Call Center Reorganization

Case Study

A regional health care company that offers a broad spectrum of group and network-based health care products to over 2.8 million customers.

CHALLENGES

The executive team was concerned about the level of service provided by multiple call centers across the organization.  Preliminary evaluations showed that the level of service was inconsistent and hurting their image in the marketplace.

ZELUS APPROACH

A detailed needs analysis by the Zelus team revealed that performance standards differed from call center to call center as did level of training between these groups.

It was also discovered that each group had different practices for handling exceptions and executing work that was not metrically measured but important to service level.

RESULTS

  • Consolidation of smaller call centers into a larger central team to improve key performance metrics by increasing the staff pool available.
  • Revised set of organizational effectiveness measures aimed at ensuring all aspects of the customer experience are viewed with equal importance.
  • Development of a comprehensive training curriculum for the call center that focuses on functional knowledge and expertise while creating a career path for representatives.
  • The team also executed a comprehensive and aggressive re-training plan addressing individual and department deficiencies without sacrificing overall performance
  • Execution of a rigorous quality program that monitored individual quality across three dimensions.
  • Creation of area specific performance standard expectations for each distinct work product including development of reporting automation, exception handling, and guidelines for non-measurable work in the department.
  • Development of a corresponding self-funding incentive plan and roll-out strategy to support the quality and performance measures.