How to Dictate Agent Tone

Agent tone issues are typically associated with the particular sound of an agent's voice like unenthusiastic, cold, and disinterested. But simply telling an agent to stop sounding that way and expecting them to change rarely works. What to do?

The proven way to dictate agent tone is to control the specific words and phrases they use throughout their calls. This is what words and phrases are designed for.

In today's call center field, the prevailing narrative espoused by experts and software companies neglects the very foundation and most important component of the call center product: words and phrases. The consideration of words and phrases, also called diction is practically nonexistent as pundits and software platforms search for a solution to why so many call centers are dissatisfied with how their agents sound and perform.

It is a little like opening a restaurant, omitting the importance of food quality, and then searching for answers to why everyone is unhappy with how their food tastes.

The call center product is a language product. A phone call is an exchange of language, not a software calculation. The ingredients of language are words and phrases. Master the complexities of words and phrases and you will master the call center product and the customer or patient experience. And it is easy for any agent to learn to do with proper guidance.

When hearing an agent sounding cold and uncaring for example, it may be concluded it is just the inflection of their voice, but that sound is created and enabled by the agent's use or non-use of specific words and phrases.

If you changed the agent's words and phrases to only those that are highly professional, it would be incredibly difficult for the agent to then sound cold and uncaring. Negative tone is a symptom of and enabled by poor diction. Proper diction eliminates negative tone and creates positive tone, impeccable manners, and a superior customer or patient experience.

But holding agents accountable for executing proper diction throughout their calls is highly challenging and beyond the capability of scripts, checklists, or speech analytics software. So even if proper diction and manners are the solutions, if holding agents accountable for executing them is unrealistic, it really is no solution. Thankfully it is not unrealistic at all.

The BCI training program teaches agents to use perfect diction and manners throughout their calls, and our proprietary monitoring methodology holds them perfectly accountable. BCI produces agents whose excellent diction, manners, and subsequent tone create the highest quality customer or patient experience possible.