Joe McVeigh

English for Telephone Calling Centers

April 1, 2004, TESOL Long Beach, CA

Joe McVeigh

Introduction

• The language of call centers

Telephone calling centers

• The basics
• Varieties of call center businesses
• Inbound vs. outbound calls
• Outsourcing
• Offshoring
• Labor pool
• US political backlash

This engagement

• Training and curriculum development team
• Facilities
• 3 cities
• 1000-3000 call center agents
• 40 different business “processes”
• Training new trainers

Presenting problems

• Accent
• British vs. American English
• “Phraseology”
• Language ability of hiring pool
• Ramping up

Needs assessment: methods

• Interviews with trainers, management, quality assurance, client reps.
• “Barging” calls: live, remote, recorded
• Transcription of NS-NS calls
• Observation of existing training courses and programs
• On the floor visits in Gurgaon (New Delhi) and Hyderabad
• The challenges of 40 processes

Needs assessment: results

• Existing training program
• Training staff background
• Voice training and relaxation
• Accent and pronunciation, especially stress, rhythm & intonation
• Listening, especially regional accents
• Grammar
• Vocabulary, slang, idioms
• Cultural knowledge and behavior
• Working the screens
• Typing skills
• Pressure

Deliverables and the dangers of “scope creep”

• Needs analysis
• Curriculum
• Piloting
• Assessment instrument
• Train-the-trainer (TTT)
• Scope creep

Curriculum development: process

• What does “very experienced” trainers mean?
• TESOL boot camp
• Subject Matter Experts
• Obtaining authentic materials, transcribing
• Process specific training scripts
• Contrastive analysis
• Team curriculum assembly line
• Training design options - integration with other types of training
• Curriculum development: content
• Listening: authentic materials, comprehension, slang, regional accents
• Vocabulary & common idiomatic language
• Pronunciation - common names of people and places, numbers, terms within processes, syllable stress, word stress, intonation
• Culture component
• British vs. American vs. Indian Englishes
• Psychological encouragement: “You can do it!”

Piloting process

• Immediate feedback
• Recycling of material
• An essential step (frame it in business terms)

Assessment

• Existing screening test: story read aloud
• New test: prompts to elicit different types of spoken language
• Working with Six Sigma

Train-the-Trainer

• Basics of ESL
• Teaching skills: micro-teaching
• Transcription of NS-NS calls
• Diagnostic skills & using the new assessment instrument
• Observations of existing trainers
• Observations on the floor
• Cultural background & knowledge

Lessons from the world of corporate training

• Cost and speed are essential
• Don’t worry about getting it perfect the first time
• Get buy-in from the top
• Be sure that your team is dedicated 100% to your project
• Resistance happens
• Do periodic reality checks for timetables, expectations, etc.
• Line up technology needs in advance
• Nondisclosure & non-competition

Web Resources

www.commweb.com

Focuses on many areas of interest to call centers. Customer service and training issues are part of this, though there is much coverage of hardware and software needs.

www.callcentermagazine.com

Web-based version of popular call center magazine with some online content.

www.ascentgroup.com

Publishers of the Call Center E-Journal and other (expensive!) reports on the call center industry. You can get a free issue of the journal by signing up.

Print Resources

Block, P. (2000). Flawless consulting: A guide to getting your expertise used (2^nd ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass/Pfeiffer.

All-time best book on the consulting field in general with an excellent introduction and overview of key concepts such as contracting with clients and understanding and dealing with resistance. Expensive, but worth it.

Donna, S. (2000). Teach business English. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Good low-level introduction to the teaching of business English including basic needs analysis and setting up of general courses. The real strength of the book is in its example exercises for specific needs.

Hutchinson, T., & Waters, A. (1987). English for specific purposes: A learning-centred approach. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Excellent overview of ESP with a particularly useful section on course design.

Reeves, N. , & Wright, C. (1996). Linguistic auditing: A guide to identifying foreign language communication needs in corporations. Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters.

A detailed look at one method of needs analysis for corporate settings.

Swan, M. & Smith, B. (Eds.) (2001). Learner English: A teacher’s guide to interference and other problems (2^nd Ed.) Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Brilliant overview of the significant differences between English and twenty common first languages. Predicts the most common errors in pronunciation, grammar, and vocabulary caused by L₁ interference.

Download this handout as a Word document