The GOPHER Coaching System Project
I have not been very clear about the direction of this blog
and wasn’t sure on how to proceed. Guess
that’s why it’s been a while since the last entry. But I figure since the actual coaching system
I have put in place is now finally working at full capacity it’s time to
explain GOPHER.
The previous blog entries were to give you an idea of where
I came from and how certain experiences of my life helped me develop the
system. I’m going to try to describe
this at the 10,000 foot view and then in subsequent entries will drill down and
discuss certain areas.
The precursor to this is that every person that is coached,
trained or mentored is treated with kind, meaningful and relevant praise and
appreciation. I’m pretty big on solid
foundations as you may have read in an earlier blog entry. Appreciation and recognition are the caissons
of the system. Sometimes the bedrock of
an agent’s foundation is just beneath the earth but other times you may need to
dig much deeper before you hit bedrock to build on.
I follow Sir Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group
and numerous other successful ventures on earth (and in space) on
LinkedIn. This quote from him struck me
as very relevant:
“If it doesn’t fit on the back of an envelope it’s rubbish”
I realized this applied to anything whether it was a
household budget or a plan for world domination. I decided to see if my GOPHER coaching idea
fit on an envelope.
It fits. It’s wordy
and I would definitely have an elevator pitch that would be just as compelling
at a high level (I think…).
The GOPHER system has a very dynamic structure. It’s easily modified. It’s not rocket science to understand but it
does require consistent involvement and buy in and understanding from everybody
involved. This doesn’t just include the
managers and agents but your systems analysts, web developers, I.T. department,
quality and training department, HR department and above all upper management.
Absolutely none of this will work if you don’t have the
technical support (to adopt GOPHER into your system) or the buy in of upper
management. There are work force
management platforms that have coaching systems in place similar to GOPHER but
they are not as modifiable. If you do
have a system you can still incorporate many of the benefits of GOPHER as
needed.
GOPHER starts with an introduction to your agent. If it’s a new hire at some point after the
quality expectations are given to them they will be informed of the coaching
content and frequency from their assigned Supervisor. Making your agents feel comfortable at the
onset is paramount to your success and their tenure with your
organization. However you decide to roll
out the welcome wagon is up to you and your call center culture but roll it
out. At the very least there should be a
welcome packet with more than direct deposit forms and insurance
information. If your agents don’t know
who their Supervisor will be after they have hit the floor that’s not a good
start.
There’s a learning curve associated with all jobs. I know that in my case it takes anywhere
between 6-9 weeks before a new hire is working at 100% of expectations
therefore I do not hold them accountable on my “scorecard” for a 3 month
period. It does NOT mean they don’t
receive any GOPHER coaching. This time
frame is the formative time to help them develop good habits and generally
correct and guide them down the right path.
After this period we start the accountability portion of the
GOPHER. What follows is basically what
was on the back of that envelope. Again,
everything starts with praise and ends with buy in and praise:
The GOPHER System (in a very loose nutshell)
It may be easy to look at this and say it’s a lot of basic
knowledge and common sense. But look at
the GOPHER system like you would look at a patent for an invention. The outline is there but it’s a lot of the
little parts of the invention that you can’t see that make it work as a unit.
This is a rinse and repeat plan. You will obviously need to set your own
parameters for developmental action plans, how often a coaching session is
given, how it will incorporate with your WFM platform or quality software, how
it will apply to different skillsets with different metrics, etc.
In future blog postings I will share with you all of the
little parts that I use to make it all come together with real life
examples. Some of the things I’ll
discuss will be:
- The real way to find true root cause for any issue
- How to listen to anybody
- How I prepared and trained the supervisors to utilize GOPHER
- How we rolled out and instructed the agents about every aspect of GOPHER and how to hold their Supervisor’s accountable for consistent coaching
- Limiting specific action items
- A disciplinary action plan that is no surprise to anybody if it happens
- How the technical aspects of the GOPHER coaching system was implemented
- How often coaching occurs and the cycle used to determine developmental action plans and disciplinary actions
- How GOPHER evolved to coach the coach – the evolution of SMAILS where senior managers audit the Supervisor’s GOPHER coaching
I’m excited about sharing my success with this plan but it
certainly wouldn’t have been possible without a multitude of IT/systems analyst
support and the buy in of the manager’s who use this system. It’s a lot of work but now it’s old hat. Everybody is used to it and every week there
seems to be fantastic recommendations to improve and fine-tune the system.
