One third of call centre staff are graduates

ILW

kabayiri wrote: »

Call centres are increasingly becoming Contact Centres. The name change highlights a change in focus. Increasingly the staff are expected to have a wider range of capability, and multi-skilling is not uncommon.

The increasing use of graduates comes as no surprise.

I wouldn't be surprised to see growth in this sector as local government up and down the country look for ways to reduce cost by outsourcing departmental functions wholesale.

Of course it does. You definitely need at least a 2.2 to say "computer says no".
Anyway give it few years and everybody will have a degree in something.

amcluesent

Oh dear. Let's see how this works.

C/C/D at A-level in Drama/Media Studies, Environmental Management, Politics
2:1 in Online Media/Philosophy at a former Poly
£20,000 debt
500 letters and CVs sent
Take min wage job at call centre

kabayiri

ILW wrote: »

Of course it does. You definitely need at least a 2.2 to say "computer says no".
Anyway give it few years and everybody will have a degree in something.

I don't say I think Contact Centres are great, but I have been directly involved with commissioning a few new ones recently (in the middle of one right now).

Some of them are heavily scripted. Some are very different, like the careers advice service.

You are right about the degree thing though. I got to hear a lot of careers advice and the overwhelming focus is on people attaining skills through training. It seems like every job role has a professional body nowadays. For example, I never ever imagined there could be 2 national bodies for Play Therapists !

It isn't very long before the conversations focus on funding either. People retraining are expected to help fund their own future development more and more. This may easily lead to problems for some.

StevieJ

ILW wrote: »

Of course it does. You definitely need at least a 2.2 to say "computer says no".
Anyway give it few years and everybody will have a degree in something.

I don't think it is very clever to be ridiculing the occupations of people, next you will be having a go at those that can't get a job.

ILW

StevieJ wrote: »

I don't think it is very clever to be ridiculing the occupations of people, next you will be having a go at those that can't get a job.

I was not ridiculing the job, I was ridiculing the low level of acumen needed to get some degrees.

kabayiri

StevieJ wrote: »

I don't think it is very clever to be ridiculing the occupations of people, next you will be having a go at those that can't get a job.

It's a very stressful time for many.

You can hear it in peoples' voices when they call advice services. The effects on the telephone advisers should not go unnoticed either. Imagine having to placate and empathise with people all day long. I know I'd find it extremely wearing.

Personally speaking, these workers have my admiration.

The-mouth-of-the-south

working the phones all day will send a lot into depression, drink and other unhealthy directions. These are moden day factories without the stress relief of having a joke with a colleague. Instead its all stats stats stats.

olly300

To be honest I don't know what the fuss is about. Both myself and lots of my friends worked in Call Centres when we graduated.

I went on to do a Master's degree (like another one of my friend's), others used it to save up for a gap year and most used it as a job to pay the bills while they were searching and applying for other roles.

We weren't and aren't all arts and social science graduates.

Would you prefer graduates to stay on the dole?

olly300

The-mouth-of-the-south wrote: »

working the phones all day will send a lot into depression, drink and other unhealthy directions. These are moden day factories without the stress relief of having a joke with a colleague. Instead its all stats stats stats.

Most workers last a few months.

Most call centres rely on the fact that people don't want to remain in the job.

Funny thing is I worked for 2. The one that paid a lower wage was a nicer place to work and kept their workers for longer.

misskool

This doesn't come as much of a surprise though. If you raise the educational bar, then you raise the minimum requirements accordingly. In the 50s or 60s when most people didn't have O-levels (or equivalent) that would have been the discriminating factor.

When more people got them, it moved up to A-Levels (or equivalent). Now that more people have a degree, it becomes the minimum requirement.