Coaching is a long-established best practice for managers hoping to drive agent performance, but traditional coaching is time consuming and labor intensive, making it difficult for supervisors to effectively coach even a small team of agents — let alone scale coaching to entire contact centers.
Today, generative AI and conversational intelligence are empowering a new approach to coaching. The Aragon Research Globe recently named Cresta a leader in Enterprise Coaching for 2024; as part of the report, Aragon shed light on how the function of coaching is evolving, and the capabilities solutions need in order to evolve along with it.
Broadening scope: Growing demand and new potential for coaching
Though The Globe recognized the demand for sales coaching in years past, the latest report highlights the increasing emphasis on coaching for all customer-facing roles, whether focused on sales or customer care.
As new innovations mount, contact center leaders are gaining awareness that coaching agents is not just possible, but vital.
Advancements in conversational intelligence and generative AI enable wider access to coaching solutions, and Aragon notes a new use case outside of sales and customer care: guidance for managers on how and when to coach agents. In turn, coaching can now be viewed through a more comprehensive, enterprise-wide lens.
Parallel to heightened awareness of coaching solutions, contact centers are facing more demand than ever, but managers are spread too thin to effectively coach across organizations, particularly in the era of remote work.
This increased awareness and growing volume of work have contributed to a rise in demand for coaching solutions.
Understanding Enterprise Coaching: A comprehensive approach
According to The Globe’s definition, “coaching is about both skills (how), interaction conversations (what), and feedback (how to do better next time).” Aragon notes that coaching was traditionally carried out by managers after the conversation ended, but now, Enterprise Coaching solutions leverage conversational intelligence to coach in real time and correct behaviors before they become habits.
In turn, an Enterprise Coaching solution includes five key elements: live coaching, practice sessions, analytics, manager reporting, and post-call feedback. For Cresta, these are long-standing capabilities, but Aragon highlights live coaching as a still-emerging area they expect to see more vendors pursuing.
The critical role of onboarding
While onboarding may not immediately jump out as an area impacted by coaching, Aragon points out a close link. Efficient onboarding is one of the greatest challenges for contact centers, particularly those focused on sales.
Robust and effective sales playbooks and coaching practices help reps ramp faster by providing the necessary guidance, even in remote environments. In effect, the role of a coaching solution can be felt from an agent’s first day — if it is, onboarding is bound to be a more streamlined journey.
A leading provider for contact center leaders
Placed in the leader quadrant for Enterprise Coaching, Cresta’s strengths highlighted in The Globe include:
- Omni-channel capabilities
- Real-time coaching and agent assist
- Real-time summarization
- Automated note taking
- Focus on both agents and managers
As the emphasis on real-time support grows in step with demand for coaching, Cresta takes a comprehensive approach to driving contact centers’ success. Read the full report here, or reach out for a personalized demo!
