Effective Leadership: Coach to behaviors not metrics

The call center business is very metrics driven. We operate in an environment where everything is measured - hold time, handle time, conversion rates, dropped calls - you name it, we measure it. In fact, I'm pretty sure there's even an Avaya report that will show you the number of times the toilets flush in the employee restrooms. Well maybe I'm exaggerating just a bit but it's not hard to understand how we can sometimes fall in to the trap of managing to metrics instead managing to behaviors.

It is not uncommon at all to walk past a coaching discussion and hear something like this: " Well, your AHT (average handle time) is 540 seconds. Get that down to 480 by next week." Unfortunately, this supervisor thinks he's "helping" his agent be saying this. The reality is this is not helpful at all. If the agent knew how to reduce their AHT to 480 seconds don't you think they'd already be doing that?

A much better approach is to arm the agent with the specific BEHAVIORS that will help them accomplish the goal. Instead of saying "get your handle time down", the effective coach would give the agent specific action items that will result in a lower handle time, for example: follow the required call flow or ask this specific question at a specific time, etc. And this doesn't apply to only AHT discussions. This applies to any aspect of managing performance.

I am not saying that metrics or numbers are not important. On the contrary, in the call center industry, particularly in the call center outsourcing industry, meeting metrics is how we make our money. But their is a huge danger in holding agents accountable to metrics instead of behaviors and here's why: Agents do not control metrics. BUT agents do have complete control over their behaviors. If the right behaviors are happening the metrics will take care of themselves.

An agent feels empowered when he or she leaves the coaching discussion with specific, observable and measurable behaviors to put in to practice vs. feeling demoralized after getting beat up over their "numbers". And here's something to keep in mind: If agents are doing all the "right things" and still not hitting the metrics than we have probably showed them the wrong "right things". Make sure you focus on the "critical few" behaviors that will have the biggest impact on performance.

Remember, managing performance is about changing behavior. It's as simple as that. And you will never change behavior by focusing on a number. You have to focus on the right behaviors and hold your team members accountable to those behaviors.