Targets

[peachey]

That's all the world of business consists of now

a shallow world of targets
to throw on bank managers and accountants desks

all they care about is bonuses and payoffs for fatcats and the like
who ruin industries

erm, was there a point to this latest rant then ?

[peachey]

Originally Posted by pem

erm, was there a point to this latest rant then ?

yeah
lots of companies cry 'customer service' is paramount etc

typically - this is what happens in a call centre
'targets' want it so that the agents spend less idle time between calls

as they are so pressurised into typing up all sorts of notes etc in less and less time, the only option is to keep the cmr on hold and do these taks then
rather than terminate the call and go into 'idle time' that you get chastised and penalised for being in

thus - the targets are better - the customer service is worse - most customers to all companies are angry and irritated by long waits

but as long as the targets look better....etc

[Florence]

The companies need to look at the role of call centers.

If a customer is happy holding on getting help and asering questions then this should be allowed.

If the CS has to type up what was said and is doing this after the customer has gone offline this shouldn't be called idle time. Idle time should be from when the customers details have been typed up and their data that was on screen closed.

[peachey]

Originally Posted by Kitty

If the CS has to type up what was said and is doing this after the customer has gone offline this shouldn't be called idle time. Idle time should be from when the customers details have been typed up and their data that was on screen closed.

if only - yeah

but its not the case

like I said - all that is cared about is excel spreadsheet targets in offices

[peachey]

was a bit dissapointed that no more chinless wonders responded to what i feel was an emerging issue

[Bifta]

Originally Posted by peachey

was a bit dissapointed that no more chinless wonders responded to what i feel was an emerging issue

Perhaps because it's not an emerging issue, nearly 6 years ago I was doing third line tech. support for a call centre and targets were just as important then as you seem to think they are now, also, referring to people as "chinless wonders" is hardly going to lure people into engaging in conversation with you.

[Kneebs]

the way things are goin we wont need to be worrying about target et all for much longer.....

i work in a call centre (although i'm not on the phones), but i remember when our number 1 buzz words were customer primacy - this lasted all of a few weeks before something else took over, and this was quickly forgotton about.

at the end of the day, the more you work the system in your favour, the better you measure against the targets, and the better your bonus - **** customer service i know, but its all about getting the stats racked up

edit - i was gonna edit in that this is not an emerging issue, but bifta beat me to it

[peachey]

back to my point tho

all they see is figures on excel sheets


bums on seats
and not give a t^ss about what hapens to the customer 'experience'

its all guff!

Originally Posted by peachey

That's all the world of business consists of now

Not my business, sunshine!

Ok, my business my consist of me and me alone, but I still think the words "Customer Service" have some sort of meaning!

[peachey]

Originally Posted by Graham

Not my business, sunshine!

Ok, my business my consist of me and me alone, but I still think the words "Customer Service" have some sort of meaning!

that is nice to hear

as i am of the opinion of 'stamp out the sole trader'
is the nature of the corparate world

[Sociable]

Targets have a valid place in any organisation.

The problem comes when the target becomes more important than the reason it was put in place.

Perfect example of this was our local Hospital that was so worried about achieving the "target" for reducing waiting times they found a way to reach the target without actually reducing waiting times one iota. (Effectively manipulating the data to give a more favourable result)

Had they concentrated on reducing the waiting time instead, the target would have served a very useful purpose.

It's basically another form of my pet hate whereby a "system" becomes more important than the job it was designed to do.

The idiot that says, "Oh we can't do that because of the System", as if the system was God. If doing it against the system actually allows the original purpose of the sytem to be fulfilled then the system gets bypassed if there is any sanity involved.

Sadly this is rarely the case, especially in large organisations like NTL, most Banks and also pretty well all Government departments.

Originally Posted by peachey

was a bit dissapointed that no more chinless wonders responded to what i feel was an emerging issue

Perhaps because people simply saw it as an attempt to cause arguments and decided to leave alone.

[Shaun]

Originally Posted by pem

Perhaps because people simply saw it as an attempt to cause arguments and decided to leave alone.

[Escapee]

Targets have become a burden in most large companies, ntl have proved themselves to be a prime example. I know many people here will not be pleased with my opinion, but ntl increased callcentre staff and telephone support staff in an effort to clear faults on the cheap.

It is far cheaper to employ someone on £14K in technical support than sending an engineer out to fix a fault, as the average ntl network technician earns £20K+ plus the cost of all his equipment, vehicle and running costs.
It is far more productive in the short term for a company like ntl to run a callcentre and technical support centre that gets customers off the line as quick as possible, then when the customer has called the 2nd or 3rd time about the same fault that has been fobbed off, they will get an engineer call.

This has been taken too far in ntl as the regional engineers are now controlled by the callcentres, in an effort to cut costs and keep their head above water the short term "fob the customer off" solution is the one they are taking. This attitude ives the impression that they can safely get rid of more technical people who are actually out in the field carrying out a task.
Managers are going back to the guys at the top saying faults are being cleared by technical support, and they are also saying we need less engineers in the field because we are working smarter!
The battery back-up (UPS) project for Cable Modems and Digital TV on the HFC network was cancelled due to the cash shortage, this also meant the status monitoring for nodal cabinets has fallen by the wayside as well.

How can they say they are working smarter and need less people in the field when they have not implemented the tools that would enable them to do this in the real world. The managers can only make this claim if A: They dont know what they are talking about. or B: They are lying to keep the pressure off themselves in the short term.

Many of the problems encountered with helping the customer never get back to the senior management because the managers in between lie to make themselves look good and save their own skins.