London, Ontario - When faced with an
intrusive telemarketing call over the
dinner hour, we rarely empathize with
the person on the other end of the line.
But with the enormous growth that has
occurred in the contact centre segment
of the Canadian economy over the past
decade that may change as an increasing
number of Canadians are making a living
working the phone.
A new
study by Associate Professor
Ann Frost at the Richard Ivey School
of Business, Danielle van Jaarsveld at
Sauder School of Business, along with 40
scholars around the world, examines
nearly 2,500 call centres in 17
countries around the world –
encompassing more than 475,000 call
centre employees.
It’s no surprise that call centre
employees face monotonous tasks, low
pay, low job discretion, high
performance monitoring, and that they
experience high stress from the call
centre environment. This leads to high
turnover rates – as much as 31% of the
workforce in Canadian call centres turns
over each year – as employees quit,
retire, are promoted or fired.
The
costs of turnover are high. On a global
basis, replacing one agent equals on
average 16% of the gross annual earnings
of a call centre worker.
But
there are specific steps that employers
can take to stem the turnover, including
forming problem-solving groups and
organizing workers into teams.
The study found that contact centres in
Canada with at least 30% of the
workforce in problem-solving groups had
quit rates of almost a half compared to
centres with less than 30% of workers in
these teams. And centres with at least
30% of employees in self-directed work
groups have considerably lower quit
rates.
“Adopting strategies that contribute to
lower turnover, absenteeism, and better
job quality is in the interest of
managers and companies. Contact centres
make an important contribution to the
economies of the cities and towns where
they are located. They are an important
source of employment and new job
creation,” said study co-author Ann
Frost.
The
Canadian Call Centre Report – a
subsection of the Global Report – is a
first step in creating a deeper
understanding about employment practices
in contact centres in Canada, and about
outcomes of interest to both firms and
the workforce. The results of the
Canadian study are based on responses
from over 400 centres from a broad range
of industries and site visits to centres
located in all ten provinces across
Canada.
There
are many similarities between Canadian
and global contact centres, namely that
the majority of centres are in-house;
non-unionized; handle inbound calls; and
the frontline service workforce employed
in these centres is predominantly
female.
The Global Call Center Report is the
first report to provide a detailed
comparison of management and employment
practices in centres within and across
national boundaries. The results of the
study suggest that institutional
factors, business strategies, and
operational choices all play important
roles in the call centre’s management
and employee satisfaction.
One of
the largest differences to emerge
between Canadian and global contact
centres is the lower portion of centres
with union representation in Canada – at
19.9%, it’s about half the 40% of
contact centres that are unionized
globally. The study finds that union
presence in Canadian centres is
associated with significantly higher
salary levels for both customer service
representatives as well as managers, and
lower turnover compared with non-union
centres.
Call
centres look quite similar across
countries in terms of their markets,
service offerings, and organizational
features. But beyond these similarities,
call centres take on the character of
their own countries and regions, based
on distinct laws, customs, institutions,
and norms. The ‘globalization’ of call
centre activities has a remarkably
national face.
The
global study is the first large scale
international study of call centre
management and employment practices
across all regions of the globe.
Participating countries include:
Austria, Brazil, Canada, Denmark,
France, Germany, India, Ireland, Israel,
Netherlands, Poland, South Africa, South
Korea, Spain, Sweden, UK, and the U.S.
For more
information, please contact:
Prof. Ann Frost at
afrost@ivey.ca or 519-661-3262 or
Marisa Kanas at 519-850-2536 or
mkanas@ivey.ca
For a
multimedia Q&A with Ann Frost, please
visit our
Impact Summer Supplement
Previous issues of
Impact and Impact Summer Supplement
Breaking down preconceptions: Canadian
Facts & Figures
Workforce Characteristics, Skills and
Training:
-
Newly hired agents receive an
average of 26.2 days of initial
training, and 8.7 days of ongoing
training.
-
Upon hiring, it takes an average of
21.5 weeks for an agent to perform
competently.
- The
average tenure is 5.7 years.
-
Although contact centre jobs are
portrayed as low-skilled or clerical
in nature, in many cases they
actually require considerable
knowledge and skill.
Geographic Distribution:
- The
largest centres are concentrated in
the Maritime
- The
majority of centres are located in
Ontario
Organizational and Market
Characteristics:
-
In-house centres represent 62.3% of
the centres in this study.
-
Outsourced contact centres represent
37.7%.
-
19.9% of centres are unionized, and
union representation is less common
in outsourced centres relative to
in-house centres.
- The
centres in this sample serve a
largely national and international
market with one-third of centres
handling calls from an international
market, and a subset of those solely
handling calls destined for and
originating from U.S. customers.
Operational Characteristics:
- The
workforce handles, on average, 99.5
customers per day, with an average
call handling time of 5.5 minutes.
Turnover and Absenteeism:
-
Total turnover including quits,
dismissals, promotions within the
business, and retirements averaged
30.9%.
-
Outsourced centres experience quit
rates that are twice that of their
in-house counterparts – 20.9%
compared to 10.3%.
-
Non-union centres report the highest
dismissal rates (7.1%) whereas
unionized centres report the lowest
(2.4%).
-
Agents employed in centres that
operate twenty-four hours per day,
seven days a week have an
absenteeism rate (6.5%) that is
almost twice that of centres
operating within business hours
(3.8%).
Strategies Associated with Lower
Turnover:
-
Contact centres with at least 30% of
the workforce in problem-solving
groups had about 43% lower quit
rates than those with less than 30%
of workers in these teams (quit
rates of 16.9% v. 11.5%).
-
Centres with at least 30% of
employees in self-directed work
groups have 70 percent lower average
quit rates than those with less than
30% of workers in these teams (quit
rates of 16.5% v. 9.2%).
Unions, Turnover and Absenteeism:
-
Non-union centres have twice the
average turnover rates (including
quits, dismissals, promotions within
the business, and retirements) of
union centres in comparable markets:
34.6% compared to 16.9%.
-
Non-union centres have over three
times (16.6%) the average quit rates
of unionized centres (5.0%).
Customer Service Representative and
Managerial Compensation:
-
Agents receive $31,468 (CDN) on
average in annual pay, with agents
working in unionized centres being
paid 36% more than their non-union
counterparts.
-
Full-time agents receive a
comprehensive set of benefits
although despite an overwhelmingly
female workforce, only 5.9% of
centres offer daycare as a benefit.
- The
typical manager receives an average
salary of $59,017 (CDN).
Economic Development and Employer
Networks:
-
Local and provincial governments
often offer incentives to firms
seeking to relocate contact centre
operations. These incentives include
site location assistance, tax
incentives, loans, and other
incentives for locating in specific
geographic regions.
-
60%
of the centres in the study
received at least one type of
incentive,
-
25.5% have received two or more.
-
Despite these efforts, 45.7% of
contact centre managers reported
that the presence of a skilled
workforce was the primary reason for
the location of their contact centre
Breaking down preconceptions: Global
Facts & Figures
Markets:
Call
centres typically serve national rather
than international markets. 86% serve
their local, regional or national
market.
Service versus sales:
The
largest proportion of call centres
provide customer service only (49%),
while 21% provide sales only, and 30%
provide sales and service.
Inbound versus outbound calls:
Most
centres primarily handle inbound calls
(78%), rather than outbound calls.
Job
quality and turnover:
The
typical level of turnover in call
centres with very high quality jobs
(high discretion/low monitoring) is 9%,
whereas it is 36% for low quality jobs
(low discretion/high monitoring). |
