The Sisyphean Task of Being a Contact Center Agent

We must imagine Sisyphus happy!

We all have heard about Sissyphus. The king who was condemned to push a rock up a mountain only for the rock to roll down again upon reaching the top. Sometimes our jobs feel like a Sisyphean task, especially if you are an agent at a contact center.?

A day-to-day for a contact center agent is nothing short of pushing a boulder up a hill. Logging in and reviewing the tasks of the day, handling calls while maintaining a positive attitude throughout the day, managing multi-communication channels, handling frustrated customers, and maintaining sound KPIs throughout all this is an extremely grueling job.?

But it doesn’t have to be so. “We must imagine Sissyphus happy”, said Albert Camus in his book The Myth of Sissyphus. What did he mean? According to Camus, it is the experience and not the seemingly impossible goal that helps Sisyphus smile through his hardship. Indeed, experience is one of the most important aspects of any task. With contact center agents, the better the experience the more efficient and fulfilling their job.

So, how do you improve your contact center agents’ experience so they feel like they are making a difference? You reward their efforts with seamless and interactive experiences. Whether that means setting up wallboards to help your agents gauge their progress or employing an agent desktop to cut back time on window hopping, the idea is to set up an enriching and exciting experience across the board.