By
Erica Marois
| Published: July 17, 2019
| Comments
For nearly a decade, ICMI has recognized outstanding contact center
supervisors through the ICMI Global Contact Center Awards program.
Candidates in this category must directly supervise frontline customer
service agents, and meet a variety of criteria including the following:
- Motivation and commitment to improving the customer experience
- Qualities that make them uniquely suited to a customer service role
- Efforts to create the most productive environment possible
- Effective skills training and coaching team members
- Evidence of involvement in the introduction or implementation of an
innovative or creative new initiative that has led to improvements in
customer service
With dozens of high-caliber applicants this year, the judges had a
difficult job to complete. After two rounds of judging, weeks of
deliberation, and then weeks more of suspense, Nate Brown officially
revealed our 2019 winner at the annual Global Contact Center Awards party
in May. This year’s honoree for Best Contact Center Supervisor was Ashley
Trout, from WebMD Health Services. Ashley began her career at WebMD as an
agent, and after nearly four years serving on the frontlines, she was
promoted to supervisor in 2014, and given a team of 18 agents (or health
coaches, as they’re called at WebMD) to oversee--some in-office and others
working remotely from home.
Through thoughtful responses, pictures, and dozens of glowing testimonials,
Ashley’s colleagues did an amazing job of showing our judges why she’s so
deserving of this recognition. While we could write pages and pages about
why Ashley is an amazing supervisor, one of the things that stood out about
her approach to leadership is the way she personalizes her interactions
with each agent and prioritizes building strong relationships.
A Personalized, Relational Approach to Leadership
At WebMD, Ashley has developed a reputation for remembering the little
details and celebrating them on a regular basis. Teammates say Ashley is
the type of boss who never forgets a birthday or a work anniversary. Not
only does she remember those important milestones, but she’s also been
known to go all out, flexing her creativity by decorating cubicles for
special occasions, and bringing in treats to share with the contact center.
She also takes the time to get to know all of the agents who report to her
and makes it a point to find about about their interests, both in and
outside of work.
“Ashley cares about each individual on her team as a person,” said Amanda
Burleson, Training and Development Specialist at WebMD. “She is there as a
listening ear for her coaches to voice their opinions, complaints or ideas.
She builds rapport with them by getting to know more about their
personality style, what motivates them, and how they function at work.”
Ashley is constantly in touch with her team--via in-person meetings, calls,
or IMs. One manager noted that Ashely is known to have 15 or more IMs open
at a time. She’s the person that everyone feels comfortable approaching for
help or advice. Every morning her team has a 15- minute daily briefing, and
on Wednesdays, they have a 30- minute team meeting where they gather to
discuss things like quality trends, proper workflow refreshers or a health
topic that impacts their customers. If her team is struggling in an area of
the quality rubric, she will have a quality assurance representative join
the meeting to answer questions and address the issue at hand.
How has this personalized, hands-on approach benefitted Ashley’s direct
reports, the team as a whole, and her customers? Ashley’s managers say her
team members are more motivated to succeed, and the proof is in their
outstanding quality results.
A Natural Coach Who Inspires Results
“Quality scores are a top priority for Ashley, as she knows that translates
to a positive end-user experience for the customers we serve every day,”
said Burleson. “In 2018, her Team was the most consistent with their
quality (QA) scores, receiving the highest QA score five out of the twelve months
and exceeding our 90% quality goal.”
Because Ashley spent years in the same position that her team
members are now in, she’s uniquely qualified to help them work through the
challenges of their role and able to guide them proactively. If one of her
team members is struggling in a specific area of the quality rubric, she
works with the quality assurance team to ensure that team member gets the
training they need to succeed and that she understands any changes in
protocols.
Ashley also works hard to find meaningful ways to reward her team for a job
well done. For example, her team once finished first in a company-wide
competition and they used their team budget to rent a bus and spend a day
downtown together socializing. Her team members said they had a blast and
appreciated the chance to enjoy each other’s company outside of the office.
The time together helped them build stronger friendships that have carried
over into a better work environment.
Beyond her assigned duties, Ashley regularly goes above and beyond to help
the training and coaching teams get new agents acclimated in their roles.
She teaches the new hires helpful productivity hacks and shows them how to
balance quality with efficiency. Ashley also helps the training team with
mock call exercises. During mock calls, a supervisor or quality team member
calls the new health coach or customer service representative and completes
a practice session over the phone. After the mock is complete, they stay on
the line to receive feedback, then complete a second session. This second
session allows them to improve based on the areas just outlined in
feedback. Ashley has a knack for throwing some curveballs at the new agents
during those practice sessions, just to make sure they’re prepared to think
on their feet with an inevitable curveball comes their way during a real
call.
WebMD Cares
Ashely is not just a fun, attentive manager who goes above and beyond to
serve WebMD team members and customers, she’s also a role model who’s
played an active role in building and growing WebMD’s community outreach
program. Her commitment to making a positive impact in the local community
wowed our judges, with one commenting:
“Ashley not only balances her leadership to improve her team but also
her community. She seems to impact everyone around her in an extremely
positive way! With her tenure and the respect of her team, she has many
doors open ahead of her.”
In 2016, WebMD launched an internal philanthropy program, WebMD Cares,
which was established to better align corporate social responsibility
activities so that WebMD’s grant-giving and volunteer efforts would have a
greater impact, both internally and externally. Ashley heads up those
efforts for the Indianapolis office, organizing every aspect of employee
volunteer events, from ordering t-shirts to communicating with the
nonprofits and distributing post-event surveys. In October of 2018, Ashley
spearheaded an Impact Day at a local food bank. Employees assembled 1,440
food sacks to provide weekend meals to kids in need, prepared 700 shipping
boxes for warehouse use, and also sorted over 9,000 pounds of frozen meat
for food pantry distribution. This activity provided call center employees
with a fun, interactive way to network and serve the local community, but
it also reinforced the mission and values of WebMD in a tangible way.
Company-Wide Accolades
Even beyond the walls of the contact center, Ashley is well-known as a
valuable part of the WebMD Health Services team. She’s a prime example of a
leader who advocates for and advances the perception of the contact
center’s value. Last year, Ashley was recognized as an MVP through WebMD’s
corporate employee recognition program. One of her peers nominated her for
her customer focus and valuable contributions to the training program,
noting that she did double the work that was expected, without even being
asked. And plenty more employees have spoken up to share rave reviews for
Ashley. When the WebMD Health Services leaders announced that they’d like
to nominate a supervisor for the ICMI Global Contact Center Awards, they
let the team vote to select the nominee, and the feedback for Ashley was
overwhelmingly positive, including testimonials like these:
“Hands down the best sup in the office, but that needs no explanation.
She has stepped in to handle multiple other sups duties when they are
sick or on vacation, she is always open to help on weekends if there is
no sup available. She is the go-to for escalations and WFM has always
used her for feedback and updates. There is no question that this woman
should be given this award. She keeps her head down even when being
overlooked for other tasks. She is always positive and then some.”
“I think the best supervisor of the year for 2018 should go to Ashley
Trout. She has been the best supervisor I have had for numerous
reasons. Anytime I have had a problem she will go above and beyond to
help me fix it. She has a very positive attitude and makes the work
environment so fun. She goes above and beyond with keeping
communication open on our team. She is always keeping us in the loop
with changes and anything we need to know about. She is extremely
hard-working and amazing!”
“She always goes above and beyond to meet the needs and wants of her
fellow co-workers. She is a team player and a strategic problem solver.
Her abilities to effectively communicate new information, positive
news, negative news, or just explain what's going on in general to her
peers are far more advanced than any supervisor I've had in my life.
Her down to earth personality makes her easy to talk to and even more
easy to relate to. She's awesome in every way and deserves this!”
Ashley’s also earned the respect and recognition of senior leaders,
including Sarah Koop, Assistant Manager of Health Education.
“Ashley Trout is an amazing asset to WebMD,” said Koop. “I see her as a ‘go
to’ person for many things. I take comfort in knowing that if I need to
delegate something, she helps out where she can and never complains. Her
positive spirit is infectious, and she truly brings joy to this office.”
What’s Next for Ashley?
Since the awards party, Ashley has earned a promotion. This month, she
stepped into her new role as Client Program Manager. It’s a move she’s been
working toward for over a year, so she’s thrilled to see her hard work
recognized as her career continues to advance at WebMD Health Services.
With her new title, Ashley is actively managing client accounts that
utilize the call center's services. She says her years of experience in the
contact center side of the business have armed her with the unique ability
to better understand how to communicate with clients and more easily
de-escalate any issues as they arise. And she’s thankful for the
recognition of her team and the ICMI awards judges, which helped her
achieve her goals.
“Winning the award for Best Contact Center Supervisor really meant so much
to me; from start to finish,” she says. “The fact that folks from all areas
of the business were willing to put my name in the running was
acknowledgment enough in my book. Then, to read all of the wonderful things
that my teammates and leaders put into the submission was so fulfilling. I
am someone who wants to always question the status quo, to push for
improvement, and to also break through the invisible rule that you can't
have fun at work. I am thankful that I have a workplace that allows me to
do all of these things--and rewards me for doing it, too! I do not take
this lightly, as I know how valuable it truly is.”
Want to learn more about the award-winning things the team at WebMD
Health Services is doing? Be sure to attend session 501 at Contact Center Connections, this October 28-30 in Chicago.