What can Winemakers Teach us About Technology in the Call Center?

Napa Valley wineries are deploying optic readers to help winemakers identify the best grapes for their wine. The robots can separate the preferred grapes from the non-preferred grapes at hundreds of times faster and more accurate than humans. Vintners believe that not only will these new tools speed up the sorting process and lower cost, but the taste of each vintage will improve as well.

New tools change the way we work in the pharma call center to lower costs while improving performance. Several commonplace tools have met this dual objective through the years – Automatic Call Distributors, Interactive Voice Response, Work Force Management, and others.  But can the new tools like text and speech analyzers step up to meet the expectations of call center managers, their customers, and the company accountants?

The winemakers said that high tech sorters can’t tell the perfect grape from a raisin until the expert winemaker programs the robot what to look for. So too is this true for text and speech analytic tools. Heat maps and stress tones are fairly worthless until they are used under the expert guidance of an experienced call center manager or monitoring professional.

Benefits & Caveats of New Digital Tools

All tools have benefits and caveats, and here are a few that we have experienced:

Benefits:

1. More data – Because digital tools can review and report on nearly 100% of contacts, monitors now have more data for evaluations and insights.
2. Faster – Let’s face it, monitoring takes time. Digital tools can provide real time information on contacts and deliver immediate results to agents, supervisors, and other call center leaders.
3. Self development – Agents can have access to real time performance. More timely and consistent feedback can improve agent performance.

Just One Caveat:

1. Reports, Insights, and Performance – It’s easy to fall in love with the promise of putting to use all of the data we gather in the call center.   With improved reports, insights, and performance, it is most important to focus on performance. It was better wine that ultimately drove winemakers to break with centuries old traditions.

In conclusion, we certainly believe the value is there to begin working text and speech analytic tools into your contact center. These systems by themselves may not deliver the value contact center leaders are looking for, but with a little human involvement, you can have an investment that will pay dividends for your contact center. 

At Centerfirst, we utilize industry leading transcription and speech analytic software partnered with our expert team of monitoring specialist to deliver an enhanced Quality Monitoring (eQM) process that delivers contact center leaders the insights they need at the right time. 

Contact us if you would like to learn more about our usage of text and speech analytic tools or discuss how Centerfirst can help you maximize the value of your contact center.