... MANY CONTACT CENTER TRAINING MODELS WERE BUILT IN THE 1990s AND EARLY 2000s. THEY DESPERATELY REQUIRE UPDATING FOR THE AGE OF AGENTIC AI...
TRAINING
BY MIKE AOKI, REFLECTIVE KEYNOTES, INC.
ILLUSTRATION PROVIDED BY ADOBE STOCK
EVERY AI HANDOFF IS AN ESCALATION
IS YOUR TRAINING READY?
I
could be the nicest person in the world, but when the interaction drops into my headset, the customer is already yelling.
• They have been through the website FAQ, IVR, agentic voice AI, and now I am the fourth layer they are facing.
• They are frustrated, angry, and they want the company, meaning me since I answered the phone, to know how angry they are.
That is what agents are facing now. That is what makes emotional intelligence, de-escalation skills, and the ability for
10 CONTACT CENTER PIPELINE agents to emotionally reset after a call crucial for both customer retention and agent retention.
THE BROKEN TRAINING MODEL
With agentic AI voice and chat, every contact that moves to a human agent is an escalation. Those require more advanced skills and better training. However, many contact center training models were built in the 1990s and early 2000s. They desperately require updating for the age of agentic AI.
New hire agent training used to be about training people to handle the most common interactions, such as password resets and account balance inquiries.
... MANY CONTACT CENTER TRAINING MODELS WERE BUILT IN THE 1990s AND EARLY 2000s. THEY DESPERATELY REQUIRE UPDATING FOR THE AGE OF AGENTIC AI...