2010 Call Center Benchmark Study

The Post-Recession Call Center – The Focus, the Spend and the Case for Talent Management After 18 months of a grim economy, companies are emerging from one of the most volatile business environments in recent history. Some are still feeling the pinch, while others are optimistic about what 2010 will bring. Regardless, companies are – for the first time in a long while – looking ahead, exiting survival mode and focusing on how they are going to gain a competitive advantage in a post-recession environment. This is especially true in the call center. In December 2009, Knowlagent conducted a survey to determine the impact of the last 18 months on call center performance and budgets. The survey was also intended to determine the areas where call centers will be focusing their improvements and investments in the coming year. The survey was conducted through an email questionnaire and yielded 121 respondents. Of these, more than 50 percent represented contact center managers and approximately 18 percent represented contact center operations titles. The sizes of call centers represented in the survey is diverse; approximately 50 percent small (1-100 agents), 22 percent medium (101-500 agents) and 28 percent large (501+ agents). At a high level, the survey yielded two key observations. Firstly, the call center is more important than ever to today’s enterprises. Roughly 72 percent of respondents said that the call center’s perceived value to the ...