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Welcome to the podcast! Today we are talking with Fred Stacey about his experiences in call centers, both helping to build them and helping them in recovery.

Dovetailing nicely with our Agent-Centric Call Center Philosophy is the objective today to discuss Employee Experience. What can we still do to enhance the work life of our employees? How can we engage with them and support them?

What’s working and not working? What can technology to do serve them as they engage with customers each and everyday. For example, gamification adoption is at about 20% even though it’s been around 10 years. What is the ideal role of technology in supporting employee experience?

Topics discussed in this episode:

[ 3:28 – 3:57 ] For call centers in recovery invest in mid-level leadership; we’re talking about floor-level leadership. It’s shocking how many c-suite executives have never taken a call in their call center.

[ 11:14 – 12:25 ] People here in America are in for a rude awakening when it comes to the costs of running call centers. Fred Stacey fears that companies, right after making any necessary cuts in marketing will then turn and make cuts in service and support. Wait times creep back up and customers and employees alike will feel the strain.

[ 13:04 – 13:37 ] Taking a positive viewpoint, we ought to start viewing the entire cx operation as an opportunity for positive business outcomes!

[16:06 – 17:23 ] Agents receive a ton of information that is coming from a human perspective, but we should also gather the structured and unstructured data that never makes it way up to the c-level executives. Teach leadership how to engage with agents to find out what they know.

[ 27:17 – 28:06 ] Fred Stacey has been a witness to call center global expansion in the Caribbean, later-stage India, Latin America, South America, and early-stage Philippines. In these locations call center employment is a very good position. It’s a fact that companies that focus on employee experience always perform better.

Call centers aren’t just a necessary evil or a cost we must sustain to do business. The truth is call centers are the easiest way to access positive business outcomes. Make sure your leaders have the skills to connect with their agents. The only thing that’s missing is recognizing the agents in this process.

To listen to a recording of this and other episodes, visit vistio.io/podcasts. And to join our show live each week, go to vistio.io/cxlive .