Member-only story
How many people do you need in the call center at any given time? In this article, I’ll explain an improved way to calculate the answer.
To start, refer to Figure 1. The left side of the diagram illustrates Calls Per Hour (CPH). The peak of the CPH section shows CPH1, which is the maximum number of calls per hour a given employee might be able to process. For any given business, this number will vary. If the people in your call center are taking orders for merchandise, each call may be relatively short. If your call center is providing technical support for a newly released application, the average call time may be longer.
The right side of the diagram illustrates Customer Satisfaction (CS). The peak of the CS section shows CS1, which is the best customer satisfaction score as measured by a customer survey taken after the call is complete.
The diagram illustrates something every call center manager knows is true: the maximum number of calls per hour and the best customer satisfaction survey results don’t line up. If the operators handle the calls too quickly (to improve CPH1), then customer satisfaction will go down. By spending more time on each call — under certain conditions — customer satisfaction improves. If the call is longer because the customer is placed on hold, customer satisfaction goes down, of course. But if the call is…