Maximize the Value of your Pharma Contact Center

"CenterFirst started working with us when we needed help with improving our contact center operations. They stayed with us to help develop a new global approach for contact centers across all of Shire. CenterFirst consistently brought the right level of expertise in both strategy and operations that helped us advance in this increasingly critical area of our business."— Bob Harrell, Director of Integrated Marketing – Shire

by Bill Mugavin

Quality monitoring is a fundamental component of most contact centers; however, there are nearly as many variations of quality monitoring programs as there are contact centers! To get started, let’s establish a common understanding of quality monitoring. Quality monitoring is a contact evaluation process that appraises the qualitative aspects of contact handling. It includes the tracking and analysis of data to identify individual agent and overall contact center performance trends, anticipated problems, and training and coaching needs (Cleveland & Harnes, 2004). There are also a number of different quality monitoring methods that managers can employ including:

  • Silent monitoring- The person responsible for conducting the monitoring session listens to an agent call in real-time from another location
  • Call recording- The person responsible for conducting the monitoring or the contact center’s automated system records a sampling of calls. The person monitoring then randomly selects calls for evaluation of agent performance
  • Side-by-side monitoring- The person responsible for conducting the monitoring sits beside the agent and listens while the agent handles a call
  • Mystery shopper- A form of unobtrusive observation in which the person monitoring acts as a customer, initiates a call to the center, and monitors the skills of the agent.

Good quality monitoring programs lead to many benefits including:

  • Providing the basis for organization wide quality improvement and innovation
  • Measuring the quality of interaction and accuracy of information provided
  • Measuring adherence to call-handling processes
  • Identifying customer needs/expectations
  • Providing legal compliance and mitigating liability

In order to achieve these and other benefits, a contact center’s quality monitoring program must be well designed and managed. To maximize your contact center’s results, we recommend the following guidelines be followed when designing and managing your quality monitoring program (adapted from ICMI): 

  • Clearly inform agents about the purpose of monitoring, how it is conducted, and how the results are used
  • Use standardized evaluation forms with objective, behaviorally measurable criteria and involve agents in the development of the criteria
  • Clearly communicate the goals, guidelines and priorities for call handling, and provide agents with the resources and training required for call handling
  • Consistently monitor  employee performance
  • Get a good sample for the group and for each individual. New hires and agents in need of additional coaching should be monitored more frequently, but don’t forget regular monitoring for high performers too!
  • Compare monitoring results against other key measures such as customer satisfaction surveys, other monitoring methods (peer, side by side, call taping), service level, average handling time, experience level, etc.
  • Fix problems at the group level, not just at the individual level
  • Provide specific , behavioral and performance based feedback

Implementation of these guidelines takes a focused, disciplined effort on the part of the contact center management team; but, the benefits far outweigh the effort in terms of improved quality, agent productivity, and customer satisfaction. 

References and Additional Resources
Call Center Sample Monitoring Forms (ICMI, Call Center Press, 2001)
Call Monitoring Trends (From Call Center Management Review, ICMI, 2005)
Maximizing the Value of Quality Monitoring (From Call Center Management Review, ICMI, 2003)
Call Center Management on Fast Forward (Cleveland, 2006)
Call Center People Management Handbook and Study Guide (Cleveland & Harne, Chapter 6, 2004)