LEADERSHIP SOURCING AND SELECTION

Industry Content Supporter:
Marc Carriere
Managing Director
https://www.linkedin.com/in/marccarriere/

The team leader's role is critical in any call center. A fantastic team leader will lift their team to more tremendous success, while a bad one can crash it. That’s why hiring someone with the right traits should be your most important consideration when hiring a new team leader. 

Over the 35 years I’ve been running marketing departments and call centers around the world and consulting with businesses coaching Call Center Managers and Team Leaders, I’ve learned the hard way that getting the right person in the team leader role is more important than making sure they have all the practical skills to do the job.  Imparting new skills like call monitoring and scoring or providing corrective feedback is easy, especially when you’re coaching people with the right traits.  

There are many traits and qualities to look for when hiring a new team leader, however, the top three that I look for in a new team leader, or any other leadership role for that matter, begin with honesty.  Honesty is the foundation of any relationship. If a leader isn’t always honest, they’ll never earn the trust of their team, peers or management. And, without earning their team’s trust, they’ll never get anyone to follow them or break their backs for them.  Next is integrity. Someone with integrity is widely trusted and seen as a direct, truthful person who presents the unvarnished truth appropriately and helpfully. They keep confidences, admit mistakes, and never misrepresent themselves for personal gain.  

The last trait you want to find is high emotional intelligence. You want someone who can control their emotions and doesn’t let negative feelings or thoughts influence their decision-making skills, so they’re less likely to make hasty decisions.  You want someone good at understanding and caring about the emotions of others, so they can play an essential role in conflict resolution with better ways of handling conflicts.  

Industry Content Supporter:
Marc Carriere
Managing Director
https://www.linkedin.com/in/marccarriere/

Team leaders are the backbone of any call center, and depending on who you have in that critical role, can make or break you. Many Call Center Managers usually promote an excellent operator as a team leader, thinking they should be able to show others how to be as good as they are. Still, the sad reality is that not all outstanding operators have the characteristics and traits of fantastic team leaders.

Over the years, I’ve managed call centers and consulted with small to large businesses worldwide. As a call center owner, I’ve seen call centers face many challenges, including ineffective team leaders. The major problem is that many people responsible for running call centers don’t fully grasp the best traits of successful team leaders. Consequently, they don’t have all the information they need to identify amazing or potentially incredible team leaders.

To fix this, I created a scoring model based on my 35 years of experience running and consulting on call centers and extensive research, during which I came across the Lominger Standard 67 Competencies and Definitions of Great Leaders. I deconstructed those competencies to develop the 43 characteristics and traits of outstanding team leaders used in this scoring tool, which I share with those who enroll in my Creating Amazing Team Leaders online self-paced course.

With this scoring model, you can quickly identify how your team leaders rate against each criterion and subsequently identify areas that you can work with them to improve. The tool also includes a tab with my top 15 characteristics and traits and a list of open-ended interview questions one can use to gather the information needed from prospective candidates to determine their scoring. I created it in Excel to make it easier for everyone to use and make any changes they wanted to customize to their specific needs.

The first column lists team leaders' 43 traits and characteristics, along with a description of each. The next column is the Criteria Rating, and I’ve set each trait with a high score of 10, but you can change these scores for each trait if you want to provide further weight to specific characteristics over others. The row next to the Criteria Rating is where you’d list all your existing team leaders. Then, all you do is give a rating of 0 to 10 for each trait in each Team Leader’s column, and their final score will automatically tally up in the Team Leader Score cell. I also included a Criteria Rating % that calculates each Team Leader Score against the accumulated score value set in the Criteria Rating column.

This helps you quickly compare each team leader's score against a perfect score to identify those who need the most help first. If their score is just awful, it may indicate that a change needs to be made quickly. Promoting from within is usually the best place to look before looking outside when looking for a new team leader. When assessing their suitability, just be careful of any bias you may have in scoring them. If you feel too close to them, consider scoring them with someone else or having someone else do the scoring instead. If they score higher than the minimum mark set for the scoring model, that should give you more confidence about selecting them for the role. However, as with any outside candidate, you should still conduct a formal interview.

When you do conduct interviews, make sure you ask a series of open-ended questions that speak to the top traits you’re looking for in a team leader. The answers to your questions will give you essential insights into a candidate’s suitability and give you more confidence in selecting them.

In the third tab, I have provided 26 open-ended questions you can use for interviews. Each question is explained to help you get the necessary information to score them effectively.

Before using this tool, you must calibrate the scoring and determine a minimal acceptable score, either with the current team leaders or when bringing on new ones. You do that by pulling a group together from different levels in the organization to get a 360-degree view of what the team thinks each trait and characteristic should be scored for either exiting team leaders or future ones. When you pull the group together, make sure you have the person the Call Center Manager reports to, of course, and include at least one high performing team leader and a high performing team member. 

When the group goes through each trait and characteristic together, discuss its relevance and decide on its maximum rating number. After you’ve done this, see if you can recall an excellent team leader who has previously worked with you, and have the team score them. Based on that score, you can determine the minimally acceptable overall score. If you can’t come up with someone who used to work there for calibrating, list each current team leader and score them. See the overall ratings for each and determine the minimally acceptable overall score. Make any changes you feel are required and you’ll be ready to go! Of course, after you’ve used the tool a few times, review it for your needs, and make any necessary changes.

Now that you know the traits and characteristics of extraordinary team leaders and how to score them, you should consider how to identify these traits in people you’re looking to recruit as team leaders. Usually, promoting from within for a team leader is the best place to look before looking outside, so let’s start there. And, as you already know the person you’re considering promoting for the role, you should be able to score them against the Scoring Model. Just be careful of any bias you may have when scoring them. 

If the person you’re thinking about hits the minimum mark on the scoring model, that should give
you more confidence about selecting them for the role. However, as with an outside candidate, you should still conduct a formal interview with them. When you do, ask open-ended questions that speak to the top traits, behaviors, and characteristics you seek in a team leader. And, when asking open-ended questions that require them to discuss situations where they’ve demonstrated these traits or characteristics, like:

• Please let me know how you organize your work week and the activities you ensure you set time aside to get the most out of your team?

Their answers to your questions will give you essential insights into their suitability and give you more confidence in selecting them. Here are 10 traits and characteristics I look for when interviewing to provide me with confidence in choosing a candidate, whether I’m promoting from within or looking outside the team:

1. Action-Oriented
2. Approachability
3. Customer Focus
4. Developing Team Members
5. Directing Team Members
6. Ethics and Values
7. Integrity and Trust
8. Motivating Team Members
9. Effective Team Builder
10. Time Management