CORE COMPETENCIES OF A CALL CENTRE AGENT

Call centre agents are becoming increasingly important in the call centre context. They act as a contact point between the customer and the company. Call centre agents should have certain competencies to perform their duties sufficiently. Identifying competencies, required to be effective agents, will ease the task of training and recruitment. Due to the interrelatedness of the call centre agent, the management of a call centre and customers, all relevant role players' perceptions were taken into account. By using qualitative analysis to analyse the data, various competencies needed to function effectively in a call centre were identified.