further up this page JoAnne said:
"we need to provide call center professionals with the skills to do their jobs, clearly identified goals, and a ton of support when they struggle or fall short of expectations. When call center professionals see and feel the company's committment to them, and they see their own personal growth, they will be energized, not for a day or a week, but for their career. "

Hi JoAnne, bear with me a moment but doesnt management normally react to underperforming staff but forget to recognise overperforming staff??? In my opinion I think this is the root of a lot of problems in employement (not just for call centres) as staff are conditioned to think that they must meet a basic minimum standard (to avoid their managers reacting to underperformance) rather than motivating staff to overachieve (by incentives, promotion, training and even things like compliments)???

I am a manager looking to imnprove my staff relations in a small company environment and have found that this 'big brother' policing of underachievers works but doesn't motivate. I read one place a good saying:

"Better the carrot than the stick!"

I think it applies here and has implications throughout for motivation, meeting goals, avoiding stressed workers, making the workplace a happy place etc.

Rob

Hi Robin,

It was an interesting post from you. You said "Better the carrot than the stick!" .

Well for a demotivated staff what is the use of a carrot when he is actuaaly looking for understanding and guidance. The ends do justify meansin business. But what about the values? Aren't we neglecting the most important factor - one's own value system as the intrinsic motivating factor.

Vedula

Vedula, good points.

I think Robin may have been meaning 'the carrot' as a proactive strategy to ensuring staff remain motivated, rather than a reactive one to apply once staff motivation drops. You're right about the employees' values system, though - respect and recognition are of course fundamental to motivation.

Congratulations on becoming a senior member, by the way (that is, your last post was your 50th) :-)

John

Hi everyone. It’s good to be back I think! I’ll let you know after a week out of the sun…

Looking through the posts here, and especially taking into account Jim's point about usable/practical offerings, I’d like to add a bit of practical advice.

For your people to feel ‘motivated’ they have to feel that whatever it is they are doing or saying is being recognised by the organisation as being valued. Then, and only then, will the individuals feel more secure and happy. Once they feel this way they are more inclined to contribute further and the positive cycle continues.

The big question is of course, “What can I do as a manager to generate this behaviour and encourage it once started?”

Bearing in mind that staff will do what you do, say what you say and act the way you act it is important that you begin to think the think, do the do and talk the talk.

Firstly, DO NOT start telling people what you are going to do. As Nike says, “Just do it”. Start by changing the language you use on a day to day basis. Use positive words and phrases. Don’t talk about what hasn’t been achieved talk about what has, “Great. We achieved 95% today well done.” Rather than, “We were 5% short”

Make a point of looking around your business every day to say ‘thank you’ to at least ten people. Look for real things that you wish to encourage rather than phoney items but look hard. If they are not there don't do it for the sake of it but don’t over do it either.

Before going to work in the morning, decide what significantly positive thing you are going to ‘catch’ someone doing. Look out for it all day. Every time you find someone doing it reward them with something small. Don’t make too much fuss ‘just do it’

The point of all of this is that your staff over a period of weeks will sense the change in culture. If you carry out these things properlyyou WILL
motivate people as they will see and learn that doing the 'right' things by customers is seen by management as being the thing to do (i.e. actually recognised and rewarded rather than simple talked about)

You of course need to have identified what it is that is important to your customers so you have a basis in fact forthis recognition and rewarding of people.

Catch yourself in public too. When you use the old words and attitudes and kind of catch yourself doing it, tell yourself off in front of staff so that they begin to see the change in you too.

Hope that is a bit more ‘practical’ for you all.

David

Motivation is free, so why try to buy it.

Managers are seldom equipped psychologically to talk to their
people on a personal level. One reason is that many people are
managers because of their technical ability not because of their
managerial skills. We should reward technical experts with
higher salaries but not with promotions to management. We would
be far better off if we promoted to management the people
who have good managerial and people skills and poor technical
skills -- which will solve two problems:

1 - Improve overall technical competence
2 - Improve managerial effectiveness

As long as executives do not know how to identify future effective
managers, management will be stuck with "The Peter Principle":

"In a hierarchy, every employee tends to
rise to his level of incompetence."

When managers are asked to list the Top Ten Motivators for their
employees the list looks like:

1 - Salary
2 - Bonuses
3 - Vacation
4 - Retirement
5 - Other Benefits & Perks
--------- the money line ----------
6 - Interesting work
7 - Involved in decisions
8 - Feedback
9 - Training
10 - Respect

Note:

Managers rank money items as their employees' Top Five Motivators.
When employees are asked to rank their Top Ten Motivators the list
looks like:

1 - Interesting work
2 - Involved in decisions
3 - Feedback
4 - Training
5 - Respect
--------- the money line ----------
6 - Salary
7 - Bonuses
8 - Vacation
9 - Retirement
10 - Other Benefits & Perks

Note:

Employees rank items that are equivalent to money as theirbottom
five motivators.

The managers' top five motivators are the employees' bottom
five motivators. The managers' top five motivators are more
related to the need of the managers to avoid personal contact
with employees than the desires or motivational needs of
their employees.

Managers pick the top five motivators because these are the things
that managers can "give" their employees without ever having to ask
what the employees want or need, i.e., no involvement on a personal
level is needed and all decisions can be made behind closed doors--all
the while avoiding personal contact even to the detriment of the
organization.

Note:

Managers give the same sequence as employees when asked to
rank their own motivators.

Sorry Bob, I have to somewhat disagree with you on your point that technically adept people make poor managers. Being in the IT field myself, I can tell you that a technically inept manager will not have the support of the team on his/her decisions, even if they are a 'nice person.' For technical management, you need to have people who are both technically skilled and not stunted personality-wise.

My $.02.

Marianne

Marianne,

Interesting point, and one which I concede. However, as a technical person, I personally feel that the very best people should remain where they are proven performers; technical excellence is something that comes from drive and genuine interest. To move someone into the paper-shuffling, email-answering abyss that is modern management may represent a backward step for the technical 'star'.

This is doubly worrying in modern technologies, such as the internet and telecoms, wherein technology is marching on at a tremendous pace. No matter how skilled the techie, take her away from the 'bleeding edge' and her skills begin to date rapidly, and she might well pine for the days when she was able to do what she was good at and enjoyed. Management is often best left for managers, but 'boss types' can often make the worst managers. Technical leadership is perhaps the optimal role for the 'star', with administrative decisions perhaps even delegated to someone who 'shines less brightly' in a technical capacity.

This is the technical promotional dilemma. Food for thought?

John

Hi Marianne:

>...technically adept people make poor managers.<

Let me rephrase my point; Employees don't make good managers because of their technical expertise alone. Good managers are good managers because of how they manage and not necessarily because of what they know. If we keep our best technical people in their jobs then by necessity their managers will not be as technically adept as they are, which is to be expected.

>Being in the IT field myself, I can tell you that a technically inept manager will not have the support of the team on his/her decisions, even if they are a 'nice person.'<

My point is about who should be a manager. I suggest quite strongly that managers need to be competent, but they need not be the most competent or as you say the most technically adept.

>For technical management, you need to have people
who are both technically skilled and not stunted
personality-wise.<

We agree 100%.

An appropriate personality or behavior is only part of what a manager needs. A manager must be capable of doing the job and be interested in the job of manager. I find most technical experts are not motivated by what managers must do, they like their technical work which is one reason they are so good at it.

Bob

Hello John:

When we develop benchmark success patterns for a technical position and its manager we find that the patterns differs substantially from one another. In other words, what is needed to be an effective technician is different than whatis needed to be an effective manager. Managers who do not know this often select their best technical employee for the promotion into management rather than the best person for the job.

Dr. Neil Thornberry, author of "Transforming the Engineer into a Manager: Avoiding the Peter Principle", of Babson College studied the high tech industry along Route 128 outside Boston and found that the most talkative competent engineer generally gets the first promotion into management and the second most talkative competent engineer gets the second promotion into management. The only problem is that the third most talkative competent engineer generally makes the best manager. Which stands to reason since the third most talkative competent engineer is spendingmore time listening and learning than talking while the two most talkative are talking more than listening.

If anyone is interested, feel free to read my article "1. How to Avoid the Peter Principle When Selecting Managers " at

Bob

You can post html in here, but we currently don't validate it, so if you're competent with the old hyperlinks, you can put in a link.

Alternatively, we're always looking for quality contributions - you'd obviously still retain all rights over the article - so why not submit your article for inclusion as a 'static' resource (to which people can add comments, as in the motivation sections)... what do you say?

If you send some details about your firm, we'll give you a free plug on your page. After all, there's nothing like well written and informed articles to attract customers toward your company.

Best wishes,

John

Hello John:

Thanks for all your help.

200+ articles & commentary by Dr. John Sullivan (Fastcompany's "Michael Jordan of Hiring"), Bob Gately and others
You can find my articles by clicking on my name likewise for Dr. Sullivan.

Is their specific location for me to post an article?

Bob

Hi Bob,

There is, but an administrator would have to do it - if you email them to me then I can do the necessary bits over the next few days. I'll also fix your font in that last post for you too!

Best wishes,

John

PS. The soon-to-be-launched CCV v1.10 will include a post 'preview' option, so that you can see how your post will look before posting it - ideal for those html glitches that we all get from time to time...

My thoughts are:

(1) One size does not fit all, it depends on the individual staff in question and the functions they are performing, so how about *asking the staff* (not with these words!):

(a) What could be changed to reduce de-motivation?
(b) What could be done to increase motivation?

(2) If you only put in place things that motivate people for a short time you will need to keep renewing/refreshing them. Is there anything you can do towards *longer term* motivation (eg career development, job variety).

(3) Asking leavers may reveal some of the most interesting ideas!

"(3) Asking leavers may reveal some of the most interesting ideas!"

I agree and I do recommend to my clients that they conduct exit interviews. The answers are often less than helpful if we give equal weight to each departing employees' answers.I'd give the comments of a departing top performer more weight than the comments from departing non-performer. When a non-performer leaves the question that needs to be answered is; why was the non-performer hired?

How about creating some kind of offical looking paper to go into an employees file where you fill it out when you ask them in to talk about their job and the way they feel about what's going on and the company - what others might be saying, etc., etc.

The time to make an employee feel his/her input is important is during employment, when you're paying them to do more than be a non-thinking machine.

Interview your employees regularly - let them grade your management and the company somehow, quote and paraphrase what they say. Make sure those comments make it to boardroom decisionmakers. Perhaps the human resources person is the best one to do this, since they have their own departments and may be able to be objective about an employees overall view of the organization.

If an employee feels what they think about the company is important while they are still employed there, this does a heck of a lot to motivate them - honestly, try it and find out.

Sincerely,
LoriAnne Hancock
Teleconnecting Consultant

Bob said: I agree and I do recommend to my clients that they conduct exit interviews. The answers are often less than helpful if we give equal weight to each departing employees' answers. I'd give the comments of a departing top performer more weight than the comments from departing non-performer.

- I have heard that exit interviews carried out by external parties are more effective than if they are carried out by (soon to be ex-) colleagues. What is anyone's experience/view on this?

- I'm not sure how the 'weighting' works, but I don't think I'd take any of the comments at face value. Rather I would be looking for all sources of possible improvement. The very worst performer might come up with something of great significance.

Alan ...........

The overall aim of any Call Centre manager is to monitor and manage the level of satisfaction delivered through their operation. There are 3 important areas that expect to be satisfied.

1. Customers
2. The organisational executive
3. Staff

In essence staff will leave your Call Centre for either a legitimate reason or through lack of satisfaction. Whilst you normally will not be able to address the legitimate, working towards improved staff satisfaction will address the latter.

Achieveing positive staff satisfaction on the whole is not that difficult. based on sound recruitment practices which employ staff who embrace the desired culture of the organisation, addressing logical and practical issues which impact the peoplewill achieve this. Sure some staff will demand the impossible and overstate their issues, these are your personal challenges to manage.

The remainder of the staff will respond positively to an open process of addressing staff satisfaction with realistic requirements.

How to implement this in practice? plan to conduct a survey of Staff satisfaction at least twice a year. Your survey process needs to cover all aspects of the Call Centre operation to ensure staff feel they are able to contribute. It is best to conduct your surveys with no ID markings so all participants feel secure to respond without fear. You are after the real truth and not a sharade put on through concern or fear of reaction.

It is also important that you makeclear your aim to share the results with all staff and a positve committment to address any issues which are identified through the process. You will find this form of issue resolution both liberating and develop a positive response for "truely" concerned staff as you develop ideas to addess their concerns.

This process should also be supported by a similar approach which enables staff to lodge operational concerns with management (without identification) on a regular basis. Often this takes the form of a "suggestion box". They are often worth more than most people realise. Remeber that feedback needs to work in a loop.

If anybody is interested in some examples of a staff satisfaction survey template please drop me a line.

Fringe benefit

Jim, I agree wholeheartedly. We advise and use a similar model of maintaining a balance of customer satisfaction, owner satisfaction and people (staff) satisfaction.

How about going one step further: make the overall scores of the employee satisfaction survey a weighted component of the management yearly performance evaluation. Any thoughts, anyone?

I would be interested in your templates for measuring employee satisfaction, if you don't mind, Jim.

Brent

Hi Bob,

Saw some of your posts and I do agree with you - Technical excellence does not mean man management excellence.

The interesting part about motivation is that it can not be explained by mere carrot dangling or few fringe benefits. What motivates people to work is the internal drivers- if internal motivation is lacking then the external motivator may not work. If performance is the yardstick then motivation to enhance productivity will depend on skill levels, supervision and job interest.

We have discussed issues like employee turnover and job interest, recruitment policies which all identify and solve some of the problems related to internal motivation.The discusiion forum is full of them.

If we have to add a new angle to motivation let us look at Bob's way - compile a list of probable motivators and see how many of them are external and how many of them are internal.

My findings and observations are very clear- Unless a person is motivated internally he will not perform. External motivation does the work of only first-aid and not a therapy.

Any comments?
Vedula