Workforce Management Featured Article
More Companies Transition to Work-at-Home Call Center Model
While contact centers are more important than ever in the disruptive COVID-19 era, they’re also breeding grounds for disease transmission. Call centers are often crowded, with workers sitting elbow-to-elbow. Workers talk most of the day, potentially exhaling virus particles that hang in the air of a crowded room. Surfaces are high-touch, and break rooms represent even bigger transmission opportunities.
Call centers have had to quickly ramp up their work from home procedures in order to meet customer expectations while simultaneously keeping employees safe and ensuring that service levels are being met.
Minnesota-based tool and equipment supplier Northern Tool + Equipment recently announced that the company will transition 60-plus team members from its Pequot Lakes contact center facility to a remote, work-at-home model. The company told the Brainerd Dispatch that it plans to retain all of its current contact center employees.
“As we move through this change, our primary goals are to provide our team with a safe place to work and a flexible schedule as well as an improved work-life balance, and we are excited to deliver on these promises that are important to our employees here in Pequot Lakes,” Chris Erath, senior director of contact centers at Northern Tool + Equipment, said in a statement. “Our company is proud to continue to retain our local Pequot Lakes team and we look forward to continuing to support of this great community.”
Experts say that flexibility is a key to success with remote contact center operations. Companies that are not willing to adapt their hiring, training and workforce management procedures will likely struggle to reach a satisfactory work-at-home model.
“Now that everyone's on lockdown, remote options for onboarding and training are the only way you're going to get new hires up to speed and ready to contribute in a timely manner,” wrote Greg Dyer for Total Retail. “And bear in mind that 80 percent of employees believe working remotely increases their productivity on the job, according to this survey. Therefore, more robust remote work options should be a win-win.”
Edited by Maurice Nagle
