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Customer experience

Planning Guide 2024: Customer Experience

 960 640 Stuart O'Brien
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71% of CX leaders plan to invest in tech to elevate customer insights. How are they planning to utilise it?

Check out The Forrester guide, in partnership with Freshworks to review:

  • The right areas to invest in CX in 2024
  • Spending benchmarks curated from 600+ global companies
  • How to experiment with emerging technology like generative AI

Furthermore, the link from Freshworks contains a great kit for Customer Support leaders who are looking at their planning and priority investment areas in 2024. Use the navigation on the left hand side to review the materials.

Take a look at the insights, here!

Want to hear more? Freshworks will be exhibiting at the Contact Centre & Customer Services Summit on the 29th and 30th April, 2024.

Thank you,

Team Freshworks

Biometrics opening new possibilities in user experience

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As the demand for heightened security and seamless user experiences continues to grow across various sectors, advanced biometric technologies are poised to redefine the authentication and identity verification processes. From ensuring secure financial transactions to enhancing border control and streamlining retail interactions, advanced biometrics’ ability to provide robust security while improving user experience marks a new era in sectors such as financial services, government & law enforcement, retail, automotive, healthcare, and consumer goods.

That’s according to GlobalData, as the firm’s Associate Project Manager of Disruptive Tech explained: “Biometric technologies are transforming various sectors by uniquely identifying individuals through traits like fingerprints, voice, and facial patterns. The integration of AI and machine learning has boosted their accuracy and ability to detect fraud, especially in finance and healthcare. As privacy regulations evolve, the providers and implementors of biometric technologies are also adapting upgraded secure and ethical data practices. This blend of innovation and security is positioning biometrics as a key ingredient in future technology solutions, balancing user experience with individual rights.”

GlobalData’s “Advanced biometrics: emerging trends and technologies in authentication” report delves into over 60 real-life implementations of biometric technologies. The report categorizes these implementations based on the end-use sectors and applications.

UK-based Lloyds Bank’s new digital ID app, developed in collaboration with UK-based digital identity startup Yoti, facilitates age and identity verification for accessing accounts and services via smartphones. This app, named Lloyds Bank Smart ID, leverages biometric and liveness detection technology, offering a reusable digital identity solution that meets high security and compliance standards.

Walmart has incorporated selfie-based biometric verification checks, provided by the American identity solutions startup Persona, into its Spark delivery app. This strategic step is designed to mitigate instances of identity fraud, where individuals exploit multiple identities to dominate the delivery job market.

Mercedes-Benz has collaborated with Mastercard to introduce an in-car biometric fuel payment system. This technology enables drivers to use their vehicle’s fingerprint sensor to conduct transactions seamlessly through the Mercedes Pay+ digital payment platform. This feature allows Mercedes-Benz customers to make secure digital payments at over 3,600 petrol stations across Germany.

Daga concluded: “Advanced biometrics are likely to be a game-changer for a multitude of industries. Their ability to enhance security, streamline processes, and offer personalized experiences is reshaping the way businesses and governments operate. By harnessing the power of advanced biometrics in combination with technologies such as AI, blockchain, and IoT, industries can unlock new levels of security and convenience, ultimately shaping a more secure and user-friendly future.”

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Optimise customer interaction: Effective use of large language models for companies

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By Björn Lorenzen, Regional Vice President EMEA Central at Yext

Linguistic understanding is essential in today’s communication and has a significant influence on our everyday lives. It enables us to exchange information and control processes. In business, language is therefore an essential building block for strengthening customer loyalty and increasing customer satisfaction.

The advanced development of comprehensive language models and their broad application in services such as ChatGPT, Bing Chat and others are creating innovative communication channels and content management options. This enables companies to increase their work efficiency, reduce the workload of their employees and improve customer contact. Artificial intelligence enables an improved user experience and provides customers with direct answers, reducing the need to search FAQ sections or make telephone inquiries.

However, there are also challenges: Large language models can be opaque and contain errors that can affect up to 20 percent of answers. This can undermine trust and impact the customer experience. To avoid this and ensure a pleasant customer experience, companies should optimise their platforms such as websites, intranet or social media with their own data and use it to train artificial intelligence. This not only allows them to retain control over information, but also facilitates the publication of standardised content and streamlines customer service processes. Customers benefit from simpler handling and easier dialog with the company.

But how can this be implemented?

In order to provide targeted information at various contact points such as Google search, website search or chatbots, the following is required:

Large amounts of data (Big Data): This is a collection of all relevant company data. This includes user manuals, FAQs, location information such as address and telephone number as well as product information, company biographies and technical details. It is important that this information base is organised, up-to-date and clear and that sensitive or confidential information is made unrecognisable. The quality of the data directly influences the quality of the derived models and forecasts. In order to be able to make reliable statements, it is necessary to clean the data in advance. This includes finding and completing missing data records, identifying outliers and correcting or removing clearly recognizable erroneous or contradictory data.

A data source: Information can be collected, organised and stored in a knowledge graph or a headless content management system. Here, data is prepared in such a way that it can be related to each other. Artificial intelligence can extract correlations and insights from this data that would otherwise not have been accessible. Even complex queries, such as the search for a Turkish-speaking mortgage consultant in Cologne, can be handled with the help of the system.

In addition, only verified information is included in the system, which gives companies control over the published data. However, before this is possible, the relevant data must be fed into the system. As this often comes from different sources, data transfer via a connected API interface is advisable. This process is not only much more efficient, but also less prone to errors. If the necessary interfaces are not available in the company, the option of manual input remains.

Database technology helps to minimise the risk of data protection violations and adhere to compliance regulations. A headless content management system (CMS) ensures that data is not exchanged directly with AI systems such as ChatGPT. The AI models are only given access to the data they need. In addition, internal training for employees is essential.

Large language models: Language processing models such as GPT-4, LaMDA, PaLM, Gopher, Jurassic-1 and BERT analyse texts depending on the area of application and produce different results. There is no universally superior model, but each is used in different applications according to its strengths. GPT-4, for example, is used to quickly and efficiently create texts such as product descriptions or job advertisements. It can also autonomously generate responses to customer reviews to improve customer service.

Models such as LAMDA and BERT can help to answer user queries directly via a website’s search function. Companies that want to use these technologies need sufficient computing and storage capacity. In addition, the models must be trained regularly in order to gradually increase the quality of the answers and the database must be continuously updated.

Finally, the processed data is made usable for various purposes by the language models and is available for internal and external communication channels. External users receive quick and verified answers in natural language, while internal employees benefit from automatically generated content such as product or personal descriptions and responses to online reviews. With the help of the intranet, internal training resources, such as sales presentations in the finance department, can be accessed quickly. This simplifies work processes and allows specialists to concentrate on more demanding topics.

Conclusion

AI and voice models are more than a trend – they are part of our future working world. Companies should use these technologies to remain competitive. It is important to collect, process and secure data in advance. When integrated into corporate channels, voice models offer great potential for maintaining brand integrity and creating customer-oriented experiences. However, necessary preparations must be made before implementation. Data should be carefully collected, summarised and reviewed to ensure its quality and security.

The integration of GPT-4 and similar advanced language models into your own business processes offers enormous potential to increase brand consistency and create impressive customer experiences. However, these technologies should not be viewed in isolation, as their effectiveness is directly dependent on the quality of the underlying data. They must therefore be continuously fed with company-specific data. Only through a solid data organisation and an adaptable infrastructure can we prevent false information from being disseminated and seamlessly base customer communication on correct information.

About the author:

Björn Lorenzen has been Regional Vice President EMEA Central at Yext, a leading digital experience platform that powers both owned and third-party experiences, since the end of 2020 and in this position is responsible for the company’s strategic new business, among other things. Previously, the IT specialist spent seven years at Facelift, a social media management provider – most recently as Head of Enterprise Sales. His other positions include Actito and Mail Select AG.

Two thirds of digital experiences are damaged by outdated technology

 960 640 Stuart O'Brien
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Nearly two thirds (63%) of ‘digital experience’ professionals say their experiences are being let down by poor and outdated technology.

That’s according to FullStory research based on surveys 700 professionals responsible for building customer experiences online, including product teams, marketers and UX professionals.

The global survey spans the USA, Germany, The Netherlands, Australia, Singapore, Indonesia and 100 ‘DX’ professionals from the UK.

According to the data, almost a third of DX professionals (30%) say that siloed tools and disjointed data are causing multiple teams to replicate work, wasting time and leading to disconnected customer experiences.

Many of those surveyed are also unhappy with their existing tools, with 68% agreeing that too many analytics platforms treat customers as nothing more than “numbers in a spreadsheet.”

To solve this, many brands have invested in additional tech, often simply building on what has come before. As a result, 66% of those surveyed said there are tools in their DX stack that they have never used. A quarter (25%) go as far as to say they rarely use “the majority” of their DX tools.

Andrew Fairbank, FullStory’s Vice President of EMEA, said: “A poor digital experience can damage everything from user acquisition to customer loyalty, and even a brand’s reputation. Over the years, the market has become flooded with tools designed to address just one or two small parts of a brand’s digital experience (DX). As such, many businesses have ended up with disjointed technologies spread across multiple teams and all doing similar jobs. The result is siloed data, less informed DX strategies, and ultimately a worse experience for customers.

“Instead of piling more tools on top of each other, brands need to treat DX as a unified function with one ‘source of truth’ for data and insight. The future of this space will be single-platform solutions, built from the ground up as a cohesive platform designed to be that single source of truth, that span journey mapping, UX analytics, frustration signals, conversion tracking and more. Ideally these platforms should be used across product management teams, CX, engineering, customer success, marketing departments and more. That will be the key to better experiences, happier customers, and increased revenue.”

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How self-service could shape the future of customer experience

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As technological advancements continue at an unprecedented rate, businesses are incessantly seeking ways to enhance their customer experience (CX). A core strategy that has gained significant traction in recent years is the proliferation of self-service options. Over the next five years, the evolution of self-service is poised to transform CX in several distinct ways. Here we explore a few possibilities, based on input from delegates at the Contact Centre & Customer Services Summit…

  1. Greater Personalisation Through AI and Machine Learning:
    • The integration of AI and machine learning into self-service platforms will usher in a new era of personalisation. Customers will be met with interfaces that intuitively adapt to their individual preferences and browsing behaviours. By predicting a user’s needs based on their past interactions, businesses can proactively present solutions even before a customer recognises the need, streamlining their journey and amplifying satisfaction.
  2. Omnichannel Consistency:
    • The rise of multiple touchpoints, from mobile apps and websites to chatbots and kiosks, demands an integrated, seamless user experience. Over the next five years, businesses will increasingly ensure that their self-service options offer a consistent experience, irrespective of the medium. The goal is to provide a fluid, brand-cohesive journey, allowing customers to switch between platforms without losing context or convenience.
  3. Enhanced Virtual Assistants and Chatbots:
    • Virtual assistants and chatbots will undergo significant evolution, moving from simple scripted responses to sophisticated entities capable of understanding and processing complex human emotions and nuances. This will make interactions feel more ‘human’, despite being automated, thus ensuring that even self-service channels retain a touch of personal connection.
  4. Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) Integration:
    • AR and VR technologies are poised to redefine the realms of self-service, particularly in sectors like retail and real estate. Imagine a scenario where customers can ‘try on’ clothes virtually or take a VR tour of a property they intend to buy. Such immersive experiences can significantly enhance decision-making and satisfaction.
  5. Predictive Self-Service:
    • As data analytics becomes more advanced, businesses will be equipped to forecast potential issues customers might face and preemptively provide self-service solutions. For instance, software platforms might offer troubleshooting steps even before a user recognises a glitch.
  6. Empowerment of Customer Independence:
    • A subtle but profound shift will be the increasing empowerment of customers who prefer a do-it-yourself approach. Enhanced self-service tools will cater to this demographic, allowing them to resolve issues, make informed decisions, and complete tasks at their own pace and discretion.
  7. Security and Privacy Focus:
    • With the growing emphasis on data protection, especially with regulations like GDPR, self-service platforms will integrate more robust security protocols. Customers will be able to access services with the confidence that their data remains uncompromised.

The future of self-service in shaping customer experience is intrinsically linked to the rapid technological advancements of our age. As businesses pivot towards offering more autonomous tools, the next half-decade will witness a blend of efficiency, personalisation, and innovation, all aimed at placing the customer at the heart of the journey.

Are you looking for Chat and Web Self-Service solutions for your business? The Contact Centre & Customer Services Summit can help!

Photo by Hassan OUAJBIR on Unsplash

Generative AI set to ‘redefine’ customer experience offered by financial institutions

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In the evolving world of financial services, where rapid adaptation to customer needs is paramount, generative AI (genAI) is quickly becoming a game-changer. Its prowess in generating customised content and solutions is redefining how financial institutions interact with their customers and optimises their internal operations.

That’s according to analysts at GlobalData with Kiran Raj, Practice Head of Disruptive Tech at GlobalData, stating: “With the growing demand for personalised financial solutions, genAI has a pivotal role in curating bespoke customer experiences. It is not about generic financial products anymore but crafting individualized strategies that align with each customer’s financial goals.”

Saurabh Daga, Associate Project Manager of Disruptive Tech at GlobalData, added: “Harnessing the power of genAI to analyze intricate patterns in transaction histories and financial behaviors can create predictive models that not only anticipate customer needs but also craft targeted financial products and advisories. This has the potential to elevate customer service, optimize costs, and enhance overall user satisfaction.”

Diving deeper into the transformative potential of genAI, GlobalData’s latest Innovation Radar report, “Code to capital: generative AI meets financial services,” showcases the broad spectrum of genAI applications. From risk assessment and personalized advisory to cognitive customer care and fraud detection, the breadth of genAI’s impact is profound.

Traditional banks such as JPMorgan and HSBC have already developed genAI-based tools that offer personalized financial advice to their customers.

On the other hand, emerging fintechs such as Stripe and Cowbell are enhancing their end-user experience with genAI-powered tools.

Synthetic data is being used by financial service providers such as Provinzial Insurance and Wells Fargo to create predictive models to detect fraud as well as develop personalized offerings.

Deutsche Bank and Goldman Sachs are experimenting with genAI to automate some of their backend processes including banking software development and management of financial documents.

Daga concluded: “Implementing genAI in the sensitive landscape of financial services comes with its set of challenges. Issues surrounding data accuracy, ethical considerations, and privacy are paramount. However, with judicious governance, these hurdles can be surpassed. Forging strategic alliances can be a pathway to harness the transformative potential of genAI, ensuring they are equipped with the right technology, infrastructure, and talent to capitalize on this wave of innovation.”

Ireland’s Permanent TSB tackles employee and customer experience

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Irish bank Permanent TSB has selected Medallia to deliver its Voice of the Customer (VoC) and employee experience programmes, representing a continuation of their four-year partnership.

Medallia’s enterprise experience platform will support the retail bank in further embedding customer and employee engagement initiatives to promote organisational change through the power of positive experiences.

Permanent TSB (PTSB) has been supporting communities in the Republic of Ireland for over 200 years, with 3,000 employees serving more than 1.2 million customers. The bank says it’s constantly striving to improve its customers’ financial wellbeing, attract and retain talent, and enhance the bank’s trustworthiness with all stakeholders. Central to this is actively evolving company culture, improving its customer and employee experience in tandem.

PTSB initially selected Medallia to reimagine its customer experience strategy in 2019, recognising the need for a more robust strategy to fully understand customer pain points. A year later PTSB chose Medallia to deliver its new employee experience programme, ‘Every Voice Counts.’

At a time of turbulence in the Irish financial market and pandemic-induced societal change, PTSB realised that a fresh approach to how employee experience data was collected, understood, and actioned would allow it to better support employees through all stages of their journey.

“Permanent TSB’s purpose is to build trust with our customers – we are a community serving the community. We have a responsibility to understand the sentiment and feedback our customers share with us, and take meaningful actions to improve our customer experience. Having the ability to quickly identify pain-points through our customer’s feedback and prioritise improvements to remove friction for them has been transformational,” said Sarah Cashman, Customer Experience Manager at PTSB. “Customer experience is the golden thread that weaves through the entire organization. Team members at all levels of the organization are now looking at the same dashboards – from customer-facing teams to senior leaders, drawing on the insights in weekly ‘Customer Experience Task Force’ meetings. We are excited to see where our partnership takes us next.”

With Medallia powering PTSB’s employee experience programme, all employee engagement metrics are trending upwards. Between 2020 and 2022, employee net promoter scores (eNPS) have increased by 19 points, culture by eight, engagement by seven and trust by 10. The organisation has taken action on more than 1,000 positive changes based on employee feedback, all of which have contributed to the bank’s strategic priorities and sense of community. With the help of Medallia, PTSB is now expanding its employee listening to new touchpoints, such as onboarding, to further enhance its Every Voice Counts program. This continues to play a central role in improving the bank’s culture proposition, DEI initiatives, recognition, belonging and wellbeing strategies.

Medallia was able to conduct linkage analysis on PTSB’s data to uncover a strong connection between engaged employees and customer satisfaction. Notably, it showed a 30-point difference in customer Net Promoter Score (NPS) between branches with lower employee engagement and higher employee engagement.

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Examining the impact of AI on Contact Centre and Customer Experience

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Artificial Intelligence (AI) is revolutionising various industries, and its impact on the contact centre and customer experience sectors is profound. AI-powered technologies are transforming how businesses interact with customers, enhancing efficiency, personalisation, and overall customer satisfaction. Here, we explore the ways in which AI is impacting the call centre and customer experience sectors, reshaping the way businesses handle customer interactions…

Intelligent Virtual Assistants
AI-powered virtual assistants, such as chatbots, are transforming the call centre landscape. These intelligent systems can handle routine customer queries, provide instant responses, and assist with basic problem-solving. AI-driven chatbots can handle multiple customer interactions simultaneously, reducing wait times and improving response rates. They provide 24/7 support, enhancing customer experience and freeing up human agents to focus on more complex tasks.

Natural Language Processing and Sentiment Analysis
AI technologies, particularly natural language processing (NLP) and sentiment analysis, are improving customer interactions. NLP enables systems to understand and interpret customer inquiries, allowing for more accurate and relevant responses. Sentiment analysis helps businesses gauge customer emotions and sentiment, enabling tailored responses and proactive measures to address customer concerns. This AI-driven analysis enhances the overall customer experience by providing personalized and empathetic support.

Predictive Analytics and Personalisation
AI-powered predictive analytics help businesses analyze customer data to anticipate needs and personalize interactions. By leveraging AI algorithms, businesses can understand customer preferences, predict future buying behavior, and offer tailored recommendations. This level of personalization enhances customer satisfaction and loyalty, as customers feel understood and valued by the business.

Call Routing and Intelligent Call Routing
AI-enabled call routing systems use algorithms to match customers with the most suitable agents based on their needs and requirements. By analyzing customer data, such as previous interactions and purchase history, AI systems ensure that customers are directed to agents with the appropriate skills and knowledge. Intelligent call routing improves first-call resolution rates, reduces call transfer times, and enhances overall customer experience.

Voice Recognition and Natural Language Processing in Voice Assistants
AI-powered voice recognition and natural language processing technologies are revolutionizing voice assistants in call centres. Voice assistants can understand spoken requests, interpret intentions, and provide relevant information or assistance. These systems offer a more intuitive and convenient way for customers to interact with businesses, enhancing the customer experience and reducing call handling times.

Data Analytics and Customer Insights
AI-driven data analytics provide businesses with valuable customer insights. By analyzing vast amounts of customer data, AI algorithms identify patterns, preferences, and trends. This information helps businesses make informed decisions, refine their products or services, and improve the customer experience. Data-driven insights enable businesses to deliver more targeted and personalized solutions, ultimately enhancing customer satisfaction.

The impact of AI on the call centre and customer experience sectors in the UK is transformative. From intelligent virtual assistants and sentiment analysis to predictive analytics and personalized interactions, AI technologies are reshaping how businesses engage with customers. By leveraging AI-powered solutions, businesses can improve response times, personalise customer interactions, and deliver a seamless and satisfying customer experience.

However, it is important to strike the right balance between automation and human touch to maintain genuine and empathetic customer interactions.

Embracing AI in the call centre and customer experience sectors allows businesses in the UK to stay competitive, enhance customer satisfaction, and drive long-term success in an increasingly digital and customer-centric era.

Customer experience benefitting from IDP automation

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ABBYY has released its Intelligent Document Processing (IDP) Global Trends & Outcomes Report highlighting document challenges and opportunities driving enterprise intelligent automation initiatives.

The report provides innovation leaders with key insights into how businesses are optimising document-centric processes to achieve operational excellence, improve the customer experience, and accelerate business value.

“Enterprises continue to be driven by the ever-changing digital needs of their customers. At the heart of meeting customers’ expectations is making operational improvements that impact engagement and deliver measurable value,” commented Gabrielle Lukianchuk, Chief Marketing Officer at ABBYY. “Various global market factors noted in our report highlight the need for faster access to and a better understanding of customer-centric data to achieve more exceptional customerexperiences. The goal of sharing our insights is to foster mutual learning and enable today’s organisations to reach their intelligent automation milestones faster.”

Analysis of three key regions reveals priorities to improve workforce agility, customer experience, and overall operational efficiency. According to ABBYY data, the key driver is the need to improve how they process the data and related documents. Most notable by region include:

North America

  • Tax forms (IRS 1040)
  • Financial documents (bank statements, invoices)

Europe

  • Documents for international travel and commerce, such as customs declarations, identity documents, and waybills

APAC

  • Forms related to international shipping (air and sea waybills)
  • Identity documents
  • Financial documents (bank statements, invoices)

Despite their varying priorities, all three regions are focused on streamlining accounts payable operations by improving and decreasing cost of invoice processing, as well as elevating the customer experience for both consumer and business customers through automated processing of identity-related documents, and documents used within transportation and logistics.

Enterprises in all regions also had similar priorities to augment their intelligent automation platforms with connectors to more advanced IDP capabilities that have better accuracy in reading, extracting, and classifying unstructured and semi-structured data. Connecting to high-end IDP solutions with their existing platforms enable organisations to cost effectively scale their technology investments. ABBYY data notes the most common connectors requested are for the following platforms:

  • Microsoft Power Automate
  • UiPath
  • Blue Prism
  • Automation Anywhere

Based on initial data from January through March 2023, ABBYY anticipates continued growth of IDP adoption for use cases accelerating workforce agility, improving the customer experience, and streamlining supply chain and logistics business processes.

Delivering a great experience for the new brand custodians

 960 640 Stuart O'Brien
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The role of Contact Centre employees has changed significantly in recent years. The arrival of AI, chatbots and webforms has encouraged customer self-service, leaving dedicated agents to handle the more complex issues requiring knowledge, understanding and empathy. But these employees are also increasingly working from home a few days each week, remote from colleagues and support.

They are targeted with achieving more first-time resolutions, irrespective of the complexity of each case. And they are expected to use an array of complex, interacting collaborative technologies – that may or may not operate seamlessly together. So how can a business optimise the digital employee experience for these increasingly valuable brand custodians? Tony Smith, contact centre and employee experience expert, IR explains…

Valued Resource

Contact centre agents are no longer the most junior, undervalued employees in the business. Today, they are the transitioning up the value chain, recognised as brand ambassadors, empowered to handle those complex customer interactions that cannot be managed through self-service technologies. Yet despite the elevation and recognition, contact centre managers continue to struggle with high levels of staff churn, leading both to additional costs and disruption that can undermine the quality of the customer experience (CX).

In an increasingly complex contact centre environment, it is now vital to understand the day-to-day digital employee experience (EX) of agents and its impact on their ability to deliver a great CX. It is no longer enough to track the standard key performance indicators (KPIs), such as call resolution, call abandonment and agent occupancy. Businesses need to understand how technology is affecting the experience and as a result influencing performance.

Call answer rate may be well within target, but if the video or voice quality is poor, what is the impact on the CX? Is one agent’s performance dropping because customers are unable to hear properly and therefore abandoning the call? When staff are both increasingly skilled and hard to attain, no business can afford to lose talent due to technical problems.

Complex Contact Centres

The challenge is that these individuals are typically using multiple tools across many diverse networks, creating a complex picture for IT to unravel. Indeed, in many cases the system uptime figures will look great – and the business will be blind to the specific problems affecting one or more agents. In these complex, multi-tiered environments it is now essential to achieve a single source of end-to-end monitoring. With one tool, a business can quickly identify the problems and the cause, such as the need to improve capacity to avoid call quality dropping when the contact centre is busy.

IT performance can be monitored on an agent-by-agent basis, highlighting issues that may be linked to home working, such as poor Wi-Fi or an agent using an unauthorised camera that is affecting video quality. Fast access to this insight empowers a contact centre manager to be proactive with individual employees, highlighting and addressing any technology issues that could be damaging their EX and hence the CX and, as a result, their performance.

Complete Digital Experience

This insight is fast becoming essential if companies are to address the loss of younger talent. The generations now in the workforce are both tech savvy and connected. They expect technology to work and work well – whether that is at home or in the office. They don’t want to arrive for a day’s training or a collaboration with colleagues to discover the equipment in the meeting room doesn’t work.

They also don’t want to arrive in the office to discover just three people on a floor that could support several hundred. Continually monitoring equipment usage across the entire business estate can provide key insight about building usage, and information used by buildings and facilities management to support operational planning.  If equipment is used just once or twice a month, companies can not only gain significant cost benefits through consolidating and reducing energy usage, but also ensure staff are always in a busy, supportive and collaborative environment.

Conclusion

Contact centre staff are increasingly valuable and valued – and the onus is on businesses to do more than just invest in IT to allow more customers to self-serve. Every part of the contact centre environment, whether an agent is at home, in the office, or reaching across the wider business to speak to a subject matter expert, must work perfectly to deliver a great employee experience. If the environment isn’t good enough, talented staff will leave for an employer that can offer a better digital workplace EX and, as a result, enable them to deliver a better CX.