Promotion and Protection of Childhood and Adolescence - The “Child Contact Centre”

This paper wants to study in deep one of the existing services to help and to improve the parent-son’s relation: the “child contact centre”. This centre is a place where children can meet their parents after different family problems, from parental conflicts until violence and abuses. It’s very important that each child could have the possibility to continue to live with his family as reported by the “UN Convention of childhood and adolescence’s rights” (1989). The history of these meeting centres is very recent and, in the same way, also the role of the social workers. For this reason, research of peculiarities of this place and the rules of the operators involved is very important. In particular, the history moment where we are living today with the “Covid-19” spread all over the world, has caused many problems in the families and it has compounded family situations already compromised. The choose of this theme is also born from the need of study in deep the organization and the functioning of a child contact centre. This is one of the services most complex and heterogeneous and that’s why even today again it doesn’t exist one guideline that is the same in each contest. Finally, the paper wants to describe this service and, mostly, it wants make some proposals about the best practises or operations that could improve it.

‘The petri dish and Russian roulette’: working in UK contact centres during the COVID-19 pandemic

This article analyses the dynamic interaction of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes the disease COVID-19, and its epidemiological characteristics, with an expansive conception of the contact centre labour process, integrating the contact centres’ socially-constructed built environment with distinctive qualities of the social organisation of work. Based on an online survey conducted in April–May 2020 of 2,226 call handlers in, largely, the telecoms and financial services sectors, it provides compelling evidence of the risks facing workers from inter alia dense building occupancy, compromised social distancing, inadequate cleansing and sanitisation, heating ventilation and air conditioning systems and from the outcomes of management control systems. A crucial element in explaining widespread virus transmissibility lies in understanding how the broader political economy that produced the dominant mass production contact centre paradigm is intertwined with its ‘inner workings’, leading to a ‘business-as-usual’ default that prioritised value-generating service continuity at the expense of any precautionary principle. The article contributes additionally by re-affirming the utility of labour process theory.

RFID: A Fuzzy Linguistic Model to Manage Customers from the Perspective of Their Interactions with the Contact Center

In an increasingly globalized market, the relationship between the customer and the brand goes beyond the purchasing process. It is very important to understand the customer, to know their needs and to propose actions to increase the value of the brand for them. In the literature, there are several models capable of determining and segmenting customers according to variables dependent on the purchasing process. However, we have not found any study that applies to the business case of classifying customers according to their relationship with the contact centre. In this paper, we establish a working model that allows us to define the value of the customer in the process of interaction with the contact centre, so that we can propose actions both in the sales phase and during the post-sales service, so that the value and perception of the brand is increased. In this model, we propose using the value of recency, frequency, importance and duration of customer interactions with the post-sales service, thus obtaining a ranking, and grouping of customers to help establish personalized communication strategies. We have verified this model by presenting a business case applied to the telecom sector.

Propensity to Selling Scale

Sales occupation is one of the most frequent in the job market, and selection of successful sales people is typically among the highest priorities of their companies. Research aimed at explaining sales performance shows that traditional psychometric predictors are limited in achieving this goal. Common constructs that are typically related to work behaviour, such as abilities or personality traits, typically show non-significant or low relations with sales performance. Taking that into an account, we developed a new measure for assessing one’s propensity for selling, based on motivational constructs that underlie successful sales job. In the first study, we developed an initial set of items and assessed its content validity using a sample of sales professionals. In the second study, we assessed the scale’s dimensionality, divergent and predictive validity. A sample of 99 contact centre agents were asked to describe themselves using newly developed items and measures of personality and explicit motives. Besides psychometric measures, the data on agents’ objective sales performance was provided by their employer. First, a unidimensional, three-item solution was shown to be the most appropriate in the exploratory factor analysis of initially developed items. Second, an aggregated result of these three items, representing a total scale score, showed to be largely independent of personality and explicit motives measures. Third, propensity to selling, compared to personality and motives measures, showed to be the most important predictor in explaining the variance of objective sales performance. The scale was labelled Propensity to Selling Scale, and its theoretical and practical implications were further discussed.

Knowledge management as a strategic asset for customer service delivery at a contact centre in South Africa

Knowledge Management (KM) is often touted as a panacea for organisations aiming to be efficient and competitive. While the world today has undoubtedly entered an information era, how organisations convert information to usable knowledge has become of significant importance. Furthermore, the growing emphasis on managing and utilizing knowledge to improve organisational functioning, efficiency and competitiveness has reintroduced KM as a possible strategic asset for organisations. To explore this idea, empirical work was conducted on a contact centre making use of KM practices as a means to enhance the transmission of knowledge to their employees and in turn, to their clients. Further objectives of this research were to identify how KM was understood in this organisation, the benefits and challenges it presented, how it manifested in relation to the idea of leadership and ultimately, if it could be considered a strategic asset for organisations of this nature.

How customer service representatives lose control of the call

The contact centre industry has been growing rapidly in the Philippines over the last two decades and now boasts over one million customer service representatives (CSRs). Outsourcing work to this destination, where English may not be the first language, can lead to communication difficulties. Problems of locally recruited CSRs ‘losing control of the call’, leading to customer frustration and poor feedback, have previously been attributed to poor grammar and incomprehensible accents. However, more recent research has suggested that such communicative problems actually stem from a more general inability to build relationships and appropriately select, explain and describe information about the product or service and, if needed, instruct the client on what to do. This paper therefore examines ‘losing control of a call’ in terms of the overall exchange. Specifically, two calls were examined to analyse how information was organised, packaged and developed to the satisfaction (or not) of the client. We argue that discrete grammatical inaccuracies and regional accents do not result in losing control as much as the way overall meaning is managed by the CSR. The implications of these initial findings could be of importance to the recruitment, training, coaching and appraisal of CSRs in an industry where the nature of communication breakdown remains poorly understood.

Mental health assessment and triage in an ambulance clinical contact centre

Background: With increasing numbers of emergency calls to ambulance services, exploration of the triage and management of mental health calls is valuable, given their volume and duration. Studies have explored these calls from patient and practitioner perspectives, but few have considered the perspective of the practitioners assessing patients over the phone in terms of clinical capability. Aim: This study aimed to explore the thoughts, feelings and educational requirements of paramedics and nurses working on emergency medical services clinical desks, focusing on mental health-related calls and the triage tools used. Methods: A service evaluation was conducted. A questionnaire was developed and distributed to 41 staff on clinical desks at the Welsh Ambulance Service Trust's (WAST) clinical contact centres in June 2019. Quantitative data was analysed using descriptive statistics and qualitative data by thematic analysis. Findings: Out of the 41 employees, 26 (63%) responded. Low levels of confidence were reported in managing mental health calls, along with inadequate detail in the mental health elements of their triage algorithm and deficiencies in referral pathways. Conclusion: Given the volume and complexity of mental health calls to ambulance services, more attention should be paid to the education and training of clinical desk professionals and the decision support tools available in WAST and other ambulance services. Further research is required with a larger sample size over multiple ambulance services.

Design, rationale and analysis plan for the Stand Up for Health trial in contact centres: a stepped wedge feasibility study

Background Contact centres are one of the most sedentary workplaces, with employees spending a very high proportion of their working day sitting down. About a quarter of contact centre staff regularly experience musculoskeletal health problems due to high levels of sedentary behaviour, including lower back pain. There have been no previous randomised studies specifically aiming to reduce sedentary behaviour in contact centre staff. To address this gap, the Stand Up for Health (SUH) study aims to test the feasibility and acceptability of a complex theory-based intervention to reduce sedentary behaviour in contact centres. Methods The Stand Up for Health study has a stepped wedge cluster randomised trial design, which is a pragmatic design whereby clusters (contact centres) are randomised to time points at which they will begin to receive the intervention. All contact centre staff have the opportunity to experience the intervention. To minimise the resource burden in this feasibility study, data collection is not continuous, but undertaken on a selective number of occasions, so the stepped wedge design is “incomplete”. Eleven contact centres in England and Scotland have been recruited, and the sample size is approximately 27 per centre (270 in total). The statistical analysis will predominantly focus on assessing feasibility, including the calculation of recruitment rates and rates of attrition. Exploratory analysis will be performed to compare objectively measured sedentary time in the workplace (measured using an activPAL™ device) between intervention and control conditions using a linear mixed effects regression model. Discussion To our knowledge, this is the first stepped wedge feasibility study conducted in call centres. The rationale and justification of our novel staircase stepped wedge design has been presented, and we hope that by presenting our study design and statistical analysis plan, it will contribute to the literature on stepped wedge trials, and in particular feasibility stepped wedge trials. The findings of the study will also help inform whether this is a suitable design for other settings where data collection is challenging. Trial registration The trial has been registered on the ISRCTN database: http://www.isrctn.com/ISRCTN11580369

Engagement, Innovation, and Impact in a Dietitian Contact Centre: The EatRight Ontario Experience

Purpose: EatRight Ontario (ERO), a multi-modal dietitian service (phone, email, web), provided the public and health intermediaries with healthy eating advice, professional support, and health promotion tools from 2007 to 2018. An evaluation of ERO was conducted to assess the impact of the model on knowledge, attitudes, and behaviour for consumers, utilization, and support levels and satisfaction provided to health intermediaries. Methods: Consumer clients were sent a survey 1–4 weeks after using the ERO service to capture self-reported dietary changes, intentions, nutritional knowledge, and satisfaction. Health intermediaries were recruited through an electronic ERO newsletter and asked about how ERO supported their practice. Results: Of the 867 consumer respondents, 92% had either made a change or indicated that information from ERO confirmed their present behaviour, and 96% indicated they would recommend the services to others. Of the 337 health intermediaries who responded 71% indicated that ERO provided services they could not deliver. Conclusions: ERO’s multi-modal dietitian contact centre provides a model for implementing successful remote service access for consumers and professionals to support healthy eating across diverse demographics and geographies, including those in geographically underserved areas.

Resilience and green spaces: association with stress among contact centre agents in the Philippines

ABSTRACTThe work environment in Philippine contact centres had been shown to expose employees to factors that contribute to work-related stress; health promotion strategies that could mitigate the impacts are needed. With the framework that stress is experienced as a result of the interactions of an individual with the environment, this study examined the relationship of stress with individual resilience and the presence of urban green spaces (UGS) in the environment. The study involved employees (N = 186) from six contact centres in the capital region of the Philippines, where a large number of contact centre service providers are located. A two-stage survey was administered online using standardised instruments to measure stress (10-item Perceived Stress Scale) and resilience (Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale), customised questions to gather demographic information, and open-ended questions to probe on participants’ insights. Google Earth Pro was used to conduct satellite mapping of UGS, followed by on-site ocular inspection. This study revealed that participants’ average stress level was categorised as high. The percentages of UGS in the vicinity of the study sites were categorised as low. Linear regression revealed that amongst individual and environment factors, resilience, household income, and awareness of UGS in the vicinity were significant predictors of the participants’ stress levels. Health promotion in Philippine contact centres could consider strategies that include resilience building, enhancing income security, and promoting the awareness of UGS within the workplace vicinity.