Positioning the Contact Center: What’s your strategy? (Part 1 of 5)
By Jeremy Lee

“The Contact Center, what’s that?”… “Oh you mean customer service; of course I have that in my organization. Customer Service is very important….”- The CEO

“The Contact Center. That place alone is giving me sleepless nights. They have all those… eh… customer service agents, highly expensive equipment and well, to keep it short it is one whole huge cost. A cost center that’s what I call them. What’s more they are always asking for more money for expansion”- Mrs. Accountant

“They are always for the customer. All they do is report customer complaints on our defects. Whose side are they on anyway? The customer or US. Furthermore they want to discuss with us on product improvement, what do they know about these technical things anyway.” - The Engineer

“Everything we do is wrong according to them, we launch a product and they tell us they were not sufficiently informed to prepare. What do they need to prepare anyway. We did all the work and launched the product in time and they say were not informed. They are doing customer service, so service the customer lah.” – Mr. Sales person

“That division is draining my budget; ever since they started I have had to increase my staff. Their turnover rate is unbelievable. And let’s not even start on their training needs.” – Human Resource Director

“Do you know that because of them, I need a group of IT personnel just to serve their needs? One moment they want this and the next that. Do they need all those reports?” –Mr. IT Manager

Does the above sound familiar?

The contact center unlike many of the other departments such as Sales, Marketing, Accounting, Human Resource, Research and Development, Logistics, Engineering, is comparatively new. This is justifiable by the fact that the study of customer service is itself a new field compared to other areas of studies. Until recently Quality was the key to success; Customer Service was not critical. However in today’s Service Economy where quality is assumed, customer service is reigned supreme.

Being “new”, the relationship of the contact center with the rest of the organization proves to be a dilemma for many organizations. Organizations are uncertain of the functions of the contact center and how the proper positioning of this division can bring tremendous benefits to their business and the rest of the organization.

In this series of articles, we will be exploring the above questions and much more.

Last updated - 30 September 2004