Time ◽  
Call Centres ◽  
Significant Difference

ABSTRACTWhile there is a growing body of research on telephone call centre management in the U.K. and the U.S.A., empirical studies in Australia are at an embryonic stage. To date, most of the studies have focussed on the management of employee performance. The principal aim of this study was to provide data on current compensation practices in Australian call centres and to determine the extent of their strategic and best-practice orientation. A second aim was to explore whether the strategic management of compensation can help to balance the tension between commitment to customer service and commitment to employee motivation.Using data collected through a mail questionnaire survey of telephone call centres operating in a range of industries in Australia, the paper explores the effect of compensation practices on employee performance, absenteeism and turnover. Following a review of the literature on call centre management and the literature on compensation strategies, the findings are presented. Key findings include: a) a significant negative correlation between annual salary and the number of calls handled by full-time customer service representatives (CSRs); b) a significant positive correlation between casual CSRs' pay rates and turnover; c) a significant negative correlation between full-time CSRs' pay and absenteeism; d) a highly significant difference between the compensation strategies currently practiced in Australian call centres and the strategies call centre managers think should be practiced and e) Australian call centre managers report their compensation strategies are not very effective in increasing performance or employee satisfaction.

Construing negotiation

2017 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 137-162
Author(s):  
Jenny Yau-ni Wan
Keyword(s):  
Customer Service ◽  
American English ◽  
Voice Quality ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Prosodic Features ◽  
Quality Framework ◽  
English Speaking ◽  
The Voice ◽  
Customer Service Representative ◽  
Service Representative

Abstract The call centre conversation is a telephonic exchange of voices between the customer and the customer service representative (CSR). Both lexicogrammatical and prosodic features are used to construe emotional and attitudinal recognition. Studying these features can investigate how the call centre discourse is construed, and how the interpersonal meaning takes shape through the text. The spoken data are constructed by Filipino CSRs and American English-speaking customers. The findings show that participants tend to make specific paralinguistic voice quality choices to express their emotions in dialogue. This article first discusses the voice quality framework for its semiotic features in relation to interpersonal meaning, reviews previous voice quality studies and later delineates how voice quality relates to interpersonal meaning in the calls.

Calling on Compensation in Australian Call Centres

2003 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 62-76
Author(s):  
Gary Crone ◽  
Lorraine Carey ◽  
Peter Dowling
Keyword(s):  
Customer Service ◽  
Negative Correlation ◽  
Employee Performance ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
Significant Negative Correlation ◽  
Telephone Call ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Full Time ◽  
Call Centres ◽  
Significant Difference

ABSTRACTWhile there is a growing body of research on telephone call centre management in the U.K. and the U.S.A., empirical studies in Australia are at an embryonic stage. To date, most of the studies have focussed on the management of employee performance. The principal aim of this study was to provide data on current compensation practices in Australian call centres and to determine the extent of their strategic and best-practice orientation. A second aim was to explore whether the strategic management of compensation can help to balance the tension between commitment to customer service and commitment to employee motivation.Using data collected through a mail questionnaire survey of telephone call centres operating in a range of industries in Australia, the paper explores the effect of compensation practices on employee performance, absenteeism and turnover. Following a review of the literature on call centre management and the literature on compensation strategies, the findings are presented. Key findings include: a) a significant negative correlation between annual salary and the number of calls handled by full-time customer service representatives (CSRs); b) a significant positive correlation between casual CSRs' pay rates and turnover; c) a significant negative correlation between full-time CSRs' pay and absenteeism; d) a highly significant difference between the compensation strategies currently practiced in Australian call centres and the strategies call centre managers think should be practiced and e) Australian call centre managers report their compensation strategies are not very effective in increasing performance or employee satisfaction.

What a performance! the influence of call centre workflows on workers’ skills and emotional wellbeing

2014 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 259-274 ◽  
Author(s):  
Julian Alexander Clarke
Keyword(s):  
Social Skills ◽  
Customer Service ◽  
Call Centre ◽  
Emotional Wellbeing ◽  
Front Line ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Emotional Labour ◽  
Labour Process ◽  
Interactive Nature ◽  
Front Line Workers

Purpose – This purpose of this paper is to use the concepts of performance and emotional labour to shed new light on the skills workers use on two workflows in one call centre. In addition, the paper demonstrates how different workflows impact on workers everyday emotional experiences and wellbeing. Design/methodology/approach – Using an auto-ethnographic approach to data collection the paper provides insights by focusing on both the self and others as objects of research. The underpinning theoretical inspiration is drawn from Labour Process Theory but considering the interactive nature of front-line call centre work, it adopts Goffman's (1959) dramaturgical concepts and draws on micro-sociological analyses of the labour process, particularly Hochschild (1983). Findings – The case study illustrates how workers use social skills, through the performance of emotional labour, to different extents on contrasting workflows. The concept of performance is also used to demonstrate how management rely on worker's social skills to deliver fast and quality customer service. Contrary to other research, this study finds that the greater time front-line workers spend on calls and the wider scope they have for exercising discretion does not necessarily mean they experience greater levels of satisfaction and emotional wellbeing. Rather, the workflow with the tightest scripting and shortest call cycles – which inhibit the need to perform emotional labour – offered the greatest protection from the emotional demands of the job. Originality/value – This paper is the first to apply Goffman's theatrical metaphors and concepts of performativity to unpack the nature of front-line call centre workers’ skills.

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