The unprecedented pandemic amassed chaos, upheaval, and disruption at numerous industrial sectors. From industries like hospitality, aviation, entertainment, BFSI, medical care, and so on. Though it is a never-expected situation, the BPO industry has proved how resilient it is by coming up with remote work, so that the call centre agents are able to seamlessly deliver a superior customer experience, despite the testing times.
According to a survey, the BPO industry around the world has retained the standard of productivity, although professional agents are not under the same roof while working.
But guess what? Both work at home agents and call center agents have their own set of advantages when it comes to being a promising contact center service provider. To have credible customer experience management , the service provider should have an in-depth understanding of each of the modes, and how they could be used efficiently to achieve maximum productivity at minimal costs.
Read on to get an insight into how the modes for work at home agents differ from campus call agents, in rendering customer service.
Advantages of work at home agents
Helps in cost-cutting
Naturally, having an office and maintaining it for smooth functioning of business, the premises have to be bought or at least leased, so that the employees of business process outsourcing, can perform their duties smoothly. But the system of work from home has extensively helped in cutting down hardware, real estate, operational, and equipment costs, as a whole.
A broader and better talent pool
Who doesn’t want a top-notch talent pool of their own choice? With remote working, any contact center service provider has a better scope for fetching talent, now that geographical location is no longer an obstacle for the deserving candidate. This is why remote working ensures that best-in-class professional agents are hired, hence paving the way for countless opportunities for both potential employees as well as companies.
The vast talent pool will open doors for smoother and effortless customer experience management that will eventually help in providing satisfactory customer service.
Modified call center strategy
For the time being the same strategy, that was used by agents working from the office, could be used by the ones who started working remotely. But sooner or later, it may cost the cumulative productivity of the service provider as a whole. Therefore, a modified strategic model could be custom-made for the remote working conditions.
The aspect of working from home naturally opens the door for all possible alterations, in order to deliver the best, while keeping the standard of efficiency and productivity, right on track.
Better customer service
Now that agents are working from the comfort of their homes, the performance of all the agents is naturally going to be elevated. With not having to commute daily to the offices, and by complying with the novel strategies for the ones working from home, an exemplary customer experience could be gifted to the clients.
Satisfied and pleased workers equal delivering customer service that is worth it. After all, customer experience counts as one of the crucial factors for growth.
Improved job satisfaction
Though call center agents are known and revered for their terrific communication and connecting skills, it can moderately get, a bit of a hassle, from time to time. When the clients expect the best at the worst of timelines, all at once, that’s when things start getting dicey. Sometimes it may even cause a hindrance in the rapport between employees or among clients and agents.
Enhanced job satisfaction is one of the most attractive attributes of work from home agent life. Why? Well, thanks to the isolation, it also eliminates the chances for any issues that might arise due to the workload or the attitude of the clients. The improved job satisfaction ensures that the working professionals are being productive and effective, and give it their all to tailor an ideal customer experience!
Now that we have discussed the pros of remote working for the service providers. Here’s a list of pros, when it comes to working from the office premises
Advantages of call centre agents at the premises
The agents are well monitored
The work environment of the office ensures that all the employees are honestly putting in the work during the working hours, as teammates, seniors, and managers are round the corner to keep an eye on the agents. This way the performance and the all-around quality of work also remains on track, without any mishap.
If there’s an issue, the agents can easily reach out to more experienced colleagues, this surely aids in resolving all the issues, no matter how minor or major they are.
The lines are clear between work and home life
Though there are endless benefits when it comes to remote working, it also blurs the lines between home life and office life. This may cause your teammates and agents to drift off if they are unintentionally overworked or their personal time is not given enough priority.
The agents working from the office don’t face this problem, as the line is drawn to separate the professional and home life is distinct enough to not interfere with the other one at any cost.
Promising standard of security
Unlike the office environment, the remote working environment is susceptible to more leaks of secretive data. Why? Well, as the agents are not exactly working in the same confined space without anyone to keep an eye on them, intentionally or unintentionally the highly confidential data of the clients could be somehow let out, if not taken care of.
While agents are delivering omnichannel customer experience, right from the premises, the private data of the clients is definitely under lock and key, and this resolves the danger of slip of confidential client information. With a centralised business model and the systems used by the agents, altogether, the security is hence rightfully taken care of when agents work from the premises.
Sense of belonging stays intact
Working from the office premises helps in making and keeping bonds among the co-workers even outside of the work-life.
But guess what? Remote working can be too isolating and solitary, and over time the agents might feel their personal sense of belonging to the company fizzling out.
But the colleagues who meet each other face to face, have a chat, bounce of ideas, brainstorm, take a stroll, and make plans during a break, helps them in connecting emotionally and developing a deep sense of belongingness to the coworkers and the company as a whole. The agents working at the office, have their teammates at a reachable distance who can guide them through anything, with there’s a need for support.
Smoother training of nascent agents
The quality of training procedure doesn’t suffer when the new trainees join the company. Whereas when it comes to remote working the trainees and interns of the business process management have quite a hard time in learning the ropes, as it gets difficult to teach them the basics. The company might also have to bear additional costs, to provide online training to the new joiners. The members from the top-level management will also have to invest time, money and effort, to create learning videos, and this could exhaust the resources, in case of remote work. Hence, office working helps in saving funds while training the new joiners.
Conclusion
Both the modes of working, namely work from home and work from office premises, have their own respective chunks of pros and cons. But at the end of the day, it is the clients who come first, despite altering conditions. Remote working is beneficial however, the possible hazards and disadvantages of this business process outsourcing can largely overshadow the productivity and fund savings.
Hence, the objective and values of the enterprise should be considered on priority, before taking the leap in the direction of remote working and hiring remote working professionals.
