The Service Leader's Guide to Resiliency
SVP, Product Marketing, Service Cloud
When the COVID-19 health crisis upended business as usual, it was amazing to see service teams step into important new responsibilities. Agents doubled as a shoulder to lean on. Messaging channels became a place to build a trusted relationship. Field service teams reinvented processes and repurposed trucks to deliver groceries to high-risk populations.
At Salesforce, we are committed to helping our customers lead through change. We created industry-specific solutions like Salesforce Care, with an integrated customer service component, as a rapid response for healthcare organisations. We launched Work.com with tools and assessments to help businesses reopen safely.
Now, we are helping service leaders navigate their next journey. Through regular conversations with our customers and our partners, we’ve compiled the best practices to help your service organisation find resilience in the new normal. I look forward to seeing what you and your team accomplish.
Almost overnight, service organisations made the unprecedented shift to virtual contact centers, with every agent working remotely. Service leaders were faced with new challenges as they prioritised employee safety and wellbeing while supporting customers like never before.
EVP, Customer Support, Salesforce
As a service leader navigating change due to the health crisis, you have a lot going on. You’re trying to keep business afloat, work with service teams virtually, and handle fluctuating contact volumes across channels.
To help manage it all, you need a structured approach to planning, gathering information , and making decisions . Uncover the key considerations to set up your service team for success with a long-term plan for working in the new normal.
Assemble your go-to team
Plan for a new kind of working environment
As businesses reopen, we’re likely to see service organisations keep most service teams at home while only some return to the office. This is largely dependent on having a solid set-up and secure internet connection.
Another consideration is distance to the office. We may see a “hub approach” in which service teams work within a certain distance to the office and only go in for specific activities, such as in-person training, new hire onboarding, and conversations that are difficult to have virtually.
As you develop your plan, continue to rely on business continuity with respect to regional guidelines. When it’s time to reopen, survey employees to prioritise who is open to returning to the office. Some may have caregiving responsibilities or pre-existing conditions that will prohibit them from returning.
For employees who do return to your physical location, such as contractors or mobile workers, create clear guidelines with local governmental guidance and medical expertise in mind. Reconfigure your floor plan to allow for social distancing (this may mean staggering schedules or adding partitions). Communicate details to your teams early and often to ensure everybody feels safe.
Create a contingency plan in the event that employees and operations in your physical location are disrupted again. Run drills. Spread teams out to work from home to test connectivity and identify any potential problems.
Make data-driven decisions
As a starting point, survey employees to understand how they are doing during this time. Use these insights to gauge employee satisfaction and wellness.
Then, visualise data to make smarter business decisions. Break down silos and connect your teams, technology, and data for a 360-degree view from a single platform to manage your response now and prepare for future challenges. For example, you can analyse reporting dashboards with artificial intelligence (AI) to accurately staff resources, view trends across agent performance, track metrics, and jump in to help your teams.
Senior Business Systems Solution Architect, VIZIO
Senior Manager, Contact Center at George P. Johnson
In field service, a connected field service solution helps dispatchers visualise data so they can determine if jobs require in-person visits or can be done virtually. From your workplace command center, you can also manage shifts by modeling site capacity, optimising schedules, and staggering arrival times for employees.
Lastly, use a single dashboard for contact tracing. If an employee in your physical location tests positive for COVID-19, you can see who was potentially exposed and reach out with information and guidance to minimise the spread.
Chapters
SVP, Product Marketing, Service Cloud
He’s an experienced Vice President of Product Marketing with a successful history of working in the internet industry.
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