Could You Be Reaping the Benefits of Home Working?

Sonia Rabone reveals the core benefits of introducing home-working agents.

1. More efficient workspace

Many businesses suffer from not having the space to separate inbound customer support and outbound sales.

Working from home can eradicate any noise-level issues, giving agents the opportunity to work uninterrupted.

2. Improved customer service

Without interruptions from other staff members, your employees’ only priority is the customer and they can work in a much more focused environment.

You’ll find that customers are happy too, as they have the full attention of the agent and are not having to repeat themselves.

3. Wider talent pool

A busy contact or call centre environment is not to everyone’s taste. This could be a stumbling block for your recruitment team, as it can create a one-size-fits-all approach.

A cloud contact centre can be perfect for those contact centre staff who have all the necessary skills you require but don’t enjoy the busy contact centre environment.

You can also utilise all of those people who have the perfect skills for the role but have family or other commitments.

This is because home workers have the flexibility to do the school run or go to their appointments but can still log in and commit to their agreed hours.

You can create a win:win situation by adding certain agents at certain times of day where you know you’re likely to have peaks.

4. Flexibility

Depending on the type of business you run, you may have seasonal fluctuations and changing call patterns.

With home working you have the flexibility to schedule your staff as and when they are needed, making it far easier to manage seasonal peaks.

With cloud-hosted contact centre software you can also plug in additional agents, getting them up and running in an instant – helping you to scale up and down in line with the needs of the business.

5. Cost saving

Office space and equipment does not come cheap – and huge cost savings can be made by employing home workers.

With a physical office you need to be equipped for the maximum number of agents that you’ll ever need – even if it’s only a few days a year that you actually need that many.

By utilising some additional home workers, you can look at much more sensible offices and premises.

For growing businesses, employing home workers enables your business to expand without having to physically relocate.

6. Skill retention, staff loyalty and reduced staff turnover

Employees occasionally have an off-day when the last thing they want to do is face 50+ of their colleagues.

Removing the hassle of travelling to the office can have a big impact; with happier staff you’ll also get greater commitment and more motivation.

Increased employee engagement can increase employee retention, as well as customer satisfaction ratings.

In addition, with the average age of a contact centre employee being mid-twenties, some of your more mature employees may not want to spend their day alongside staff members the same age as their children – so rather than leave the business, they may want to opt for home working.

7. Visibility of activity and ownership

Home working often used to make managers nervous – with the concern that they cannot see what the agent is doing and that he or she may just be sitting at home watching TV?!

But the truth is that your cloud contact centre system will give you just as much insight and visibility of agent activity as it would if they were in the office.

Any abnormal activity will be automatically detected and flagged up and you can see at a glance what all of your agents are doing wherever they are.

You’ll also often find that agents working from home have an increased sense of ownership.

8. Improved business perception

With the cost savings you make, you could increase the budget for employee benefits such as child-care vouchers and gym memberships.

The work/life balance needs of your teams are satisfied, and your employee engagement ratings will increase.

We’ve had other customers who have been able to up the basic salary of their workforce thanks to the cost savings from home working.

This both increases retention and attracts a wider and better pool of potential recruits, enabling them to better drive their business growth.

With thanks to Sonia Rabone at Magnetic North