“Contact Centre of the Year”: Peeling Back the Curtain

Poor levels of customer service are costing UK businesses a reported £11.4 billion a month in wasted productivity – a quite staggering number. The emergence of new technologies and indeed a veritable explosion of digital channels have together exposed consumers to streamlined, slick, seamless brand experiences, and as a result their demands are skyrocketing. Never has it been more difficult to drive customer satisfaction and nurture the building blocks of brand loyalty.

For some companies, customer service takes a back seat to other elements of business, like product development or marketing – it’s merely an arm of their organisation designed to fix something that’s gone wrong. For others, though, it’s front and centre of everything they do, and one such example is Ocado Retail. Their contact centre was recognised as a Contact Centre of the Year in 2022 for both their extraordinary work serving their customers and the way they prioritise the employee experience. Here, we speak with Ocado Retail’s Customer Service Director Paul Greenwood, who shines a light on the policies and practices he’s put in place to help his team become best-in-class.

Ready? Let’s get stuck in!

CCW Europe Digital: To get the ball rolling and establish some context, Paul, could you briefly talk to us about who Ocado Retail are and where the company sits within the wider Ocado Group?

Paul Greenwood: Of course! At a high level, the retail side of Ocado Group is very much the part of the business that owns the customer: that includes everything from marketing to customer service. We’re currently serving big basket and immediacy missions to nearly one million active customers in the UK. Alongside that, we’ve got our colleagues who look after the distribution and fulfilment side of the operation – our customer service team members, or CSTMs for short. These are the folks dealing with suppliers, organising suppliers, and actually on the road delivering the shopping into customers’ homes. And then the third arm of the Group is our technology enterprise through which we’re self-disrupting and solving some of the most complex problems in the online grocery industry.

CCW ED: Great stuff! Ocado Retail has gained a reputation for providing exceptional customer service. In today’s CX climate, where 80% of consumers report that the experience a company provides is as important as its products and services, really delivering on customer-centricity is increasingly becoming a key business differentiator. A broadscale question against that backdrop, then: how can brands master the customer service dynamic?

PG: It's a big, big question. I've been involved in customer service for over three decades, and it’s fair to say that customer behaviour has changed a great deal to some extent, but to others it hasn't at all. The basics very much still apply – the key is really listening to your customer. And it's the small details that are important. If you promise something, whether it’s an offer in your marketing communications or a verbal agreement with someone who works at your organisation, you need to make sure, as a business, you follow through on that.

In our contact centre, for example, if we say to somebody: “We’ll go away and look to resolve this and call you back”, we’ll be absolutely sure to call them back. Alternatively, if somebody says to me: “Look, I've got a real problem with this, or with that”, I’m going to own that problem until it’s fixed. It’s a very broad and very demanding mindset. Consumer expectations are growing all the time and it’s a challenge to match what you deliver as a service against what they’re paying for – you must land on a nice, sweet spot. I'm proud to say that in most cases we're nailing it, but there's always work to do. Being named a Contact Centre of the Year back in 2022 was great for us – it reaffirmed that we’re on the right path and we’re super proud of our team for garnering that recognition.

CCW ED: Absolutely! A tremendous achievement. And just building on this subject – recent research shows companies taking the view that customer service is a value centre rather than a cost centre generate, on average, three-and-a-half times more revenue growth. What does it take to get into that “value centre” mindset and foster that cultural model across an organisation?

PG: For us, it comes back to investing in the needs of your customers, really understanding the service you're offering, and then disseminating the voice of the customer across the wider business. By harnessing that approach and sharing it, you’re then left with various organisational touchpoints directly associated with customer-centricity, and different people who play in different stages of the customer journey who buy into the notion that we’re not dealing with orders, we’re dealing with customers – people. And we want to make them happy and ensure they keep coming back – in essence, they’re not buying one product and then disappearing. We want them to stay with us every week, shop with us every week and build and build and build. We want their baskets to get bigger.

That’s the focus: taking the data and taking frontline colleague feedback and sharing it throughout the organisation.

CCW ED: Moving on to the employee experience piece. There is enough evidence out there to suggest that a motivated, empowered, and engaged workforce has a positive impact on service levels and a direct correlation to happy and loyal consumers. Can you share some tips and best practices around how you approach developing and creating a great working environment?

PG: This is a subject I'm very, very passionate about.

Sadly, I’ve worked with people whose style of leadership I’d never want to replicate, yet on the flip side to that, I’ve worked with people who are incredible role models. There's a huge distinction between being a manager and being a leader – you need to be both at different times, and what organisations forget sometimes is that the small things you do for colleagues can make a massive difference.

We changed our whole recruitment ethos on the basis that I didn't necessarily want to recruit people who had a background working in contact centres. I want to work with people I feel will not only survive, but excel, and enjoy working in our environment where we have a set of established core values. We know we can empower agents with the right skill set and training to develop and grow. We’re not limiting our staff in any way – it’s about them and their personality. I always ask myself: “How do I tap into their potential and how do I give them the freedom to be themselves?”

We don't heavily script colleagues either, which gives them license to actually listen to problems customers are facing, understand the circumstantial nuances involved, and fix them accordingly without needing a bunch of approvals. On top of that, we work hard to craft a nice working environment to come into every day – and that includes running various practical activities during the week, creating break out areas, providing access to subsidised vending machines, and other bits and pieces that are quite small yet meaningful. We look at what's important to people and to individuals, and as a result of that, our attrition rates are very low, and our colleague engagement scores are very high.

We also heavily encourage career progression. It’s important to us that those who work in our call centre understand they can build a career here and they don’t necessarily have to view it as a one-stop shop. We openly promote that mentality, and we recruit with that in mind – we're honest and transparent about the atmosphere we’re trying to create. Then – back to the original question – once you’ve instilled that and once you’ve trained your people effectively and allow them to be themselves, they’ll do the work for you because they value working for the organisation. They love the brand and that will come across in the way they talk to our customers. They become advocates – and they become advocates because they want to, not because they're told they have to be.

CCW ED: And pivoting on to the retention side of this equation, which we’ve touched on there. Naturally, over time, longer-tenured agents will build up both institutional and industrial knowledge that they can translate into delivering better, higher-quality consumer interactions. What measures, then, can companies put in place to effectively manage and nurture talent, and, consequently, reduce frontline attrition?

PG: There are many aspects to this, but one initiative we’ve found that works particular well is what we call “show and tell”. This is where colleagues go and spend a day in another area of the business to help them gain a better understanding of all the different elements at play in our overall operation. It’s easy to view certain roles as banal or uninspiring. Once you get in there behind the scenes, though, the perception can change. It’s about giving people an opportunity to see what else is out there.

Honesty around career development and the various options open to people is critical too. We have longer-tenured colleagues who don’t want line management responsibility – they would much rather own certain tasks or functions. Yet there are those who do want to become team managers. So, it’s about tailoring those discussions accordingly – when we do our one-to-ones, or personal development plans (PDPs) with colleagues, we make sure we’re having a very transparent dialogue, not only about how they're performing in the moment, but asking them thought-provoking questions: “What is it you want to do?” “Where do you see yourselves in three or four or five years time?” “What things do you enjoy that would encourage you to stay with us?” And if there isn't anything for them, then never mind. “Thank you very much for your time with us.” But normally people will tell us they didn’t realise they could do X or do Y and challenge themselves in new ways. We’ll embolden them to give new projects a go and support them, and probably 80% of the time they enjoy it.

The final aspect of this I’ll touch upon is the importance of exit interviews. These are pivotal forums for both those who sadly leave under a cloud (issues around performance or absence), but equally those who have simply decided to move on to another organisation. What was it that made them take that decision? Could we have done anything differently to keep them? We’ll ask the tough questions and if it was totally out of our control, we’ll just hold our hands up and wish them luck. For example, people have said to us the shift patterns don't align with their needs. Of course, we try to find the right balance but if customers are buying our products and they want them delivered on a certain day at a certain time, we have to be available here to service that if any issues arise. So, there are times when we just can't match where people are in their life to achieve that work life balance.

It all comes back to being transparent and honest. And it’s something that every business can be. It's a commitment, not only financially, but in terms of your culture. But it’s imperative today.

CCW ED: Let’s change tack now and dive into the technology powering your contact centre. There are so many solutions out there now designed to give agents context and information as consumer calls and messages come in. How do you strip it all back and zone in on what offers the most value?

PG: There are three considerations for me.

The first is around the process of embedding technology. Whether you're buying a new IT solution or implementing a new CRM solution or upgrading your existing systems, be sure to listen to your frontline colleagues and their ideas and thoughts regarding how they're going to utilise it. In short, take them on the journey with you. That’s a critical time investment.

Number two is reminding people of the basics. I always revert to a car analogy when discussing this. If we look at car ergonomics referring to optimal adaptation – speedometers, easy to reach controls, and other gadgets deigned to help drivers devote their full attention to the road – the same principles apply when you’re talking to a customer. The basic rules around why you’re engaged in conversation with that customer, in that moment, remain crucial. The tools around you are there to support you and help you do your job effectively. It’s vital that agents refrain from getting sucked into what technology is doing or suggesting or prompting.

And thirdly we have the data piece: the insights you can extract to show people how they’re performing and the difference they’re making in their role. It becomes an advocate and a partner rather than taking the role of “Big Brother” around what it's there for. Case in point? Yes, we monitor average handling time of every contact centre staff member, but we do it because we need to get an average to see the big picture. From that, we can start to look at ways to power greater efficiency. So, it’s there to improve performance.

We all need technology, and the future certainly looks interesting, but ultimately the contact centre is still fundamentally about that human touch. How you use technology is the important bit.

CCW ED: Well, you've teed up my next question perfectly there. Where does conversational AI, either through voice or digital channels (or both), play a part in your operation at Ocado Retail?

PG: It’s a big topic and there’s a lot floating around on this subject. I'm traditionally old school, but I'm excited by the prospect of generative AI.

There will always be a place for human-to-human conversation, whether it's written or verbal. So, when you look at your omnichannel strategy, you should bear that in mind. At the same time, though, if a system can quickly run an identification and verification check so that when a person gets through on the line you can start having a meaningful conversation straight away, that is super valuable. Equally, wrap time can start to reduce because these systems can consolidate everything you've discussed or done for that customer. It may also offer prompts to an advisor to ensure they’ve not missed any key talking points. And it will self-learn and self-teach. I see a good balance between adhering to the old traditional ways but having technology to support you.

I'm probably on base one to two right now – I’m scouring the market to see what's out there and having lots of conversations with colleagues in the industry. I think we're all excited, but it's about calculating costs, building timelines, exploring the benefits, and then processing it all with my team. Yes, it's like the shiny new toy. But back to the car analogy – I need to test drive it to make sure it’s actually fit for our purposes first.

We do need to be a little bit careful that people don't worry it's going to put their jobs at risk. If you get the balance right, it won’t fundamentally change the headcount you need, it'll just make your whole contact centre estate much more efficient so your people can focus on the jobs that will really move the needle – freeing them up to have those difficult interactions with customers, drive operational efficiencies, and improve customer satisfaction, all of which will deliver cost savings. There are some aspects of customer service that AI will absolutely speed up, both for customers and frontline colleagues.

CCW ED: And following up from that with a question around metrics. In the contact centre these can range from average handle time to number of calls processed by hour to first-contact resolution to customer satisfaction scores, and many more. In your experience, what are the best and most effective ways to, first, measure individual agent performance, and second, overall estate performance?

PG: The one we predominantly use for both measuring customer sentiment and the performance of our frontline colleagues is net promoter score (NPS). It’s business critical to understand your promoters and your detractors. That's the metric I would put at the forefront of everything because if your NPS scores are low, but your average handling time is high, there's something clearly materially wrong. On the other hand, if your NPS is low and your average handling times are low, then maybe there's work you can do. What you're looking for is the sweet spot. I don’t want colleagues feeling the weight of the clock ticking away in the background when they're talking to a customer. Similarly, though, I don't want them going off down a rabbit hole on a subject they don’t have license to discuss or digging themselves into a situation they can’t deal with, or, worse still, just wasting time on the call. It's about finding an equilibrium.

If we're looking at this from a cost perspective, NPS will still be in there, but other KPIs like average handling time and first contact resolution will come into play as well. Then you drop in measurement around absence and attrition and all those pieces – you use them all. What we avoid at all costs is putting agents under undue pressure. The pressure should fall onto the manager to make sure NPS is where it needs to be. And then if NPS and customers are quite happy overall, and they're telling us that when we're doing quality call listening, then it makes it a little bit easier in discussions with finance around costs to serve or costs to order to say well, actually, if we start to squeeze this too much, service quality is going to suffer.

So, it’s NPS, average handling time, and first contact resolution and then colleague-wise it’s attrition and absence and more broadly how they’re feeling. So, employee satisfaction as well.

CCW ED: Can you just dive a bit deeper into the employee satisfaction bit. How do you go about measuring that?

PG: We do a survey every quarter featuring a series of questions about the organisation: “Are you empowered to do your role?” “Have you got sufficient training?” “What's your relationship like with your line manager?” “Do you feel you've got the right work life balance?” That all gets collated and measured out of 10. Then we have a completion score as well – we combine those two.

An important component alongside that is when colleagues take the time to provide written feedback. It’s incredibly valuable to get back to them concerning what they’ve said because those comments are the golden egg in terms of giving you information around what people are really thinking. It's easy to tick a box. It takes time and effort to put down some text about what's on your mind – so we encourage people to read the feedback, digest it, put action plans in place, and go back to somebody and say: “Simon, thank you for giving us that feedback. Can we talk further?” Or: “We already have a plan for that, no problem at all, we've got that”. Or: “It would be great to get you and a few other colleagues together to thrash this out and understand it more fully.”

That's the bit we do around employee satisfaction, and we always look forward to the results. We get a touch nervous sometimes, but generally speaking they match where we think we are in that moment. It's a barometer – we guess to a certain extent using experience, knowledge, and observations. As we get into January, we’ll reflect on Q4 – it’s been tough for colleagues in the lead up to the Christmas period, so we expect our numbers to drop slightly, but to counter that we've done more engagement activities. Hopefully we'll strike the right balance, but we'll try and work out where we think we’ll come out and then see how close we are because I think that's important as well: that you don't just rely on what that data is telling you. Is it aligned with what you felt the landscape was looking like at a particular time or over a particular quarter?

CCW ED: Simple question for you now, Paul: what do you think are some of the biggest myths associated with customer care operations today?

PG: That’s a tricky one. I've managed contact centres in regulated and nonregulated customer service departments. There’s a perception people have that every call or every transaction is going to be somebody shouting at you. Now, of course, that can indeed be the case – customers do understandably get frustrated with poor service, poor products, whatever it may. Patience and tolerance levels are waning, but the biggest myth for me is that you’ll only be in there for a few months because you won't like it and you'll leave.

I’ve found when people get on those frontlines, they're quite surprised. It's not the old call centres of the 90s that I remember. This is a high tech, nice working environment today. You’ve got smaller teams, backed by lots of support and engagement – you can go in there and if you so decide, you can carve out a career in this industry. I've certainly enjoyed it. Whether it's a small contact centre or a large contact centre, whether it's onshore or offshore, there's always something for everybody. It's a very important industry and I think it's the backbone of this country. Unless you've worked there and tried it, you just can’t develop an appreciation or understanding of what’s involved. That's why there's a myth. My advice would be to just give it a shot, even if you're looking at something that is six, nine, 12 months – I’m confident you'll be pleasantly surprised how much you enjoy it. Especially if you come and work for us.

CCW ED: Nicely done! You are set to speak at our upcoming Exchange event in London. What themes will you be covering?

PG: The two key topics I’ll explore will centre around colleague engagement (and how that translates throughout customer service) and technology. They’re the themes of the moment. I’ll be expanding on them and giving people an opportunity to ask questions. There will be a lot of debate at that session. There is so much happening. Technology is moving on very quickly and I'm excited to talk about these subjects I'm really passionate about.

CCW ED: And finally, Paul. Let’s look to the horizon. There’s a lot of excitement in the industry right now – predominantly driven by the discourse around what’s possible with new and innovative AI-powered technologies. With that in mind, where do you see the top priorities for CS leaders lying over the next 12 months?

PG: Be cautious but don't be frightened about new technology. Talk to some of these suppliers, get them on board, make them understand what your ask is because you might have requirements and they might have a piece of software they think can match it. But both parties need to look outside the box and almost second guess what customers are going to want in 12 to 18 months' time and together work towards that goal.

And, as I said earlier, I'm very old school yet quite excited about the prospects. It’s about getting the balance right and your organisation will excel where it leaves others behind because in most industries there's competition out there. Get a supplier on board you can work and grow with: that's a massive, massive win.