Though contact centers have been operating successfully for several decades, the industry is relatively new and many centers find themselves struggling to define a measurement system that is meaningful to the organization. While all agree that measuring performance is important, many centers are grappling with what should be measured and how. The critical factor for call centers is to find the measurements which are indices for successful business and to make those measurements understandable across the organization.

We measure a lot, but we don't know why. In the customer contact industry, we've always had technology that delivers an incredible amount of data to the management team every day. Managers believe that, because these numbers are produced, they must be important to look at. So, they diligently spend time trying to decipher the data, thinking they will unlock the secret of the contact center's performance.

Unfortunately, many of the numbers don't tell us anything; data by itself is meaningless. The only time data provides insight is when it's put into context. The primary reason we measure should be to accurately assess current performance to determine the best way to invest our resources. In my opinion, one of our greatest downfalls is we over-measure and under-manage.