Creating the right culture in your business - Staff retention, absence, performance are aspects of office life that can make, or break, end results.

Consider the workplace environment as an ecosystem that requires all components to work efficiently. We have already spoken about creating the right company ethos, making your customers feel like they are at the very heart of your business and building a supportive technological environment for your employees.
But what about absence and staff retention? They can cause huge swings in your daily outputs – for good and bad.

Absence
Employees may go on short, or long, term absence for all sorts of reasons but for business, and especially contact centres, it can prompt some critically big swings in results.
A positive example may involve an employee who’s ready to take maternity/paternity leave and the office atmosphere is one of excitement and suspense. Your ecosystem is bubbling and the mood is heightened; morale is high.
A negative example may involve an employee who has greeted the weekend a little too generously and has called in late to request a sick day or emergency holiday. Your ecosystem is partly aware of its missing component and the mood has changed. On average, absenteeism cost UK employers over £18 billion in 2017. (First Care’s ‘Change at work’ report)
A team set on either of these paths can grow depending upon how they are managed. A well-trained member of staff will identify these occurrences and seek assistance. They may even have the capacity to make the situation advantageous to your business and your employees. The median rates of short term absenteeism are between 3.3%-7.5%. (ContactBabel’s 2017-18 UK Contact Centre HR & Operational Benchmarking report)
Negative absence can affect your office but it can also have a knock-on effect for your customer’s experiences with your products. There are times when unauthorised absenteeism can be avoided altogether, and in some circumstances, it can be managed in such a way that it has little, or no, effect on other employees.

• Has the role changed or been viewed negatively by employees?
• Are there employees who vocally display displeasure?
• Are there dates when absenteeism may be high e.g. music festivals, sporting events, social events, holidays?

The final point is the employee themselves. For reasons known to them they may be unreliable and not be able to fulfil the role’s specification. A solid recruitment procedure can help identify potentially unreliable applicants and give you more of an understanding of the person being considered for the role.

Staff Retention
As we see with sickness, new members of staff can have both positive and negatives effects on your ecosystem’s culture.
New faces bring new energy, experiences and a reinvigoration to the team. However, continuous or large numbers of new staff can pose challenges.

• Borrowed or extra training time for new starters may affect existing staff ’s training.
• More commitment from trainers, supervisors and/or managers leaves gaps in the team.
• Short to long term decreases in the results as new staff learn their roles paired with recruitment and new staff training costs.

These changes can, and will, happen if careful consideration isn’t given to potential effects on the equilibrium of our ecosystem. On average, sales roles, especially outbound sales, tend to have a higher attrition rate. Recruiting new staff should be done with a view to complementing and strengthening your team.

The top two reasons for high contact centre attrition are:
1. Wrong type of person for the job
2. Lack of promotion or development opportunities
(ContactBabel’s 2017-18 UK Contact Centre HR & Operational Benchmarking report)

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