It’s Not Me, It’s You

If you and your BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) vendor aren’t seeing eye-to-eye and all attempts at reconciliation are failing, then it may be time to consider breaking up. Breakups can be hard, especially if you’ve been together for a long time. However, they are necessary if your relationship isn’t heading in the right direction or isn’t helping you to grow or to meet your objectives.

Here are some ways to breakup with your BPO partner with ease and grace:

We Need to Talk

All good breakups start with “The Talk”. The talk is where you admit that you’re having problems with the way things are being run and that you want concrete solutions and a good vendor relationship. Have an honest discussion with your BPO Vendor to address the reasons why your relationship is no longer working for you. You will want to cover the following:

• Why the BPO Vendor’s services are not up to the mark, whether its spiralling costs, poor SLAs, lack of proper communication, and any other reasons you may have.
• Explain how you’ve tried to be fair and have reached your conclusions after extensive review.
• Stay open to any feedback that your BPO Vendor may have about contributing factors that may be originating from within your company. You may realize that you may not be entirely blameless.
• Establish a deadline for change and formalize the break-up steps you will take if your BPO Vendor fails to meet expectations.

We Need an Intervention

While you’re setting up the plan for a potential breakup, it’s important to consider whether there are areas for improvement from your side. A third-party intervention in the form of an external contact center consultant can be beneficial to assess your operational flaws and iron out any wrinkles.

While there may be variations in services, a contact center consultant can chiefly do the following for your business:

Conduct a full business evaluation which covers:

• Alignment to your organization’s goals.
• Customer access and retention strategies.
• Recruiting and hiring practices.
• On-boarding and training evaluation.
• Analysis of Quality Assurance
• Performance Management.
• Workforce Management (WFM)
• Employment of technology, processes, and systems.
• Employee and customer feedback/engagement.
• Self-service capabilities.

Comprehensive Report on Findings with Gap Analysis and Recommended Best Practices

Typically, the findings from the assessment are supported by recommended next steps, a sequence of corrective actions, and a complete fleshed-out business case analysis.

Introspect on How to Choose a Better Partner

Breakups don’t have to be a bad experience. They can be a great opportunity to understand what went wrong and how to set things right. Using the consultant evaluation as a baseline to jump off of, together with your own historical experience, review the following:

• Revisit the reasons for making use of a BPO vendor for your contact center.
• Pencil in your non-negotiable must-haves for a potential new partner.
• Set specific goals for what you want to be achieved and how these will be monitored and measured.
• Review industry expertise as well as a proven track record, competitive pricing structures, communication, service levels…etc. Check off all the essentials before shortlisting potential new vendors.

Have you thought about breaking up with a BPO vendor but you feel unsure about whether or not it would be the right choice, or if there are factors that are effecting the relationship that could be improved? At CH Consulting Group, we can help you to assess your situation so that you will gain clarity about it and about how to move forward. Get in touch with us today.

Want more? Check out part two & three here.