How Chat bots Change Staffing Practices

chat bots, staffing practices, bots

The 21st century has certainly seen waves of improvements and new technology in the business world. Some of these changes involve chat bots. Instead of speaking directly with a human being, customers and interested parties can speak with a chat bot. This way they can gain information or to resolve their inquiries. Businesses have many things to learn about these tools. Some of the knowledge is about the way that companies hire.

Reduced Customer Service Teams

With the addition of chat bots, some companies find the need to hire a reduced number of customer service representatives. Of course, this need can vary by company. Bots are typically designed to answer questions that do not necessarily include a wide range of variables. If a customer has a unique problem, this individual may not have much luck with a chat bot. However, many inquiries can be answered with a computer. This means that you do not necessarily need to hire as many people.

Increased Technical Specialists

While you may need to stop hiring as many customer service representatives, you may find yourself adding on to the technical team. After all, someone has to program these robots. Of course, you can explore a variety of options when it comes to this technology. However, you need to ensure that the robots are tailored to the needs of your company. A robot that can answer only general questions that are specific to a wide range of businesses is probably not the best solution. Instead, you must hire technicians capable of tailoring these tools to your business.

Increased Help Desk Support

In addition to hiring more technical specialists who program the robots, you are also likely going to have to expand your help desk. Some of the inquiries to the help desk are sure to come internally. As the technicians are working on the robots, they may collaborate with the help desk to resolve issues. Also, when customers are actually engaging with the bots, they may have questions come up about technical issues. You will need a help desk staff with individuals ready to help.

Added Analysts

When you have chat bots standing in to perform customer-service operations, you are going to have to get quite good at figuring out what types of questions customers will ask. Analysts who have experience in this field can help you to determine this information. In other words, what you really need to start brainstorming is a repository of questions that customers will ask. Once you have this repository, you can begin to develop the answers that the robots will provide. Predicting this type of inquiries can prove difficult. Fortunately, analysts can help you.

Extended Hours

Now that your customer service is offered by a chat bot, you are probably going to have to expand the hours overall. When you had human beings entirely handling the customer-service transactions, your business may have been confined to traditional working hours. When people can use chat bots to get answers to their questions, you are probably going to see business happening throughout the night. As a result, you may very well need to hire employees who work remotely in different parts of the country or the world. You’ll want to have support available in the varying time zones of your customers.

Digital Interviews

The process of hiring might also change as your company becomes more invested in these chat bots. For example, you may very well end up hiring individuals who live nowhere near you. Traveling to the physical location of your business, if you even still have one, might simply prove impractical. Therefore, you will need to become more skilled in conducting interviews online. You also want to get familiar with using the internet for business happenings considering your plan to integrate chat bots into the picture.

Qualifications

You are also going to have to really change the ways in which you look at qualifications for new hires. In the past, when you were hiring humans to conduct customer-service transactions, you likely sought out individuals who had strong interpersonal skills and who exuded a friendly demeanor in conversations. As you are hiring professionals to work more behind the scenes, you may find that these more personal characteristics may simply not matter as much. In fact, you may find that what you really need to prioritize are the candidates’ degrees and their level of experience in working with chat bots.

Professional Angle

You may also need to add people to the hiring team. If you yourself do not have experience in hiring individuals with the necessary technology background, knowing the questions to ask and what to look for in candidates can prove quite difficult. Ultimately, what you may need to do is to hire people who can help you to hire people. As you begin to build on knowledge in the area, you may find that you are able to conduct the interviews again then for yourself.

 

More Money

When people hear that you are reducing the number of humans whom you’re hiring in favor of robots, they might automatically think that your company is trying to save money. However, take a look at all of the additions that you’re making. You need to ensure that you have staff members available to handle inquiries at different times of the day and night. Also, you must hire individuals with degrees in areas such as computer science. Which means, these new employees may require higher salaries than employees in the past did. Chances are that you are going to see some of your costs rise. The positive part of these increased costs is that you are using them to expand your business.

Chat bots are certainly changing the way that companies hire. The number of changes that apply to you really depends upon your specific business. What’s most important is that you’re aware that some changes are likely necessary and that you look into the ones that are most important for your business.

Industry Awards and Affiliations

Partner with Ansafone!

Learn more about our full array of CONTACT CENTER SERVICES to match your business needs.

Ansafone can increase your call center performance and efficiency, lower operational costs, and create new sales opportunities for your business. We are ready to support your VIP customer support outsourcing and be an extension of your brand!
01.
Competitive advantage by increasing consumer awareness of your brand.
02.
Improving your VIP customer service engagement levels and
03.
Extending the reach and effectiveness of your customer outreach programs

Fill Out for Free Quote!

Subscribe to receive more blog articles

Download Case Study PDF