Average Handling Time Issues

[azriel_m4a3]

Hi,

I one of the Supervisor at Call Center (above 100 seats). Currently the common problem that all the supervicor face now is regarding the AHT issues.
I already done some research its shown not just new agent having high AHT but its also effecting the senior agent.
Hopefully i can find some advice or tips on how to reduce the AHT that we are facing now.

Azriel....

[avan]

hi

sorry to cut your Question but i just wana get some information from you 'coz you are a supervisor and i'm working in a new company who don't have any procedures because its new.
I'm the one who is responsible from the contact center i want to know what is procedures I should know about it...
infact what is the things i need to know...
like how to manage it..
how to make procedures...
what is the procedure means ...
what about this issue you are speaking about
i just don't know what is
if you can help me i'll be very glad


Avan
Iraq

[NBosch]

Hi Azriel,

AHT is the bane for all supervisors... trust me. :) And I am sorry to tell you there is not one answer that fits all issues you might be facing.
I have listed some things, you as a supervisor, must or might consider. The first one, is the most important for you, in your current role.

1. COACH, COACH, COACH
High AHT's all over the department are a lot of times caused because the focus is on other issues (reducing attrition, improving revenue etc.). This means that the agents will get the feeling they get away with more. Mistakes and lack of call control, drive up the handling times.
You will have to sit down with the worst performers, listen (with or without them present) to their calls, and tell them how they can improve their times. Tell them where they are taking too long, where they can speed up. Tell them when to listen to the customer, and when to take a firm control of the contact.
Management will expect this from you guys, so don't put this off, but get on it straight away.

Tip: focus on the worst first... their improvement will have the biggest effect.

The added value is that you will also see the reason of the high AHT's when it is NOT call control.

2. Statistics
Normally AHT is made up off Average TALK time + Average HOLD time + Average AFTER VOICE time. Check the stats, to see what is driving up the AHT's. Your agents could have great talk times (which you will see on the director screens (Aspect) ), but slumber off and enjoy themselves after the call.
Make sure you coach (hehe.. there is that word again) on the correct drivers.
Also, assure that your agents KNOW their personal and team results. Hang them somewhere where everybody can see them and give the team a target for next week. Praise them when this target is achieved.

3. System issues
Call Centres are technology dependent. Keep an eye open for slow systems (call track software, intranet, knowledge share software (casebases etc.)).
Highlight these issues with your manager and coach your agents to work arround it.

4. Processes
Sometimes calls are unnecesary long because the agents have to follow a flawed script. When you listen in, you will notice that some parts of the script don't add any value to the call. Highlight this with management and advise them to do a pilot (preferably with your own team) to see what the implications are when these processes are removed.

Make sure you always keep your agents motivated and praise them for their improvements. But do not shy away for making the improvement process very official (simple coaching plan - official development plan - corrective action - termination). This sounds crude... but in the end, these guys are letting you AND your team down.

So.... this is it in a nutshell. If you have any questions, feel free to mail me at: niek_bosch@yahoo.co.uk

Avan,

Your list of questions is quite long and answering them all in this thread, would just drag the attention away from the main topic. Drop me a mail, and I will see what I can do to help you.

Niek Bosch

[Meridian]

Originally Posted by NBosch

Also, assure that your agents KNOW their personal and team results. Hang them somewhere where everybody can see them and give the team a target for next week. Praise them when this target is achieved.

Hi Neik,

Im going to have to disagree with you there. Proper and useful goal-setting is not numbers based; it is behaviour based.

What you want to be doing is coaching to trend; finding out what, as Neik mentioned, is DRIVING the number, and talk about THAT with your staff. Show them how to fix it, discuss it, coach it, roleplay it, decide how they are going to fix it and how you are going to help them fix it. Then you monitor the number. If you see it going down or not moving, but the agent is doing exactly what you asked (you can see it), and you show them the number; you aren't going to get much buy in on the behaviour change you just implemented; and, in the end, it is probably because you have identified the wrong driver.

Work on behaviours, not numbers. Reward behaviour, not high scores.

[thetuan]

Aziel/Niek/Meridian,

First off, I would like to thank Niek for his valuable advise on how to PROPERLY identify and resolve handle time issues. This is one area that is most often not handled properly by the managers in call center operations. Niek correctly outlined 4 areas that Aziel can possibly investigate to understand his AHT issue clearly.

Meridian pointed out a great flaw in how we can use operator statistics incorrectly. If we post the AHT stats and not help the operators to understand why his/her AHT is high, then we are asking for quality issues down the line. The operators will give you lower AHTs but you might not like the way they are doing it!

What you need to do is to incorporate what Niek wrote in his post for his point number 1 and point number 4. I don't want to repeat what Niek has so eloquently stated in his post but there is no subtitution for the team supervisor to sit down with the poor performers and listen to their calls, outline the areas for improvement, follow up within a proper time frame to ensure compliance and reward/discipline accordingly. There is no quick way to do this - just make sure your team supervisors are ready to roll up their sleeves and earn their pay!

Once this coaching process is done daily on a CONSISTENT basis, then you should post AHT stats so everyone in your team is aware of their AHT performances. This is pure peer pressure and believe you and me, it works wonder if your team supervisors are coaching properly.

The end result is that Joe Blow has high AHT, he and his team members see his AHT daily on a team board and he knows what he needs to do to improve on it because his supervisor has helped him to understand his areas of improvement when he is handling customers' calls. He also knows that he has a certain time period to improve on areas he needs to work on or he will be out of a job.

Also, don't forget the other end of the spectrum and reward the good performers who are delivering excellent AHTs on a daily basis.

This is not easy as we made it out to be but if you do it right and do it daily, you can slowly BUT surely chip away at the AHT issue and you will see it improve the right way. In the end, there is no better reward for a manager than for him/her to see improvements in the call center in efficiency and in quality. You can then stop working on AHTs and quality issues and you can now work on improving operation processes, improve your management bench strengths at every level, improve your career development program for your operation, improve your manager skillsets with management training/certification programs, improve your call center technologies to deliver the calls to the operators more efficiently with the right customer information, etc .... These are some the areas that can make your call center a better place to work for everyone.

Good luck

Tuan

[Sagar]

Hi,
The stress on AHT has helped organizations to save/earn millions of dollars, however the point is that AHT alone can not be a determinant to productivity.
As you are supervisor with handling 100 agents, it is imperative that going that extra mile in customer responsiveness and probably that extra information can actually increase the AHT.

Old or new agents, the quality on the call is paramount importance then the mere stress on the AHT.

First call resolution or One call resolution is more important even if the AHT is more in such scenarios, for eg: In one of the callcenters based in third world countries providing customer services to customers of "Satellite TV based at US" - 30 to 35% of all the call received were repeat calls, even though the AHT was slow, on a deeper analysis the 30% of customer had called more than once.

The AHT was absolutely fantastic, however in the drive to have a smaller AHT, the agents were mushing up the call with basic information on the product.

It is good to have a longer AHT if the customer does not call the second time around on the same issue.

As a supervisor we need to listen to the calls of our own agents first, then analyse the script and the customer focus will automatically comes into picture.

Regards
Yathati Sagar,
Zavata India.