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CASE STUDY - ENERGY INDUSTRY   PHONE TRAINING - Train the Trainer

Training PhoneClass™ Leaders at Calor Gas

Business challenge

For over sixty years Calor has supplied liquid petroleum gas to thousands of rural homes and business in the UK that are beyond the reach of the gas mains. It has built up an enviable record for local customer service, based on a network of 12 operational customer service centres, some of them based in inaccessible parts of the country.

The company needed to find a cost effective way of using its regional managers and staff trainers, who spend many hours travelling between the company's headquarters in Warwick, and contact centres spread between the far north of Scotland, the Midlands and mid-Devon. ‘We had to find a better way of using our trainers' time, especially when they might drive hundreds of miles to train just one new recruit,' said Peter Notton, Calor customer services manager. ‘Our customers value the local service we are able to provide across the UK , but we had to find a way of reducing the operational overheads we incurred while training our staff.'

3C Associates approach

3C suggested to Calor that the company's customer service skills, technical and systems training could be delivered by phone, and recommended a phone training program for eight Calor executives. The eight staff included three regional managers, the manager of the Calor sales academy, and four in-house trainers.

The 3C programme began with a traditional face-to-face training session, where the Calor delegates explored a number of new techniques for leading phone training sessions. The course covered practical ways of engaging and holding the interest of a group they could not see, the importance of good vocal technique and the need to give effective feedback over the phone.

The face-to-face session was followed by two phone training sessions, each lasting two hours, spread over a fortnight. Delegates practised Phone Delivered Training™, using their own documentation and manuals, based round typical operational needs, such as the management of new business enquiries.

A final day in the classroom reviewed the group's programmes, and practised delivery of those programmes.

The results

Delegate experience

Delegates enjoyed the mix of classroom and remote phone training sessions. They were impressed that Phone Delivered Training™ could be adapted to cover customer service skills, technical and systems training. ‘I was very sceptical to begin with, but I am now very enthusiastic. Phone training is going to make me so much more efficient and reduce the time I have to spend away from home' said one Calor trainer.

They valued exercises that showed them how to develop their traditional classroom skills and adapt them for the phone training, and they liked the way in which the rolling programme allowed them to develop and improve training material, and to work together as a group. Delegates enjoyed the fact that for much of the training they worked from home or their own offices, rather than travelling to the company's Warwick headquarters.

The organisation's experience

A regional manager commented that training could now be delivered when required. ‘The productivity and efficiency of the training team has soared, as we can now devise a flexible phone training schedule that alters according to our business and operational needs. Previously we had to structure training in our remote locations to take account of long journey times and overnight accommodation in local hotels,' he said.

Part of the 3C's training brief covered systems training on internal Customer Relationship Management software. 3C was asked to advise on the best combination of application sharing software and phone training.

‘Using 3C's innovative approach, phone training has cut our operational overheads and increased the efficiency of our call centre and software support staff,' said Calor's Notton.

For more information on Phone Delivered Training™, click here.