The Search For Call Centre Talent Hots Up

As we hear more about the 'green shoots' of recovery, the competition for finding call centre talent hots up. Some sectors have suffered and others have prospered but despite the traditionally high attrition rates associated with call centres, good talent is still hard to come by.

Although call centre recruitment has not been as badly hit as other sectors, more specialised roles are developing as a result. There appears to be a shift towards roles like debt recovery with decreasing reliance on outbound sales. But even then finding outbound team managers to fill these positions is not an easy task if you consider the types of skills required - credit worthiness and financial services experience do not necessarily go hand in hand. At the same time these roles also become very location specific making them even more difficult to fill. Unfortunately this situation is made all the more difficult with a lack of professional qualifications. Unlike other professions where official qualifications are applied to applicant criteria, it's not possible to do the same for contact centres where there are no recognised qualifications.

But while demand is high for outbound managers, the situation is reversed for inbound managers. Again this area has traditionally suffered from over capacity and high attrition rates which in the current climate are just not sustainable. As positions have become vacant, companies have opted not to fill them reducing redundancy levels but at the same time leaving companies more exposed to reduced levels of customer service. Whereas traditionally outsourcing to places like Bangalore may have been used to maintain levels of customer service, the public has become increasingly disillusioned by what levels of service are actually achieved by this route.

Since the second quarter of this year there does appear to have been an increase in companies recruiting for these types of roles and in order to maintain cost cutting initiatives, more often than not, they are adopting a direct approach through job boards like JobsInCustomerService.co.uk rather than using agencies. Applicant levels are also up so as the ‘green shoots' start to appear it looks like we're heading towards a more streamlined and higher quality customer service industry for the UK

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