Work-from-home is an interesting work concept. It has been utilized sporadically by companies to fulfill capacity-related requirements. But it has never become the staple of any industry, until now. However, things are shaping up very differently after the Covid-19 outbreak. As humans are confined to their homes, and there is very little mobility amidst lockdowns; the need for work-from-home has risen greatly.
Necessity Is the Mother of Invention
The popular proverb ‘necessity is the mother of invention’ sits perfectly in this scenario where most of the IT operations are conducted from home. Although work-from-home has already been practiced in many companies, it has never been the sole mode of operation. It is only now that we are seeing employees working exclusively from their homes. And, this trend has been brought upon by the necessity of these testing times.
Cloud-Based Contact Centers
In the ITES industry, call centers/contact centers have already operated via cloud platforms. But companies only used cloud-based platforms when there was an absolute necessity, and there was no way to get the job done via in-house workforce. Despite the success of cloud-based contact centers, they were never considered a complete replacement for in-house work models.
The Challenges of Work-From-Home Model
There are many hindrances of work-from-home model, which prevent companies from implementing it:
Security of Data
It is very hard for a company to rely on the security aspect of a work-from-home operation. In the office, the network is secured by company firewalls. There is tier-wise access to data, and no one can access client/customer data without prior authorization. But in a work-from-home scenario, you are dependent on the agents for implementing the security. Although there are many professional VPN and Virtual Machine solutions available, not every organization is willing to put its trust in them.
Performance aspect
The performance of computer systems, the speed of Internet and other technological factors have a huge bearing on work-from-home scenarios. It is almost impossible for a company to gauge and monitor the hardware resources an agent has at his/her abode. If the performance of the network dips or a fault develops in the systems, then it would be very difficult for an organization to maintain continuity in its daily call center operations. Also, they won’t have any way to fix the problem like in the case of inbound call center outsourcing or on-premise call center operations.
Distractions and lack of motivation
Work-from-home call center employees can get distracted due to personal engagements. As call center work is real-time in nature, the impact of distractions can be higher than in other IT operations like software development. Moreover, it is not possible for TLs and managers to assemble teams at a single location and motivate them.The above-mentioned challenges need to be overcome, if work-from-home has to be a success in these times of Covid-19. In most cases, these challenges arise because the workforce is not experienced enough and well-drilled in work-from-home environment. But when you have a veteran inbound call center outsourcing services provider, most of these challenges are eliminated from the get-go.
Conclusion
Work-from-home call centers have played a bits and part role in the overall success of call center operations. But due to evolving times and new compulsions amidst Covid-19 outbreak, work-from-home call centers have become an essential part of corporate ecosystems. Although there are many challenges like security, motivation and hardware limitations, they can be overcome if you partner with a vendor that is already proficient in cloud-based call center operations.Bluechip call center is one of the best inbound call center outsourcing services providers with expertise in modern technologies. It has experienced human resources and tremendous software capabilities to take on a call center project of any scale.
