Two things drive me to a posting on Average Handle Time (AHT).

1. A previous posting on Average Speed of Answer (ASA) remains the most popular posting on the blog, so I thought another Contact Center metric may be welcomed by our visitors.
2. A recent discussion with a group of the Contact Center managers clearly showed AHT to be a point of interest.

Metrics can be a subjective bunch, and as such, definitive answers about their use may be ilusive, so please be ready for some generalizations based mostly on my personal experience – which by no means is definitive.

AHT is an often misunderstood metric because on the surface it looks like a problem to be managed, while if we look deeper, it tends to act more like a symptom.

AHT Definition: The average length of time it take agents to handle a customer, wrap-up and become available for the next customers? (This differs from Average Talk Time (ATT), which excludes wrap-up and other ancillary activities such as research).

The obvious benefit of a short AHT is that agents can take care of more customers in a set time and therefore, less agens are required to handle the incoming load. Expectedly, management, usually upper management, feels very comfortable placing attention on AHT as a way to control the largest cost of a contact center, people. Likewise, many Contact Center managers concentrate on AHT ensuring agent efficiency, at times incenting agents to achieve lower an lower AHT levels.

In my experience, the control-point for AHT is not the agent. In stead, AHT is more directly affected by our ability to provide the appropriate environment, knowledge, tools and expectations.

Here are the areas I believe contribute most to AHT.

Appropriate Staffing Levels
Staffing can become a vicious cycle. “If we had more staff we would not have this problem, but, if we were more efficient we would not need so much staff”. Although this posting is too general to address this important balance, we do know that bad Average Speed of Answer, Service Levels and excessive hold times which are greatly affected by staffing levels, can add 30 to 60 seconds to your AHT. Primarily, in the time it takes to calm down irate customers and the composure time for agent stress. Irate customers have a great effect on agent morale and the efficient flow of the call. It’s amazing how much more efficient we can be when our customers are cooperative and our agents are not stressed out.

Training
It goes without saying that knowledgeable agents have lower AHT than new agents. But technical and product training only take us so far. Our agents must also know how to quickly assess a customer’s needs, troubleshoot and create an interactive flow that is conducive to quick resolution. They must also know when to escalate. An simple analysis of call length within a queue can show us the tipping point of AHT. Passed a certain call length, we can see calls have a higher likelihood of reaching astronomical AHTs. That is the point at which to intervene and ask your agents if they need help. I know of a team that calls this the 12 minute rule – at 12 minutes a lead agent or supervisor would simply ask “need help?”. Less stress for the agent, lower AHT.

Processes
How many screens do your agents need to manage in order to manage an interaction? Do they need to get up from their station and send faxes, pull manuals, etc? Inefficient processes can add considerably to handle time.

Empowerment
An empowered agent is a less stressed agent who knows he/she has some decision-making power to do the right thing for the customer. Less time is spent working towards an unlikely solution while giving the agent more ownership of the outcome and more perceived value as an employee.
Of course, empowerment is not for every agent and requires proper training and clear guidelines, but we would do well to push as much empowerment as possible to the front lines of our customer touch-points. Surprisingly, empowerment can be easier to manage than the policies and processed designed to ensure customer satisfaction through escalations.

Attrition
Attrition is an indicator to most, if not all agent inefficiencies. It is the single most costly event in a contact center, mostly occurring within 90 days of hire and costing up to $8,000 per agent.
When we have high attrition, our average newbie rate on the floor is high, which means knowledge and efficiency is low (just think what happens to your stats -including AHT – when you have a new team nesting? uhgg!).

Also, high attrition floors have more challenges in agent dynamics which make empowerment, quality, and employee participation less likely and more difficult.
Average Handle Time is therefore, greatly affected by our ability to hire and keep the right employees. If you have an attrition rate of more than 50%, don’t worry about AHT. You’ve got bigger problems.

Perhaps most controversial, is the topic of agent relations.
At times, we can enter into contentious cycles with our agent community. Usually driven by frustration in our inability to improve operations, we’ll begin to feel a disconnect and a difficulty sharing the same side of the fence with those who directly manage the customer.

As long as it’s acceptable for us not to share the same side of the fence with our agents, AHT will remain difficult to manage and, unfortunately, we will continue to press the wrong button, expecting different results. AHT is not a measure of agents approach or willingness to follow direction, but a measure of management’s ability to Train, Hire and Empower.

I believe AHT is not the best indicator of agent efficiency but a greater indicator of management effectiveness.

Rudy Vidal
Committed to XCS!

Today I was brushing up on Mahatma Gandhi, his philosophy and methods. If you are not familiar with his works and philosophy beyond what media or folklore provide, I highly recommend a closer look.

While reading, it occurred to me that part of the reason customer service has a large impact on our lives is not because it is special in and of itself, but because it is an extension of the golden rule and therefore, of good social order -

“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”.

The curious thing is that in order to follow the golden rule, we must be willing to temporarily disengage from our own condition. That is to say, we must focus on the customer’s point of view, putting ourselves in their position.

We cannot offer good service only when we feel the world has been fair to us, when things are going well, when all is just as we want it. Good customer service requires that we consider the needs of another, even as we struggle with our own. OK, this is sounding a little dogmatic, but isn’t it the essence of good customer service.

I often notice three types of customer service people.

1. Those of us whose willingness to provide XCS is dependent on whether or not we are receiving it.
2. Those of us who are simply trying our best to do a difficult job
   and
3. Those of us who have realized, strangely enough, that our own quality of life is usually positively affected by our honest effort to consider the needs of others.

Those of us in the first group, need to move to either of the others, or should consider a diferent line of work. Most of us, however, find ourselves in the second group as we move forward day to day to do our best at a job that is, at times, difficult. This is not a bad place to be.

But, the blessing of customer service work can more readily be felt in the third group, where our lives tend to improve because of our work. Where we become more tolerant and our problems seem to become less debilitating as we disengage from the idea that we are the center of the universe, while we concentrate on helping someone else.

Service does not need to be monumental or earth shattering. It just needs to consider the customer’s point of view separately from our own.

“An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind” – Mahatma Gandhi

Rudy Vidal
Committed to XCS !

Different types of customers have different needs and thereby, benefit from different customer satisfaction strategies. One type of customer is the Business to Business (B2B) customer.

Due to the symbiotic relationship between supplier and customer, the B2B customer can have a heavy and seemingly uncontrolled reliance on the supplier’s ability to meet their operational expectations. Whenever there is potential lack of control, we see a need to manage trust.

Customer relationship management is more of an art than a science. But it’s one of those art-forms more easily managed when the basic principles of the craft are known and followed. In my view, one of the most important of these CRM principles is response velocity.

The Inherently weakness in the armor of a CRM relationship is the customer’s fear in not being able to control a supplier’s personnel or business processes and thus not being able to control their own fate. “Will they deliver as promised? Am I one of many customers and will they give me the attention I need to be successful? Will they add value to my business?

This fear is tested every time a customer reaches out and makes a request. The manner in which the request is acknowledged and followed is used as a measure of a suppliers intention to serve. A high perceived intention to serve will translate to trust.

So, few things strengthen a CRM relationship more than high response velocity. Even when we solve a customer issue within the expected time frame, if the response velocity is slow, trust will be diminished.

Bottom line – When our B2B customers calls, answer right away. When we get an email, answer it immediately-not one hour later, even if just to say, “I got your email, I’m on it”.

Build internal expectations and standards for response velocity.

Delays in getting back to our customer or in reaching out when we should, creates lack of trust and weakens the relationship.

Giving them more than they expect, feels better on both sides of the relationship.

Committed to XCS !

Rudy Vidal