When you think of individuals whose skills have been approved, licensed and certified, chances are that call center agents and managers do not come to mind. You probably think of professional people, such as accountants, doctors, lawyers, nurses, paramedics and teachers, or tradespeople, like electricians and mechanics.

These professionals and tradespeople have shown that they know how to perform given sets of unique and challenging tasks, through a combination of education and training, often including apprenticeships and internships, and on-the-job experience. They take tests to prove their abilities, competence and knowledge, and are assessed on how they perform against standards that are based on what is expected of these candidates to carry out their duties successfully.

Many IT workers are becoming certified in using increasingly complex hardware and software usually because their existing and future employers require it. Microsoft offers certification in its software. Some companies now require Microsoft certification for their second- and third-level external help desks, whether they are in-house or outsourced to service bureaus such as Convergys.

And when you think of businesses and products being certified and licensed, you're likely to think of contractors, securities dealers and appliances, rather than call centers. As with employees, a business that has been certified has to prove that it can meet or surpass a given set of standards so that you can trust its products or services.

Certification, then, provides strong but not conclusive evidence that employees and companies are qualified to perform the tasks you need to have accomplished. Certification also makes employees and their employers feel professional, giving them a sense of achievement and pride. This boosts morale, which in turn helps to attract and keep employees.

At the same time, certification is only as good as the certifying program. There is now a movement to expand certification, and the professionalism it brings to the call center industry. There are new call center manager and agent certification programs being offered and developed by private industry organizations and companies.

There are also service bureau and help desk certifications whose successful applicants have shown that their operations meet quality standards and whose standards other call centers can benchmark against.

To cover the new and somewhat controversial field of call center certification this article has been split into two parts: staffing certification, covering agents and supervisory/managerial staff, and operations certification on individual centers or sites. This month we'll look at staffing certification. Next month we will analyze operations certification.

For the purposes of this article, discussion of certification will be limited to those programs whose certificates are potentially acceptable by other call centers. The article will touch on help desk certification only as it relates to external customer support help desks as opposed to internal help desks. We will refer to external help desks as support desks.

What is Call Center Staff Certification?

What is call center staff certification and are the skills sufficiently unique and transferable? Call center staffing certification programs test and certify individuals on generic or transferable competencies or skills that agents and managers need in most call centers.

For agents, the generic competencies are a mix of soft skills, such as controlling the call, showing empathy and phone manners, and hard skills such as identifying and solving problems and identifying and acting on sales opportunities. For supervisory staff, these competencies include coaching and monitoring agents, setting up call flows, scheduling, strategic planning and interfacing with other departments.

Support desk staffing certification covers these areas and how to recognize, handle, troubleshoot and solve technical problems.

According to Bill Rose, founder and executive director of Service Support Professionals Association (formerly Software Support Professionals Association; SSPA; San Diego, CA), this can be a tall order for some people, and is why training and certification is needed. The SSPA recently introduced a support desk certification program.

"Often there are support help agents who have excellent technical skills but do not have good people or corporate skills," explains Rose. "They can get impatient with customers who are usually not as knowledgeable as them. Sometimes they go out of bounds in their opinions, like saying there are flaws with the product that may be inaccurate and which does not solve the problem at hand."

Advocates argue that the skills that call center agents and supervisory personnel must have to merit certification are sufficiently unique compared with other similar service sector fields.

Call center agents must ascertain customer needs, solve problems, judge willingness to buy and close sales without the vital visual and body language cues of face-to-face conversations like those with a bank teller or sales floor staff.

Customers who do not understand agents can't show them the products they're having problems with or draw pictures. Supervisory personnel must manage efficiency based on complex technical metrics such as abandons, average speed of answer, call and after-call processing length and by frequently monitoring calls.

In contrast, much of the same performance information is much more easily available at an airline ticket counter, bank branch or a mall outlet by observing customer gripes and how employees interact with customers. According to a recent benchmarking survey by Purdue University's Center for Customer Driven Quality (West Lafayette, IN), only 17% of respondents monitor agents side by side.

"It is much easier to judge a customer and determine their needs face to face than over the phone," says Marcia Hicks, a senior consultant with Kowal Associates (Boston, MA). "Managers can't manage call centers in the same less formal way as in other fields."

Certification advocates say these unique people and management skills are transferable between call centers, especially for supervisory staff. The companies, products and services handled, and their computer and phone systems, software and procedures differ (for example, one firm requires agents and managers to go by the book while a competitor empowers them to make their own decisions), but the work is often the same. One call center often looks and sounds like another.

This is most evident in service bureaus where agents must handle different products and services for various clients using different scripts, procedures and equipment. Shared agents must switch clients from call to call. Dedicated agents are assigned and trained on a particular client's program but if demand slackens, they can be switched for weeks or months to another busier dedicated program.

When you think of individuals whose skills have been approved, licensed and certified, chances are that call center agents and managers do not come to mind. You probably think of professional people, such as accountants, doctors, lawyers, nurses, paramedics and teachers, or tradespeople, like electricians and mechanics.

These professionals and tradespeople have shown that they know how to perform given sets of unique and challenging tasks, through a combination of education and training, often including apprenticeships and internships, and on-the-job experience. They take tests to prove their abilities, competence and knowledge, and are assessed on how they perform against standards that are based on what is expected of these candidates to carry out their duties successfully.

Many IT workers are becoming certified in using increasingly complex hardware and software usually because their existing and future employers require it. Microsoft offers certification in its software. Some companies now require Microsoft certification for their second- and third-level external help desks, whether they are in-house or outsourced to service bureaus such as Convergys.

And when you think of businesses and products being certified and licensed, you're likely to think of contractors, securities dealers and appliances, rather than call centers. As with employees, a business that has been certified has to prove that it can meet or surpass a given set of standards so that you can trust its products or services.

Certification, then, provides strong but not conclusive evidence that employees and companies are qualified to perform the tasks you need to have accomplished. Certification also makes employees and their employers feel professional, giving them a sense of achievement and pride. This boosts morale, which in turn helps to attract and keep employees.

At the same time, certification is only as good as the certifying program. There is now a movement to expand certification, and the professionalism it brings to the call center industry. There are new call center manager and agent certification programs being offered and developed by private industry organizations and companies.

There are also service bureau and help desk certifications whose successful applicants have shown that their operations meet quality standards and whose standards other call centers can benchmark against.

To cover the new and somewhat controversial field of call center certification this article has been split into two parts: staffing certification, covering agents and supervisory/managerial staff, and operations certification on individual centers or sites. This month we'll look at staffing certification. Next month we will analyze operations certification.

For the purposes of this article, discussion of certification will be limited to those programs whose certificates are potentially acceptable by other call centers. The article will touch on help desk certification only as it relates to external customer support help desks as opposed to internal help desks. We will refer to external help desks as support desks.

What is Call Center Staff Certification?

What is call center staff certification and are the skills sufficiently unique and transferable? Call center staffing certification programs test and certify individuals on generic or transferable competencies or skills that agents and managers need in most call centers.

For agents, the generic competencies are a mix of soft skills, such as controlling the call, showing empathy and phone manners, and hard skills such as identifying and solving problems and identifying and acting on sales opportunities. For supervisory staff, these competencies include coaching and monitoring agents, setting up call flows, scheduling, strategic planning and interfacing with other departments.

Support desk staffing certification covers these areas and how to recognize, handle, troubleshoot and solve technical problems.

According to Bill Rose, founder and executive director of Service Support Professionals Association (formerly Software Support Professionals Association; SSPA; San Diego, CA), this can be a tall order for some people, and is why training and certification is needed. The SSPA recently introduced a support desk certification program.

"Often there are support help agents who have excellent technical skills but do not have good people or corporate skills," explains Rose. "They can get impatient with customers who are usually not as knowledgeable as them. Sometimes they go out of bounds in their opinions, like saying there are flaws with the product that may be inaccurate and which does not solve the problem at hand."

Advocates argue that the skills that call center agents and supervisory personnel must have to merit certification are sufficiently unique compared with other similar service sector fields.

Call center agents must ascertain customer needs, solve problems, judge willingness to buy and close sales without the vital visual and body language cues of face-to-face conversations like those with a bank teller or sales floor staff.

Customers who do not understand agents can't show them the products they're having problems with or draw pictures. Supervisory personnel must manage efficiency based on complex technical metrics such as abandons, average speed of answer, call and after-call processing length and by frequently monitoring calls.

In contrast, much of the same performance information is much more easily available at an airline ticket counter, bank branch or a mall outlet by observing customer gripes and how employees interact with customers. According to a recent benchmarking survey by Purdue University's Center for Customer Driven Quality (West Lafayette, IN), only 17% of respondents monitor agents side by side.

"It is much easier to judge a customer and determine their needs face to face than over the phone," says Marcia Hicks, a senior consultant with Kowal Associates (Boston, MA). "Managers can't manage call centers in the same less formal way as in other fields."

Certification advocates say these unique people and management skills are transferable between call centers, especially for supervisory staff. The companies, products and services handled, and their computer and phone systems, software and procedures differ (for example, one firm requires agents and managers to go by the book while a competitor empowers them to make their own decisions), but the work is often the same. One call center often looks and sounds like another.

This is most evident in service bureaus where agents must handle different products and services for various clients using different scripts, procedures and equipment. Shared agents must switch clients from call to call. Dedicated agents are assigned and trained on a particular client's program but if demand slackens, they can be switched for weeks or months to another busier dedicated program.