Business as Unusual in the Call Centre Related Articles How to Write a Call Centre Business Plan Definition: Contact Centre Jargon and Terminologies How Call Recording and Quality Management Can Save Your Business Money Definition: What is Business to Business - B2B? © Tierney - Adobe Stock - 220020747 195 Filed under - Industry Insights, Poly Richard Kenny of Poly discusses long-term impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on the contact centre industry. We’ve just conducted the world’s largest experiment into home working due to COVID-19, and found that where it works, it generally works very well. For many people, the satisfaction levels of working within their home office is greater than when they are working from their company office – according of Wainhouse. However, these averages hide huge variability in the level of satisfaction and productivity for call centres. Leesman’s large-scale survey into home working made for an interesting read on what the future of call centre workspace could look like. Working from a home office is great when you have a dedicated room or a dedicated space (i.e. a desk within a room), but satisfaction levels are far lower if you don’t have either of these. On a broad office population, only 28% have a dedicated space and 33% don’t have dedicated work area at all – working from ad-hoc spaces such as sofa, ironing board, or kitchen table. As call centre work is predominantly carried out by those who are either still building their skill set or looking for a certain level of work-life balance, most wages tend be on the lower end of the spectrum. It is likely that call centre workers will not have the luxury of dedicated rooms or workspaces at homes, and this could lead them to be more distracted, less productive, and potentially prone to burnout. Findings from a recent Red Recruitment’s survey into call centre should therefore come as no surprise. It reveals that, while 32% of employees would be happy to work from home permanently, 68% want a return to the office for some days per week. Many call centre employees enjoy the camaraderie of the office and use call with their team to build their personal knowledge base and provide better service. Richard Kenny With the health of employees as a main priority, we can’t just rush back to the office. So how should this be approached? Join Tim Oldman, Founder and CEO of the Leesman Index, Katy Forsyth, Owner of Red Recruitment and Director of the South West Call Centre Forum, and myself, from Poly, on a webinar to discuss how companies across the UK and Europe are approaching the return to the call centre. To find out more and register for the webinar, click here! For more about Poly’s contact centre solutions, visit: www.poly.com Author: Robyn Coppell Published On: 10th Jun 2020 Read more about - Industry Insights, Poly Recommended Articles How to Write a Call Centre Business Plan Contact Centre Jargon and Terminologies How Call Recording and Quality Management Can Save Your Business Money What is Business to Business - B2B? Contact Centre Reports, Surveys and White Papers Get the latest exciting call centre reports, specialist whitepapers and interesting case-studies. Choose the content that you want to receive. Contact Centre Reports, Surveys and White Papers Invites to exclusive Webinars & Events Weekly Newsletter