Talent Management - December 2008 - (Page 23)

West Corp.: Measurement Increases Customer and Employee Satisfaction Dr. Ken Lahti West Corp. (West) is a leading provider of outsourced communication solutions to many of the world’s largest companies, organizations and government agencies. Founded in 1986 and headquartered in Omaha, Neb., the organization has a team of 41,000 employees based in North America, Europe and Asia. The company helps its clients communicate effectively, maximize the value of their customer relationships and drive greater proﬁtability from every interaction. West has leveraged measurement capability to help build a global presence, lower attrition rates, increase customer satisfaction and put in place measurement tools to promote ongoing employee development. West Business Services, a subsidiary of West Corp., was experiencing issues impacting productivity and customer relations in two of its business-to-business sales centers. The human resources team wanted to gather more data to determine the root cause and begin to combat the problems. With most HR problems, there usually is more than one underlying cause for grumbling in the ranks. According to the book Best Practices in Organization Development and Change, the Big 6 employee grumbles include: • Infrequent, one-way communications. • Unchallenging work. • No opportunities to grow and learn. • No recognition for performance. • No control over the job situation. • Lack of feeling that work done makes a difference. The same issues that cause employees to leave a job also may contribute to overall employee dissatisfaction and lower productivity. It fell to a team led by Vanessa Carey, West Corp.’s director of corporate organizational development, to ﬁnd a solution. After careful review of the existing roadblocks and some mapping to the business’ desired future state, Carey’s team recommended a best-practices approach: First, use a 360-degree feedback tool and a validated personality questionnaire as a starting point for future research. Then, collect baseline data on attrition rate, productivity, absentee rate, production quality and employee relations management issues. Follow-up baseline data would need to be collected at six, 12 and 18 months. Activities would focus on development of a strong core management level that could be replicated at all locations. Once management signed off on the recommended solution, Carey’s team collected the data. Surveys and assessments were given to 42 managers from two West business services locations. The competencies measured included coaching and mentoring, communication, customer focus, judgment and decision making, problem solving and teamwork skills. Once the data was analyzed, participants created action plans with their supervisors. The data was collected from the two locations and analyzed, and while results were mixed, the initial ﬁndings were promising. At location one, for sales associate positions measured over a six-month period, productivity increased measurably, while employee relations issues decreased. At location two, for sales associate positions measured over a three-month period, productivity increased and employee relations issues decreased. The personality survey also identiﬁed strengths to be utilized in the future. The participants felt they were given an opportunity to voice their opinions freely, take action and have control over their own development plans. This created a heightened level of awareness and focus on customer and employee satisfaction and allowed the Big 6 to be addressed. Further, there were speciﬁc actions that showed positive results in the ﬁrst six months, and these will continue to be measured during the next 12 months. To get the best results from an initiative of this importance: • Build a communication strategy on many levels and frequency. • Have organizational buy-in and make participation mandatory. • Communicate the purpose of the tools to avoid skepticism. • Review data frequently. • Implement rewards for sticking to an action plan. • Be aware that change takes time. “By involving different levels in the organization, this exercise helped fuel employee engagement,” Carey said. “We also feel we can potentially use the personality test results to establish baseline data on current employees, which can be used for future hiring. And possibly the most important beneﬁt, we’ve opened communication lines for change. This will allow our employees to work together to achieve West’s business goals more efﬁciently and rapidly.” talent management magazine www.talentmgt.com 23 http://www.talentmgt.com

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Talent Management - December 2008 Editor's Letter Contents Human Performance Leading Edge Foundations Recruitment & Retention Assessment & Evaluation Compensation & Benefits Performance Management Learning & Development Succession Planning Insight Dashboard Application Advertiser's Index Editorial Resources Full Potential

Talent Management - December 2008

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