CATI quality compliance: ensuring call volumes of the highest quality for every project

08-02-2024

By Kerry Boother, CATI Training and Quality Executive

In our CATI department we carry out 1,000s of telephone interviews annually, across the UK and around the world. Ensuring that all calls made are of the highest quality is of paramount importance, and on every single project our quality control team work alongside our interviewers to ensure our rigorous standards are achieved. Our interviewers represent not only DJS Research, they are also representing our clients. We want to make sure they have what it takes to obtain the correct information, in the most appropriate way, to meet the specific needs of each client on every project; placing quality at the centre of everything we do, and at the heart of the CATI team, ensures we succeed in this mission.

Our quality results for 2023 really speak for themselves and demonstrate not only the hard work of our amazing CATI interviewers but our commitment to continually evolving and enhancing the skills of this incredible team. So let’s take a look…

How do we deliver and maintain brilliant quality scores throughout the year?

All our interviewers are listened to on every project that they work upon at least twice, and our target in the quality compliance team is to ensure we listen to at least 10% of all calls made on each project. With this robust benchmark in place, it often means we end up listening to far more than just two calls per interviewer, per project! However, each touchpoint only serves to enhance the quality of our outputs.

All calls that are monitored are rated using our DJS research scoring system which sets clear targets for all interviewers to achieve. Just like research methodologies, our scoring system has evolved over time to ensure it remains current and relevant for the work we do. Our Operations Manager Michelle Flanagan conducted a recent review, and made some minor updates and adjustments, optimising it for the year ahead.

Our scoring system is built on five sections which cover every aspect of the call from interviewer tone and conduct to best practice and, most crucially, mandatory regulatory requirements. The first four sections of the system make up 75% of the final score. The fifth section is the most important and demands the most stringent compliance; failure to adhere to any part of the final section would deduct 25% from an interviewer’s overall result.

Giving constructive feedback and celebrating performance

After scoring, feedback is provided to each interviewer via email, Skype or Teams as appropriate. We use a number of different routes to help shift the dial on lower scores as well as maintaining high scores, ensuring they are valued and positioned as something to really strive for:

One to one feedback sessions - the purpose of these constructive meetings, held on Teams, is to go over where an interviewer needs to improve and conduct role play activities as interviewer and respondent. Practising interview techniques is hugely important as is going over how to implement them. Working through scenarios and playing out the role together helps equip our interviewers with the right tools as well as building confidence which is crucial to successful call handling.
Working closely with Team Leaders – alongside our work in the quality compliance team, CATI Team Leaders continually live listen to pick up errors and areas for improvement. We work closely with team leaders, as by listening to the first few completes on a new job we can identify potential problems quickly and put solutions in place to address them immediately.
Quality meetings with new starters – we schedule these sessions after an interviewer’s first week with us and run through quality from start to finish, ensuring they understand the high standard that is expected at DJS Research from the outset. This is also a useful opportunity to identify training gaps and answer any questions they might have.
Rewarding and acknowledging - appreciation and acknowledgement goes a long way and we use DJS thank you cards to recognise the hard work of team members and celebrate not just high scores, but great improvements made.

Scoring in real time – the DJS ‘Quality Dashboard’

All interviewers have access to their own ‘Quality Dashboard’ via the CATI Hub which is linked directly to our quality score sheet. Every time a call is scored, the interviewer’s dashboard is immediately updated, ensuring they have a real time view of their performance across all our metrics. The dashboard has been designed to ensure it is easy to understand and users can see at a glance the areas where they are scoring well through to areas that may need improvement, scores by individual section and total call ratings. It’s a fantastic tool which not only provides direct access to performance information, but helps to empower our interviewers so they personally recognise their strengths as well as identify areas for self-improvement.

We are extremely proud of our team of interviewers who work hard to deliver the best possible standard of calls day in, day out, up and down the UK. With our ongoing support we are confident they will continue to deliver amazing results to meet, and exceed, the expectations of both DJS Research and our clients.