I’ve watched organisations spend thousands recruiting for empathy when they desperately need analysts.
The entire perception of contact centres is that they exist to placate customers. Make them content. Protect the brand. Answer queries. A cost centre operating in reactive mode, however slick the training. Recruitment adverts reflect this:
- ‘Good with customers’ tops the list
- Empathy ranks higher than problem-solving
- Innovation? Rarely mentioned
Then something interesting happens.
The System Removes Its Best Thinkers
When someone analytical lands in a contact centre role, they don’t stay on the phones long. They’re moved to workforce planning or quality teams. Away from customers.
The system actively removes analytical thinkers from the very conversations where they could spot patterns and systemic failures.
We’re extracting intelligence from the intelligence-gathering operation.
Think about that for a moment.
AI monitoring every call doesn’t solve this. It scores compliance, not insight. Agents assume process improvement comes from AI analysis or project teams with managerial sign-off. The people closest to the problem are taught their job is execution, not innovation.
What Removing the Matches Looks Like
What if agents weren’t firefighters but match-removers?
Imagine day one starts differently. New agents are told they’re essential in finding a better way. That insights from every interaction matter. That they have agency to suggest changes to processes.
Some changes need sign-off. But others could happen at team level:
- Screen flows in the CRM
- Phrases in marketing campaigns
- Ways of working together
- Break patterns
- Rota management
- Seating plans
So many variables. So rarely given to agent autonomy.
Most organisations panic at ‘agents implementing changes without sign-off.’ But consider what happened when one retail contact centre removed its £15 goodwill cap.
Overall goodwill spending went down.
Rather than defaulting to ‘just give £15’ as an easy exit, agents considered whether that amount was appropriate. They owned the decision. Customers felt treated as individuals, not obstacles to overcome.
More autonomy created more careful decision-making because ownership changes behaviour.
The Measurement Trap
Those who implemented the cap removal knew it would work. Cynics were converted.
The results:
- Attrition dropped
- Hiring and training costs fell
- Customer satisfaction improved
- Agents felt trusted and responded accordingly
But fear persists. What if it goes wrong?
In an industry where everything is measured, the need for trust has been eroded. Trust becomes a bolt-on. The belief is that data will tell us everything. As someone once said to me: ‘In God we trust, everything else, we measure.’
Organisations have replaced trust with measurement.
But the measurement itself prevents the improvements they need.
The Squeezed Middle
Fear exists at multiple levels.
Contact centres remain cost centres in many organisations, so risk cannot be entertained. Then there’s leadership development for frontline managers. Often it’s non-existent.
These managers aren’t equipped to lead in high-trust, high-autonomy environments. They manage metrics instead. They treat teams as metric drivers, not change makers, however personable and friendly the relationship.
They’re the squeezed middle. Trying to please their team whilst pleasing management above them.
What they actually need:
- Development programmes specific to their role
- Embedded in their way of working
- Not a two-day course marked ‘done’
How do they develop trust? Establish psychological safety? Give constructive feedback? Communicate successes? Make recognition part of daily work?
These aren’t skills you pick up by accident.
What Success Actually Looks Like
Team leaders who succeed spend as much time leading their team as looking at numbers.
They value conversations. They focus on what matters and galvanise teams around it. They concentrate on behaviours as input and results as output. They understand the value and purpose of the work.
And here’s the crucial bit: they’re content saying no. To their team and the layer above.
That confidence requires psychological safety flowing both directions. They need to know they won’t be punished for challenging upward. That their boss will value the challenge rather than assume mutiny.
Shifting this mindset happens through shaped, intentional conversations. Through deliberately sharing the right stories.
Contact centres don’t need better service providers. They need change agents with the leadership to support them.
So here’s what I keep coming back to: if your contact centre exists to drive continuous improvement rather than simply handle customers, what would you need to change first?
Contact Nathan now at
Nathan Dring – nathan@ndassociates.co.uk
