Caution: Don’t View Contact Center Performance Measures in Isolation

Consider a few examples that illustrate the interrelated nature of contact center performance measures:

  • Cost per contact going down may actually be a bad sign. Viewed alone, a dropping cost per contact would seem like a positive indication. However, if errors and rework, or contacts not completely resolved in other channels are edshutterstock_244104718 copyging up, cost per contact will naturally decrease as fixed costs are spread over more calls—not good.
  • Average handling time going up may be a positive indication. Viewed alone, an increasing AHT may seem to indicate inefficiencies. However, the sample may be reflecting more complex interactions as self-service, mobile apps, or first contact resolution offload simpler contacts. Or, agents may be improving on cross-selling and upsetting opportunities, and boosting average call value. In these cases, AHT may climb, even as value to the business increases.
  • A high service level is not necessarily all positive. In isolation, a great service level may seem like a good thing, but if schedules are assigning too many agents to service level contacts while short-changing response time work, adjustments need to be made to forecasting and scheduling processes.

In short, performance measures are interrelated, and viewing them as a whole is a prerequisite to truly understanding what’s happening and taking the right steps to improve performance.