Getting To Grips With Contact Centre Recruitment

Getting To Grips With Contact Centre Recruitment

I’m sure you’ve noticed how contact centre recruitment has become a big deal. I’ve been drawn into a few of the conversations buzzing around customer contact events I’ve attended over the last months.

Michelle Ansell who is deeply experienced in the whole topic aired her views after hearing lots of frustration and concern at a recent Engage Customer conference. She wonders that if something fundamental is changing in terms of supply and demand for front line teams, then maybe adjacent culture and conditions need to realign as well.

Some of the reasons why recruitment is now so tough is that the national workforce has shrunk (half a million below pre-COVID levels), certain types of work no longer attract interest and many of us have become economically inactive through sickness.

The data shows sickness is an issue that has become worse during the current period of back-to-back crises. That said, ONS tracking also shows that the uptick in long term sickness began a year before the pandemic. So COVID cannot be the only reason for long term sickness. I’ll share an interesting alternative perspective on what is happening from a FT writer later in the article.

While experts are still figuring out the reasons, the impact is clear. In the UK, the proportion of the working age population reporting long term sick has risen to one in six or 7mn people. As compared with 5mn in 2010.

Further ONS analysis show the biggest increases are amongst younger people. A 42% rise in the 25-34 age groups and 29% for 16-24 year olds. This is a key demographic for contact centre and customer service sectors. Does this suggest that since older age groups were less impacted, recruiters might pragmatically start putting even more attention on this end of the workforce?

They are other short-term reasons that suggest this might be a smart move based on recent customer behaviour. In this age of vulnerability and anxiety, more and more of us want both the convenience of digital engagement and as well as the reassurance of human contact.

Conversations are longer, more taxing and complex in terms of emotion and issues that are being raised. And as we slip into what the Bank of England is forecasting as a two-year recession, we know that demand for help will grow, especially from live assistance.

So, are people with more life experience better equipped to satisfy current customer needs and cope with the pressure of more intense conversation? That remains to be tested. Nonetheless, the ONS analysis suggests this age group is more available and maybe more willing than when times were better. The cost of living has persuaded many to supplement income/pension with additional work.

But why are people off sick? Reasons for long term sickness are both physical and mental. For instance, loneliness is an issue in solitary jobs. Every year, one in four truck drivers experiences mental-health issues, according to the Road Haulage Association.

This makes me wonder whether working from home as a customer advisor evokes an equivalent sense of isolation and decline in resilience. It is certainly motivation to re-examine current hybrid shift patterns. Maybe advisors need more exposure to the nurturing impact of team energy and the physical presence of others? Maybe just two days at home is healthier? Worth A/B testing.

As promised, here is another insight into why the way we structure work might no longer fit the aspirations of younger generations. In the November edition of the FT magazine, an article called ‘Don’t Mess With The Way This Generation Works’ by Gillian Tett got me thinking.

Her central point was about the sense of agency people experience in their work. Or rather the lack of it and how this jars with generational values which then contextualise a certain worldview and set of priorities.

For instance, what is motivating up to 40% of workers to quit their jobs according to a recent McKinsey survey. (is this more than in other times?) And why have so many bloggers and podcasters rushed to publish their thoughts on the ‘quiet quitting’ phenomena? Something is going on.

Gillian Tett interprets this as a generational shift. Characterised in her description of Generation P. Or Generation Playlist. This is the latest evolution in a centuries long tussle between society at large and individuals within it. Starting with European Enlightenment, we end up with the Me generation in western 20th century popular culture.

The tussle is about who has the right to forge a person’s identity. A question currently being dramatically and courageously played out in our newsfeeds and screens in many countries that still weight the balance of power/agency towards State at the expense of Individual freedom and expression of self.

The 21st century version of individualism has naturally moved on again. Aided and abetted by commercial logic, we are fed a culture of consumer customisation. Bespoke experiences to fit who we are and aspire to become.

The world of customer contact has responded to this broader trend with the ambition to personalise. Now enabled by AI powered 'next best actions'; constructed on the fly from live and historic insights into the individual behaviours of each customer. Still a work in progress admittedly but one that matches these broader consumer expectations.   

If you have grown up with this as your norm, you expect everything can and should be shaped by your individual tastes. Naturally this expectation is now extending into how work is shaped to suit individual lifestyles. In summary, Generation Playlist expect to construct their own version.

I get it. As part of the Me generation, I turned away from the options I saw coming out of university. My instinct told me loud and clear I could not and would not fit into what was on offer. I have customised my work life ever since.

If Gillian Tett’s point is right about intolerance in the younger generation for vanilla careers, then organisations would be well advised to start listening hard and wonder what greater agency would look like and what org chart might support Generation Playlist. If indeed that way of organising even still makes sense.

The only other point I want to throw into the melting pot is about the nature of future work in customer contact. One that dovetails with the issue of how people now expect work to fit into their world.

I still believe we are on trend to see live contact shrinking to around a quarter of inbound demand. The rest will be dealt with through self-service, proactive messaging, and failure demand management.  Even as better times return, live conversation will remain the domain of emotive, complex and relationship building activity that is mutually beneficial to brand and customer.

We have barely started to develop lifelong learning for empathetic conversational contact. We have only just started to reprofile who is going to do a good job at this and how such skills are best encouraged and developed.

One thing is for sure, it is going to be different. And that difference might just unlock a level of interest that is evidently in short supply right now. Until we figure out how all these moving parts fit together, I suspect we are going see understaffed teams and the consequences that go with that.

For those unwilling to wait that long, it’s time to stop tinkering and fire up a collaborative whiteboard.  You might want to start the debate here for inspiration. And then start to debate the idea of making work more flexible.