With the global breakout of the coronavirus (COVID-19), employers are facing the reality of declaring a ‘work from home’ mandate to their staff. For companies and departments who take substantial amounts of inbound calls, we wish to guide you on how to cope with call forwarding your office landline to a home phone number while maintaining your usual standards of service. Using cloud technology and a hosted VoIP phone system, it could be the cheapest and most effective way of maintaining communications and managing staff remotely.
Companies will seriously need to rely on a hosted system phone system that provides reporting and analytical functionalities. How will managers know what calls are being taken and who by? Where will this information and data be tracked? Amidst the growing fear that human contact is to be reduced significantly, your company’s communications must function as usual without the necessity for a physical office space. We’re here to detail how transferring your phone system to byphone’s hosted platform could make your business optimal while operating remoting.
Here are our top tips for managing your staff and communications from home:
Managing Staff Remotely with Call Reporting, Recording and Presence
OK, so you’ve sent staff home for the standard 14-day self-isolation process. However, the domino effect could result in multiple members of staff falling ill and at different times. Alas, the only option may be for the entire office to close entirely. How do we make sure that your employees are making the required amount of calls to customers and dealing with a sufficient number of queries while working at home? byphone’s hosted phone system produces powerful call reporting analytics that allows the user to instantly view how many calls their staff are making and receiving. Setting out a target amount of calls for each staff per day ensures they are working towards a specific goal.
However, what happens if calls go longer than expected and staff don’t meet their required target? Thankfully our ad-on call recording function provides the manager with the ability to listen to all calls. If staff are worried that a call or query took longer than expected, the call recording feature will justify their activity and save any blushes in front of management.
Finally, even without a physical desk-phone, users can seamlessly access their online portal and view who’s available, who’s on the phone and who’s on their coffee break. byphone’s presence panel will enable users to collaborate and communicate with ease, from the comfort of their own home.
Forwarding Company DDIs
So, you’re making a lot of calls from home, but the last thing the customer needs is an unrecognised number contacting them about your services. Thus, two significant problems are created: 1) Calling from the number not registered as your company line signifies untrustworthiness and many customers might not answer. 2) A customer now has a record of your number; if they’re overseas, they may call back at an inconvenient time – no one want’s an unexpected 3 am wake up call.
Making sure your number displays the same on your virtual telephone system at home is essential in maintaining the integrity of the company’s image while protecting you from sharing your personal information with customers. Using byphone’s call settings, link the device you wish to connect to your company’s phone system and all outbound calls will display your business’ DDI number.
Redirecting Call Flows for Staff Unable to Work
All staff may be working from home, but that doesn’t mean they can’t fall ill with COVID-19. If this happens, you must be prepared to redirect your calls to another employee without interrupting the quality of service for your customers.
If you a running a small business through a VoIP telephone system, making sure you’re prepared for a sudden staff illness is of critical importance to keep the business call flows operating efficiently. Using our simple ‘drag & drop’ function, users can redirect their companies call flow to available employees.
Trade Physical Meetings for Conference Calls
For SME’s housing small teams, constant communication is a necessity for productivity. Job roles will cross over various departments resulting in questions about multiple areas of the business. Ensuring these questions are answered, but also, making other staff members are aware of the case is critical for ensuring communications flow correctly.
The conference call functionality on a hosted phone system, allows small business to efficiently manage their workflow through continual communication of its remote workers. Schedule a business call with your workings at the beginning and end of the day to make sure objectives are completed and issued to the correct team members. Also, using smart productivity/project management applications such as monday.com & ClickUp can aid the communications process for multiple departments working together on various tasks.
No Broadband, No Problem
Working from home can be flawless for the generations who understand technology. The more challenging question comes from those who’ve not embraced cloud technology and are not set up at home for plug and play systems. There are two possible scenarios:
- Workers with little to no connectivity at home
- Workers with little knowledge of cloud technology and resistance to adoption
Thankfully, for workers with poor connectivity, our instant mobile app provisioning through QR codes allow users to use their mobile data to stay connected. Better yet, they can still use their GSM for inbound calls, while still being able to transfer calls to other devices.
For workers with little adaption to cloud working, things couldn’t be easier. One of the most significant issues usually consists of requiring cables to plug into their desk-phones. With our WiFi dongles, simply bring your desk-phone home and connect to your WiFi in the same way as every other device; just remember the plug for power.
Morale Boosting Incentives
Some people love working from home, whether involuntary or not, but others hate it. Many employees love where they work; it’s a place they can socialise with friends, work in a team environment and get a strong sense of satisfaction at the end of the day. Office beers or Afternoon Tea can be enough for many to make the journey, far and wide. But what happens when those luxuries and enjoyments are taken from us due to the spread of COVD-19?
For employees who look forward to the perks of the workplace, but are unable to enjoy them, weekly incentives could be a great strategy to boost morale. Instead of beers or buns, those who hit their targets can finish early with really high achievers being sent an e-voucher from JustEat or Deliveroo. Setting up fun incentives for your team to strive for will help keep spirits high during trying times; who doesn’t want a free takeaway on a Friday night anyway?
