How to turn the contact centre grind into interesting and rewarding work for your agents in 2025
Automation technology can transform a tough, tedious and often thankless role for the better, writes, Ian de Sousa, CEO, Synergy Enterprise Solutions and Paul Rilstone, VP ANZ, Kore.ai
Fronting up to a bricks and mortar premises has ceased to be the default move for customers seeking information about, or assistance with, a supplier's products or services.
In today's times, the contact centre is almost invariably their first port of call and, as a result, it's become the beating heart of every organisation that deals with the public.
The Covid experience highlighted the dangers of not having a resilient, high performing digital hub. Many companies that were unable to maintain their contact centre service levels during this era of unprecedented disruption took a financial and reputational hit. Conversely, those that succeeded in ramping up their capacity to deal with increased activity saw their standing rise in the eyes of their customers.
Finding and keeping people to support company success
Every contact centre that's an asset to its owners – in all sorts of times! – has two essential components. The first is a flexible, scalable cloud-based platform that enables seamless engagement with customers via multiple channels, including telephone, email, SMS, social media and web chat.
And the second is a stable team of knowledgeable, well-trained agents who can answer questions and resolve issues efficiently and effectively.
Building and maintaining the latter is far from easy. The Australian contact centre industry has long experienced high staff churn rates and revolving door recruitment is a brutal reality for businesses and organisations of all stripes and sizes. The sector recorded an average employee attrition rate of 27 per cent last year, according to the 2024 Australian Contact Centre Industry Best Practice Report.
The picture is bleaker at the bigger end of town: in contact centres with between 500 and 1000 seats, 43.4 per cent of agents bid their employers adieu in 2024, on average.
Meanwhile, average absenteeism sat at 12.9 per cent last year, down from 13.4 per cent in 2023 but still more than double the national workplace average of six per cent.
Tackling the tedium of frontline duties
It's not too hard to see why so many agents take an abundance of sick days or fail to stay the course. Although it can vary from industry to industry, contact centre pay is generally modest and the work can be tedious, thankless and stressful.
For many agents, a frontline shift can feel like Groundhog Day – hour after hour spent answering the same basic questions and resolving the same simple issues, for customers who aren't always as patient or appreciative as they could be of the support they receive.
Deploying automation technology that can provide answers and resolutions to some of these repetitive interactions can be a gamechanger for businesses – and a sanity saver for agents.
From being able to gain instant access to a complete summary of a customer's interaction history, to receiving real time, context-based suggestions on how to solve their problems, AI-powered tools can help them power through monotonous interactions, or even sidestep them entirely, if they're able to be resolved by an automated assistant.
As a result, agents' time can be freed up to focus on more complex calls and messages; those that demand the scrutiny and judgment only a human being can provide.
Doing more of this meaningful work and less of the drudgery can elevate mood and morale. Agents with access to AI-powered automated assistants found their work more engaging and their jobs more satisfying, according to a 2024 Kore.ai study of contact centre workforce pain points.
Setting your business up for a stronger future in 2025 and beyond
In today's times, a high performing contact centre is an asset which Australian businesses can ill afford not to have.
Making the agent's role a more rewarding and enjoyable one is an excellent way to improve employee satisfaction and stem staff churn. Harnessing the power of AI technology can enable you to do so quickly and cost effectively in your contact centre setting.
If you're serious about keeping experienced, knowledgeable employees engaged and on the team for longer in 2025, it's an investment that's likely to serve your enterprise extremely well.
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