Call centers are forefront of customer services. Call center
jobs are very demanding. The customer satisfaction is the motto of this
industry. Therewards in this industry are very attractive.The job is very challenging. The
employees have to deal with long work hours, grumpy customers, sales and target
demands. This industry again, despite various perks has their own drawbacks.
This industry is very volatile as it is very much economy driven and dependent.
Call centers
in saturated market
The current situation of the labor market can be
estimated by the saturation rates in call centers. The converse is equally
true. What however, affects the call centers by the change in economic
situation is the employee layover, targets and salary. Creaghn Harry states the employee layover in case of any negative
market scenario is a given.
Market Saturation refers to the point when further
growth in sales is not possible. And customer demands cannot be made further.
Six issues
call center services often face in a saturated market are as follows:
·
Employee
attrition: When the market becomes saturated, there is a high chance that the
attrition rates may outgo 100% each year. This will in turn lower the
performance levels. Because the employees are already in a defensive position.
The labor market is obviously affected.
·
Wage inflation:
The probable way to deal with the market saturation is to increase the wages.
·
More
competition: It is important to determine the competitors, and their strength
and weakness. It is imperative that you take in the best agents as an employer,
rather than losing them to your competitors.
·
Labor longevity:
If the market is saturated, say that there are 400 jobs in the market before
they reach the saturation levels. So, it says it will be a few years before 10
new call centers open up.
·
Dissatisfaction with customers:
Dissatisfaction with job may be translated into bad customer service. It may so
happen that the employees in the lack of proper incentives and promotion, this
may lead to negligence with the job. CreaghanHarry says any indecent behavior with the clients is accounted as a sin in
the BPO industry.
·
Employees may
ultimately leave jobs because market saturation does not provide further room
for career growth and incentives. And this industry being highly taxing and
exploitive, call center agents do not find it fruitful or enough to keep
working in it without any growth and incentives.
The BPO industry is very target oriented and taxing.
And it is dependent on the market and economy. It depends upon a lot of
factors, the present infrastructure and IT or Information Technology Industry
has a lot. The communication technology and other aspects of this industry will
indirectly affect the BPO or Business Process Outsourcing. In spite of various
targets, the call agents have to adhere to their job roles assigned. They have
to interact with the customers in a pleasing voice and manner. Otherwisetheir
jobs may be in jeopardy.