Emotional Labor Implications on a Call Centre

Emotional Labor

Implications on a Call Centre

During the last two decades Contact or call centers have emerged as the answer to cost effectiveness for all sort of businesses that require back end customer services (Boreham et al., 2007). These call centers hailing from different countries are very similar with respect to markets, offered services, structure of the organization and type of workforce. This industry has flourished very quickly but usually these call centers are about ten to twelve years old hence still in infancy. Despite the similarities that exist across the globe in standards, processes and customers; are these call centers actually catering to the emotional side of this work.

Being a repetitive task with only a set of responses most of the time with no creativity and innovation in the services process added with long hours and no formal education on the subject, do these call centers affect labor in a negative manner?

Emotional Labor is a new term used first by Arlie Hochschild in her book "The Managed Heart" in 1983. If we see closely the practice itself is very old as suppression of emotions for greater good and doing good deeds for other while controlling ones instincts goes back to as early as introduction of first religion. Emotional labor is the control that is exercised by the worker which results in an appropriate and required manner (Chu, 2002). This means that the employee has to suppress or evoke certain emotions in order to exhibit and conform to emotions and behaviors that are required on the job. In order to understand emotional labor one must look in to, what determines the rational response to a situation? They can sometimes be policies, code of conduct or core values etc. stipulated by formal organizations for conformity to acceptable behavior and sometimes these are just "manners" (Mann, 2004).

There are many jobs that require a set of emotional displays. For example Nurses are expected to display care, kindness and empathy while in food service industry one expects friendliness and hygiene, Call center or customer care representatives to be knowledgeable and caring while one expects policemen to be calm and cool without prejudice. One factor that all of these jobs have is that they provide services to customers, face-to-face or over voice only. This interaction builds up the perception of a customer about the service provider. Hence in service sector the provider must emphasize on the importance of customer satisfaction to its employees through its practices, policies and other company literature. (Steinberg & Figart, 1999)

Emotional labor is practiced in either of the ways; surface acting or deep acting. Surface action means that the person suppresses the actual felt emotion and displays an artificial or fake emotion. Deep acting is means the person changes the felt emotions by controlling and enhancing internal thoughts and feelings, in order to exhibit the required emotion. (Diefendroff, 2005; Grandey 2000). These required emotions, company standards and conformity to policies are called display rule by Ekman (1973).

Emotion Labor theory has many factors contributing the enhancement of retail and service industries; Structuralism, on which Hochschild did a lot of work focuses on macro-social factors which means that emotions are understood by the audience. The subject is perceived as passive and in need of emotional management. Hence no space for self-actualization and innovation as individual understands its place in the prevailing social structure (Lupton 1998:21). Researches such as Scheff suggests that in an organizational setting and emotional labor one does not feels guilt as the conformity to norms in the team and the organization relates to the individual. For example getting an angry customer then becomes a norm within teams and is laughed at and has very low surface or deep effect amongst individuals. This conformity then results in pride while non-conformity is looked at as being strange as it is the norm amongst the other team members and is sometimes punished. In similar way if the standards provided by the customer services representative are the same then any negative comment has no negative effect on the individuals.

The cognitive theorists focus more on the emotional process then emotions. They suggest that individuals can understand their emotions and are emotionally aware resulting in decisions about self and other based on their emotions. Presenting such an emotion to others triggers reactions and dispositions. Emotional reactions are result of an informed understanding in which individuals look for consistency (in Lawler & Thye 1999:228-229). For example as per cognitive theory, the understanding of a situation by one service provider may differ entirely to the other. A stressing conversation between call center agent and customer may result in negative consequences and an unhappy customer but for another interaction a call center agent may come out unscratched emotionally as he conformed with the norms and customer's expectations were not realistic.

Phenomenological method focuses on meaningful and dynamic factors that shape our emotions and recognizes that subjects are capable of understanding and interpreting their emotions. Although this approach also suggests that one's emotions at workplace are governed by individual stances towards the world. (Finkelstein in Lupton 1998:21). For example a happier more satisfied person would react less to negative emotions directed towards him. This individual's attitude is shaped by one's positive experience and overall positive contribution for self and others. For example a person with a complete and better life, with a happy family, diet and hobbies may not react to negative emotions then an unhappy person with troubled life.

Social Exchange theory looks at emotional labor as set of exchanges and interactions and if an individual wants a similar response he should continue to behaving in that positive manner (Blau 1964:6). For example a call center agent may adopted one particular approach to every customer; a well-versed welcome and developed empathy for the customer may not get distressed due to a negative comment by customer.

While contemporary theorists see emotional labor as a set of negotiation and a binding contract that is set and agreed upon beforehand hence certain behaviors are to be expected from the interacting parties and benefiting both. Molm (1997, 1999). For example as per the nature of this industry the hiring manager may reveal to the incumbent that while making calls you may come across difficult customers; upon agreement the individual is hired and such patience is expected from him while on job. Hence the individual expects such a behavior from some angry customers and has conformity to the norms.

Like any call center, all service industries interact with customers on a daily basis. These jobs require a basic element of courtesy in employees for customers regardless of how the customer responds. This treatment given by the customer tends to be negative sometimes and it can have a very negative impact on the employee resulting in distress, hypertension and even heart diseases (Persaud, 2004). As a result of these negative consequences employees tend to suffer burnout and consequently lower their service standards.

This theory can be easily applied to employees working in a call center, although there is no face-to-face interaction between both parties but one single mistake by the agent can easily prompt the customer to behave in a negative manner. In this instance a customer only calls the service provider when he is not satisfied with the provided services or when things are not in order, immediately there is a usual queue of calls in which a customer waits for his turn. Additionally the customer is always right notion has also given awareness to the customer of being right no matter how he behaves with the service provider's representatives. Hence all these factors result in a communication where customer tends to enforce his point-of-view and misbehaves.

The agent has no choice but to stay calm and answer the queries of an enraged customer hence service providers are required to regulate or manage their "felt" emotions and display certain emotions for commercial purpose only. These "display" emotions have economic value which is transformed into salaries, bonuses, commissions or other benefits (Hochschild, 1983).

Emotional labor can also result in job satisfaction if the employee separate's the "felt" emotion and "display" emotions hence the resulting reward and quality of maintained services results in motivation.

The role of employee relationship department is very vital in promoting a conducive and friendly environment where a team can share its "felt" emotions to an extent. (Nicholls, 2003).

There is a possibility that one may lose a job or resign due to emotional labor or letting the felt emotion come out. This is a major point of concern for call centers with high attrition rates but human resource department can cater to these emotional stages using different motivating techniques.

First of all the HR department can develop a better work life for employees by providing certain flexibilities to the employees on request basis. In adopting such an approach a survey is conducted to analyze if workforce needs additional flexibility to existing schedule. Such flexibilities were fully agreed that resulted in enhanced motivation and productivity. Women were also found seeking flexibility in work in most cases more than working men as mothers of infants and school going children need more time to manage their life. (Barbara, 2011). Taking the example of Korean firms where a study showed that Family-friendly workplaces do not always benefit the business. In presence of high performance work system (HPWS) and teams providing employees with too much flexibility and family friendly management can have negative impact on firm and consequently its turnover, labor productivity and labor relations (Jong-Sung., 2010). In relation to call center industry one cannot disregard the fact that work hours depend mostly on time zones where customers reside for example a call center agent in India offering services to a customer in USA would have to work in a night shift so he can pitch his services during day time in United States of America.

It is also important to understand that most of the call centers are not unionized and the need to unionize such institutions would never be felt if there are changes in labor policies, a deregulated and individual approach to employee relations and increasing employer interest in strategic human resource management. A conducive corporate culture, effective reward system and engaged employees can reduce chances of employees to form a union no matter how much the employee strength increases.( Dianne, 1997)

Promoting equality amongst the workforce is very important in the industry of call centers as there is no face-to-face interaction with the customers there should be no preference given to how an employee looks like or the "right look" as implied by Peter Waring in his journal of industrial relations. Discrimination on the basis of one's appearance should be discouraged in this industry and flexibility in wearing casual clothing is a norm due to long hours and no interactivity with the customers. This promotes a friendly and equal environment although in promoting employees manager's preference to better looking employees remains a debatable topic. (Peter., 2011).

Taking the call center industry under consideration one can see that this business is either based on selling products directly to the customers by calling them on their cell phones or landlines (Outbound calls) and providing customer support services (Inbound calls) to calling customers after sales or for handling their general queries.

In general it is found that both types of call center services have negative consequences on employees related to low wages, not a long-term career, industry in infancy, long work hours, work hours based on customer availability (different time zones), no formal education or degrees to support the profession, repetitive task with same responses or pitch, strict performance monitoring and reward based on sales and the most influential factor is behavior of customers on phone.

For comparison purpose we can categorize call center markets and group them in three.

1. Social Market Economies, having strong labor market and strict regulations. Countries include Austria, Denmark, France, Germany, Israel, Netherlands, Spain and Sweden.

2. Liberal market economies, with more relaxed labor market regulations and less influential labor institutions. Countries include Canada, Ireland, UK and USA.

3. Recently industrialized or transitional economies, Countries included in this category are Brazil, India, Poland, South Africa and South Korea.

We find that in social market economies there are better jobs with lower attrition rate with low wages as compared to call centers in liberal markets while recently industrialized economies are in worst state using weak market regulations to their advantage and sub-contracting outsourced work which results in lower quality and de-motivated employees due to lowest wages and ineffective reward structures.

Besides these apparent differences other major differences in call centers that effect the emotional labor are;

1. Low Job Discretion: Job discretion is generally low throughout the industry but social and liberal markets have comparatively better job discretion then recently industrialized economies. For example In India alone 75% call centers have low job discretion.

2. Performance Monitoring: The methodology of monitoring performance differs widely. Recently industrialized economies are more concerned with monitoring hence they appraise performance on a weekly basis, monthly in social markets and fortnightly in liberal markets. It is found that monitoring activities in Asian call centers are most intense.

3. Teams: The practice of having self-directed teams is very low across the industry.

4. Union and CBA: A collective representation and unionized structure is present in social and liberal economies but recently industrialized economies have very low percentage of call centers having collective representation.

5. Total Attrition Rate: A typical call center has an attrition rate of 20% per year. Although there is a difference of attrition in all three economies with 15% in social economies, 25% in liberal economies and 23% in industrialized economies. India has the highest attrition rate amongst all countries with 40%.

6. Workforce Tenure: Due to no career progression in most of the call centers, individuals who turn to call centers are either working part time or studying to get a better job. Due to inevitable factors employees tend to have early burnouts and leave this industry for better jobs. The study shows that most individuals don't even complete one year in this industry. Although this tenure differs in the three economies with 16% in social markets, 21% in liberal markets and 38% in industrializing economies. India stands out the most with 60% of employees leaving their call center jobs before completing their first year.

7. Cost of Turnover: The Cost of turnover in this market is very high as the new incumbent is trained and leaving employees result in loss of productivity. It is reported that replacing an employee takes at least three to four months of his salary as an additional cost.

Holman, Batt, and Holtgrewe 2007, Report of the Global Call Centre Network

Above statistics show that call center industry has a lot to do in comparison to other industries. Employee-customer interaction has definite affects on both parties; as customer creates a perspective based on the interaction with the employee and on the other hand a bad behavior from customer can ruin the day for the call center agent. The job itself is rewarding if commissions based on sales are achieved although most employee tend to weigh satisfaction more than money. The job of a call center agent pitching sales is more frustrating than after sales services, as more than 10% of the customers tend to disconnect the call if they sense a sales pitch for service they do not want. (Holtgrewe, 2007).