Choosing the best model for a call centre function.

Inflection Point

Our client’s in-house patient call centre was a critical touchpoint. Two years earlier, call volumes were low, and easily handled by a small in-house team. However, as sales volumes tripled and with future growth on the horizon, the organization needed to make a significant change to meet current demand and be ready for continued growth. Our client faced a critical tension between the high-touch patient experience of an in-house call centre, and the scale and efficiency available through outsourcing.

How We Helped

We partnered with the organization to design a call centre future-state that would support patients and make sense for the organization. Through cross-stakeholder workshops, we built an ideal state map of the call centre customer experience. The map included customer and internal touchpoints and actions, technology requirements, process flows, and call data predictions.

Against this ideal-state, we pressure-tested the benefits of the in-house and outsourced models, and aligned with cross-functional stakeholders. Human-centred design was critical for identifying the patients’ most valued elements of call centre interactions. Taking a patient-centric view led us to recommendations that enabled scalability and flexibility for the organization, while delivering the most salient aspects of overall experience.

Mapping served as a crucial storytelling tool, helping to align multiple stakeholders to strategic choices. Stakeholders had productive conversations where assumptions were made explicit because of how we visualized complex models.

Outcomes

We guided our client to a solution that worked best for the organization and patients. What really mattered to the customer experience was the warm interaction between callers and agents. Therefore, elements like call scripts and patient forms were kept in-house.

We delivered final recommendations for the call centre and an outline of all artifacts, requirements, and capabilities. We also delivered call scripts and consent forms to enable the chosen future-state.