There is a famous saying that 80 percent of success is just by showing up. However, when employees fail to make an appearance at work, it can put a crimp in business operations. Moreover, absenteeism is a particularly acute problem in the contact center.
Studies suggest that the average contact center employee takes 7.4 sick days a year, and is absent 8.2 days per year. These unplanned absences add to business costs, may create new stresses for those who do show up for their shifts, may adversely impact a call center’s ability to meet its key performance indicator goals, and can lead to less than desirable customer experiences.
Here are some best practices to maintain and encourage attendance. Use these five steps to promote employee attendance at work:
- Have a clear attendance policy
Clarity is critical when you create an attendance policy. It should seem straightforward, right? We usually think it is to show up at work on time. But the fact of tracking and fixing absenteeism can be confused. With your wide variety of responsibilities, it’s tough also to make sure that every agent walks in the door and goes to their desk at the start of their shift. When you set clear policies and have a standard, there aren’t any gray areas for your expectations on agents, and in fact, it can be better accountability for your entire team.
Consider monotony when setting your standards. Let your team understand what absences are excused and what is not. This way, it forms a guide for short-term and long term illness leave, or maternity, paternity, or unpaid leave? Further, you might want to think outside-of-the-box of the box situations. You might have employees who need to leave to pick up a sick child at school. Or, they show up to work late because they had car issues on their way to work. Draw the lines where it makes sense for your team, and be open with your representatives right when you hire them about how your company deals with absence or tardiness. Then, hold your agents accountable. It’s up to you to implement your policy and make sure it’s adhered to. Establishing clear standards shows your agents that you are serious about attendance and that their time is valuable to the rest of the team and the company at large.
- Offer incentives tied to attendance
You can help your employees care more about their attendance by binding incentives to attendance. This might be perceived as a surface-level solution, but incentivizing your employees to come to work on time is one of the first steps to decreasing absenteeism. Employees who are consistently late or don’t come to work as scheduled, shouldn’t get the same benefits as those who do, even if their performance is high. (Short and long-term incentives tailored with good attendance could help in this regard) If you have short-term, smaller bonuses for agents who have a particular issue with attendance, you encourage change incrementally. Don’t forget that they are other creative ways to do incentives. Some of these ways are movie tickets or a gift card. You can use typical prizes like movie tickets or a gift card. Rewarding consistent attendance is one of the simplest ways to decrease absenteeism and encourage your agents to respect your policies.
- Combat stress. (Build a Healthy Environment)
Contact centers can be a stressful work environment at times. There are high standards for performance and constant positivity, the work can feel monotonous, and customers are often hard on your agents. If your contact center’s environment is stressful and intense, it should not be a surprise that attendance is an issue. Empower your agents to deliver quality service. Your employees want to come to work when work is a comfortable place to be. It’s crucial to build time into the workday for your agents to combat the stress of the job. They may need to take a deep breath or a walk around the office to get back on the grind. Or, they might need an extra 15 minutes on a break to vent frustrations. That would be okay as it would help your workplace to be happier one, and your agents would be more likely to be on time and ready to work and serve your customer.
At Qualishore, we can testify to the fact that making our workplace comfortable has shown that our agents are readily available to provide 100 percent excellent customer service and be on time.
- Create employee schedules in advance
Part of keeping your agents engaged and attending work comes with how you communicate expectations. It is your responsibility to create schedules ahead of time, so your employees have sufficient time to make accommodations for the week. Acknowledge that your employees have lives outside of work that requires much planning, and respect their time off the clock. Whether your agents are on or off the clock, they are valuable to your company’s growth. Show them their time matters to the business by planning ahead.
Your agents need to know far in advance how to manage their time to have a sufficient work-life balance. Workplace engagement strengthens if you can think three steps ahead of the present. Stay organized, so you can plan schedules that are convenient for your individual agents’ lifestyles.
- Allow for flexible schedules
Reduce agent absenteeism by implementing flexible schedules for your team members. You can let your agents create an ideal work schedule. This is something we do here at Qualishore, and it has shown to be effective. For example, if you put an agent who loves night shift on an early morning shift, it is most likely they will have a hard time getting to work on time or might not be ready to work effectively even if they are on time. You can allow for shift swapping. Have grace on your agents who need a bit more flexibility in their life outside of work. While adhering to your attendance policy is essential, remember that your agents are people, not machines.
It is essential to know your team when it comes to attendance and absenteeism. Build a schedule that plays to their strengths and conveniences their time. If employees see that you’re considering them and they have a voice in the process, they come to work ready to give their time and energy.
The above image is a screenshot of our proprietary software used to help us manage attendance at Qualishore. This tool allows each employee to self log their time, track their production hours, breaks/lunches, etc. In addition, it allows the supervisors and floor managers to monitor activities in realtime and even extract the data they need to process payroll and billing. To learn more about our software and how we can help implement the same systems in your business, please feel free to contact us via email – info@qualishore.com