If there is one thing common between Generation Z and the Millennials, then it is the hustle culture. All they want to do is hustle through this fast-paced life. Though this kind of hustling is beneficial for the economy, it can however not be so beneficial for the individual itself. A lot of times they tend to experience intense burnouts which can affect the individual greatly.
Officially recognised by the World Health Organization, Burnout Syndrome is a real issue that affects not only productivity but also the individual’s mental health. Though burnout is prevalent across a lot of industries, call centre agents tend to experience call centre burnout or call centre stress relatively more.
But what exactly is burnout?
What exactly is a Call Centre Burnout?
In simple words, Burnout Syndrome is a condition that stems from factors like chronic stress in the workplace. Call centre agents tend to experience constant fatigue, exhaustion, start resenting their career choices, feelings of negativity, start maintaining a distance from their workplace activities, etc. when they experience burnout. Constant exposure to call centre stress can lead to a lot of mental health problems and can also result in the individual experiencing high functioning anxiety and depression.
Burnout can stem from various reasons. An employee can experience burnout if he/she is failing to maintain a balance in his/her work life, having way too much work to do or being burdened with way too much work, not being able to manage work properly and feeling helpless. Employers need to recognize and take action for customer support employees who are experiencing burnout. If left untreated, burnout can not only result in dangerous heart conditions but can also cause other long term physical health conditions.
Ways to prevent burnout in your customer service team
Recognize signs of possible burnout
The first thing to do to avoid burnout is to identify the potential for burnout in the first place. Employers need to stay attentive and recognise certain signs of possible burnout in their employees.
An employer should look out for signs like
-Exhaustion
-Low productivity levels
-Complete lack of motivation
Managers can look out for diminishing work efficacy and complete isolation. These are the first few symptoms of potential burnout. Once the potential for burnout is identified the employer should then work on understanding why exactly an employee is experiencing such signs of burnout. The employer needs to understand if the signs are caused due to factors like heavy workload, unreasonable deadlines, unprofessional treatment, etc.
Take feedback
Very often it is seen that employees shy away from reporting issues like burnout or anxiety. This can be due to various reasons like being afraid of performance setbacks, being afraid of not getting that promotion, not having a culture of openness, etc. This is why taking feedback from customer service teams or call centre agents is necessary.
Collecting regular feedback from your employees will help you identify issues right when they arise. This will allow you to make changes or take immediate action when there is a problem.
Taking regular feedback can also give you a better understanding of how you as a company can keep your employees healthy and happy.
Encourage dialogue
Talking and expressing one’s feelings always helps. Shying away from talking about issues such as burnout only makes it worse. In order to deal with burnout or possible burnout, encourage your customer service agents to open up and talk to their colleagues or friends and family. Encourage dialogues about burnout and other mental health challenges in your workplace. Developing a culture of open dialogue about burnout or mental health issues makes your workplace a safe zone for your customer service agents. In addition to this, creating a culture of open dialogue enables you to identify the shortcomings in your organization or workflows.
Self-compassion and self-care
During burnout, self-compassion and self-care can go a long way. Encourage your employees to be more compassionate to themselves and their coworkers. Experiencing Burnout can be a very intense and tiring situation and in a time like this being kind and compassionate to self can help in easing the pain. Businesses can also aid in this process by doing little things like keeping a check on the customer service agent, sending them little treats, sending them little encouraging emails, giving them some time off, allowing sabbaticals (if possible), etc. We should you know what are the tips and tricks are easy and not much time consuming to tackle this error code [pii_email_
Encourage communication
A lot of times problems or stress in call centres or customer service teams stem due to communication problems. When there is unclear communication agents, as well as the employer, can be negatively affected. It is important to understand that clear communication can help organizations and individuals gain clarity. When a customer service agent is ready to clearly communicate about what is bothering him or her and how it has caused them to reach a stage of burnout it helps organizations to easily identify the shortcomings or loopholes in their strategies. Clear and precise communication paves way for better and more efficient workflows.
Taking action
The next step after recognizing possible employees who are about to or are experiencing burnout is to take action to curb the effects of the syndrome. in Times like this, the employer needs to provide support for employees and give them their own space. Micromanaging at this stage is a big no-no. After understanding the root cause of the one out employers can then work on the particular reason and help the employee.
For example, if a particular employee’s reason for burnout is a heavy workload then the employer can work towards creating a better schedule that allows the agent more flexibility and extends deadlines so that the agent can easily distribute the workload.
Understand possible causes of burnout
Monitoring stress on employees and understanding possible causes of burnout allow the employer as well as the employees to look out for each other. One of the most reckoning causes of burnout among call centre or customer support employees is unreasonable workload and unreasonably rigid deadlines.
Customer service employees are always burdened with such challenges due to which they often exhaust themselves to the core. Setting achievable and realistic goals is a good move that’ll help organizations avoid potential burnout in their employees. Assigning achievable workload should be taken seriously. Burdening one agent with the work of two or three is a big no-no. Dealing with a burnout in their customer service teams that is caused due to heavy workload can be done by prioritizing stress and tension reduction activities.
Here are 6 signs of a Burnout
Treating burnout in customer support employees is necessary. Working in customer support can be physically taxing due to the amount of work. Here are 6 signs of call centre stress or call centre burnout –
1. Call centre agents to start losing interest in their job. They no longer enjoy tasks related to their job. They put in less or no effort in maintaining workplace discipline or order.
2. Help desk agents start displaying physical symptoms as a result of burnout. increased moodiness, constant fatigue, loss of sleep and appetite, high functioning anxiety, etc. are a few symptoms to look out for.
3. Low productivity and efficiency are other signs to look out for. Agents might make a lot of errors or mistakes that could have been easily avoided. The agent’s performance starts to deter and their efficacy goes down.
4. Agents start seeing everything from a pessimistic lens. They might have feelings of resentment. The agent might also start negatively influencing their coworkers.
5. Another common sign among customer service agents experiencing burnout is isolation. Agents might feel like just wanting to be left alone. They might not show up at work-related socializing events like office parties, employee and family get-togethers, etc.
6. Call centre agents with burnout can easily get annoyed and irritated. There might be a constant display of irritability which can be noticed in the body language or actions like lashing out at their fellow workers.
Set your team up for a stress-free working environment with Kapture
Investing in the right technology is important. To work in customer support is not an easy job. Customer service agents have to go through a lot of workloads within tight deadlines. Sometimes these deadlines are unreasonable and so is the workload. There are multiple tasks in a call centre that can easily be automated and this can only happen if you invest in the right technology.
Investing in customer relationship management systems like Kapture can help your customer service teams automate several tasks. This can not only reduce the workload on customer service agents but can also help them utilise their valuable manual labour elsewhere.
From automating ticket assignment to handling ticket registration, Kapture’s intelligent customer management software can help agents avoid burnout and enable businesses to create better workflows. To know more about how Kapture CRM can help your business click here to book a demo.
About the Author | |
 | Namitha RV |
| Namitha R V is a freelance content writer and copywriter whose primary focus leans on B2B and B2C content writing. She has worked on several SEO projects and has a demonstrated history of writing for diverse content requirements like – Long form blog posts, Optimized Website content, Infographics, Ad copies, Social Media content, etc. | |
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