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Company: Kohl's Department Stores - Credit Division, Menomonee Falls, WI
Company Description: If you've ever shopped one of our clean, bright department stores, you've already experienced our commitment to family, value and national brands. Our stores are stocked with everything you need for women, children and men, plus home products like small electrics, bedding, luggage and more. We offer the best merchandise, the best prices, and we're always working to make your shopping enjoyable.
Nomination Category: Customer Service & Call Center Awards Team Categories
Nomination Sub Category: Contact Center of the Year (Over 100 Seats)

Nomination Title: Kohl's Retail Payment Solutions Contact Center – 2012

Tell the story about what this nominated contact center achieved since the beginning of July 2011 (up to 500 words). Focus on specific accomplishments, and relate these accomplishments to past performance or industry norms. Be sure to mention obstacles overcome, innovations or discoveries made, and outcomes:

Kohl’s Retail Payment Solutions

The Kohl’s Charge Contact Center is a 600+ seat environment with 2 domestic locations, providing Retail & Customer Service and Operational Support to over 25 million Kohl’s Charge Card customers and 1,147 retail store locations.

The Kohl’s contact Center Strategy contains 3 blended elements for unique service … The C/3 Brand

2012 outcomes

•Convenient (Efficient) access... 80% of all calls answered in 20 seconds
•Courteous (Consistent) service Voice of Customer response … Associate Courtesy rated at 97.43%
•Correct (Accurate) answers/solutions Voice of Customer response … First Call Resolution rated at 95.71%

In the C/3 model, the Kohl’s Call Center expects to “Take Care of People,” one call at-a time.

Strawman & Scarecrow Production Modeling … Development of standard templates (i.e. Strawman) that establish production, coaching, training, meeting times, etc. for Managers and their Associates on a daily basis (i.e. “the gift of time”). Scarecrow reporting then measures outcome of these activities. As a result, productive time on the phones has increased over 400 basis points, and schedule adherence remains above 90%.

Unique IVR strategy … The Kohl’s Charge Contact Center enhanced its IVR on 2 occasions, increasing a caller’s access (speed) to an Agent at the “front end” of their call, reducing time for a customer to reach an agent, and improving Voice of Customer IVR survey scores over 1,000 basis points. Recently the Kohl’s Customer Service IVR was recognized by SQM (i.e. Survey Quality Measurement) for Highest IVR Customer Satisfaction - in Navigation.

C/3 Performance “Scorecarding” … The daily scorecard is a measure of each Associate’s C/3 performance (including direct customer survey results) that roll up into Supervisor, Management and site level outcomes. (Refer to attached document for sample scorecard)

Unique Pay-for Performance programs … The C/3 Brand model and performance Scorecarding have been designed to identify and reward Associates on three separate tiers of performance. Since this innovative program was implemented, Associate performance has improved over 13%, The plan averaged annual 2012 payouts to Associates has more than offset by a 4% increase in production.

Customer Satisfaction Indexing … Benchmarking … The Kohl’s Charge Contact Center evaluates its ongoing performance in 3 primary ways.

Internal Measurement … of standard results, emphasizing either year-over-year improvement Examples of performance outcomes through year end 2012 are as follows:

•Tripling “estatement” penetration since 2008 at a combined savings of $36.9 million in expenses
•Monthly VOC results (post call customer surveys; refer to attached document for 5 year results) reflecting a 94.50% rating for “Overall Service” in 2012
•Maintaining a Service Level of 80% of all calls answered in 20 seconds 45 out of the past 48 months.

Industry Metrics … McKinsey & Company compared the 2011/12 performance for the Kohl’s Call Center to their CCE Database showing “above top quartile” performance (refer to specific results on doc attached):

Finally, involvement with state run quality programs (i.e. Wisconsin Forward) and national organizations (i.e. the American Businesss Awards, SQM, etc.) provides insight relative to industry peers and their perspectives. Utilization of feedback materials to improve performance and enhance the customer experience has been and will continue to be an ongoing focus of the Kohl’s Contact Center.

Provide a brief (up to 100 words) biography about the leader(s) of the nominated contact center:

Jim Nagle’s current responsibilities include the overall direction of the Kohl’s Charge (i.e. Card) Contact Center, providing Customer Service and Operational Support to Kohl’s Charge customers across the nation. Prior to Kohl’s, Jim spent 20+ years in the Financial Industry holding leadership positions in Retail Banking, Mortgage Servicing, Call Center Sales and Servicing, Technical & Merchant Help Desk Support as well as Debit & Credit Card Operations. In addition, Jim has been a frequent presenter on the local and national levels touching on topics ranging from Leadership to Call Center design. Jim’s background in Call Center work has focused on a variety of quality principles impacting strategic design that have led his teams and Call Center operations to various State and National Awards for Excellence.