From Call Center Blues to Call Center Green

Like many old-school call centers, telecommuters must sit in physical facilities, in cubicles, with neon lights, and perhaps a dozen hours at a time. The Wall Street Journal reported a few months ago that the average length of call center employees is 90 days.

It's reportedly one of the most unsatisfying jobs, with a supervisor leaning over his shoulder and taking note of his bathroom breaks, performance pressure, and much of the same.

VOIP technology has enabled a tremendous change in bpo call center industry and consequently a tremendous change in the job of a call center employee. VOIP stands for Voice Over Internet Protocol, which means that instead of voice traveling over the phone line, it travels over IP, the Internet protocol. This means minimized long-distance fees and increased bandwidth. It also means local overseas phone numbers and the ability for remote long-distance workers to be, as if they were local. It is what we see happening with so many advanced technologies, as Matthew McLuhan once said, "The future of human development will result in the world becoming a global village." This is what VOIP has helped create for the world of telephone correspondence.

For the future of call center employees, this means a whole new way of handling customer service and sales, from home. Companies like JetBlue, Staples, Virgin, just to name a few of the big players, have embraced this methodology. They have sent their workers home. This will allow disabled employees, stay-at-home mothers, and ex-pats abroad to get jobs. The workers are delighted to work in their pajamas while doing laundry and avoiding commuting. Employers are happy to save overhead, insurance, and physical facilities, with flexibility for expansion.

But how are workers supervised?

This new technology comes with a new set of monitoring tool solutions: all phone calls can be archived in MP3, the duration and frequency of phone calls are recorded. Additionally, the whisper mode functionality gives a supervisor the ability to step in as a third party to simply listen, or speak so that only the telecommuter hears "tell them about the orange sweater two-for-one". In this way, all remote workers will essentially be watched more closely; Rather than monitoring your bathroom breaks, this allows the supervisor to actually interrupt the calls himself.

This VOIP revolution for call centers will bring the job to less likely candidates with even tighter oversight, while also providing reduced costs and risks, a higher return on investment, and the ability to keep green flowing.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Faisal Naveed works at All Star BPO, a company that offers hosted call center services and solutions such as inbound call center, progressive dialing, chat, CRM call center, predictive dialing, and many more.

Faisal Naveed works at All Star Bpo, a company that offers hosted call center services and solutions more.