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Talkdesk Outlines Customer Experience Reframe for the Post-Pandemic Contact Center

At Enterprise Connect 2020, Kieran King (Senior Vice President of Customer Success, Talkdesk) outlined how Talkdesk is planning for the post-pandemic contact center for enterprises. COVID-19 has dramatically shifted the landscape of how contact centers are operating, requiring a shift in how contact center providers offer services that create and maintain positive customer experiences.

Since March 2020, Talkdesk reports that 86% of the agents they surveyed are now working remotely, with the other 14% practicing a combination of working remotely and working in the office. This reality has increased the need for data analytics and reporting software, since supervisors are not always able to immediately communicate with their agents.

Customers have also significantly altered their attitudes since March 2020. According to Talkdesk, 58% more customers since March 2020 have preferred to talk directly to a person instead of using other contact center channels (such as interactive voice response, IVR).

To respond to this changing landscape, Talkdesk offers a five-step action plan for reframing what positive customer experiences look like in this new normal.

1. Resolve: The primary focus is on the health and safety of agents and customers. The structures that are put in place to enable this frame how everything else should be carried out.
2. Resilience: Ensure flexible and sustainable responses, including leveraging data analytics and reporting to enable a more responsive agent workforce. Processes gleaned from this implementation will bolster the contact center in the post-pandemic world.
3. Return: The above processes will create agile, durable ways of working. When agents return to the office (or continue with a hybrid work-from-home model), they will have the resources they need to meet customer demand.
4. Reimagine: The post-pandemic world will push for new frontiers of innovation, providing technology that ensures contact centers are resilient, flexible, and responsive. Rapid growth in contact center capabilities will continue to reinforce business continuity, from virtual assistants to speech analytics.
5. Reform: Enterprises must thus have serious discussions about how to reform their contact centers for the next generation of customer service. Indeed, this discussion should never stop. The five-step action plan should be a continuous process of improvement.

For more information, watch Talkdesk’s session The CX Reframe: Planning for the New Normal of the Contact Center (available online until December 31, 2020 at Enterprise Connect 2020).

Source: SoftwareReviews Talkdesk Contact Center Software Scorecard. Accessed September 1, 2020.

Our Take

Talkdesk’s statistics demonstrate the reality of the shifting contact center structure. With more agents working from home, organizations need to accommodate this change to ensure excellent customer experiences.

Though Talkdesk’s five-step action plan is vague, here are some concrete Info-Tech resources to map on to it:

1. Resolve: For immediate and emergency remote work situations, refer to Execute an Emergency Remote Work Plan. This blueprint contains important tools for establishing the safety of your workers, including a home office survey. But don’t stop there – consider other important aspects of your workers’ life that will impact their work, including child care. Optimize your response with The Essential COVID-19 Child Care Policy for Every Organization, Yesterday.
2. Resilience: For data gathering, analytics, and reporting, check out Beyond Survival. This research helps organizations identify use cases where data, analytics, and AI deliver tangible business and human value now and in the future. For a longer-term approach, Build a Reporting and Analytics Strategy provides a detailed roadmap for the iterative development of a business intelligence program.
3. Return: For guidance on the safe repatriation of people, assets, and workloads to the office in the post-pandemic world, refer to Responsibly Resume IT Operations in the Office. If you need an HR-centered approach, then Bring Employees Back to the Workplace Amid the COVID-19 Pandemic will ensure a process for maintaining awareness of public health requirements and return-to-work protocols.
4. Reimagine: To protect your revenue while maintaining strong customer relationships during the pandemic, see Adapt Your Customer Experience Strategy to Successfully Weather COVID-19. This research gives you the tools and methods necessary for shaping and preparing your organization for the future.
5. Reform: Rinse and repeat – with ongoing discussions and planning with Info-Tech’s analysts.

Want to Know More?

• Responsibly Resume IT Operations in the Office
• Adapt Your Customer Experience Strategy to Successfully Weather COVID-19
• Beyond Survival