Outsourcing customer support is a great way for businesses to ensure diversification and rapid growth for the existing support team. At SupportYourApp, our goal is to help businesses scale up rapidly, using our HR, technical, and managerial resources. However, it can entail additional challenges, specifically — uniting the efforts of two different teams, an outsourced and an in-house one, for one strategic goal — improving customer service.
Before we decide how to organize a smooth cooperation of two teams, we need to get a clear vision of the process. Do we imagine it as a one well-connected molecule consisting of atoms, or different molecules with their own atoms and structure? What are our initial expectations from the collaboration, what conditions can we provide, and what objectives do we want to achieve? As long as we have answers to these questions, we can proceed with the organization itself.
In this article, we'll cover:
3 Common Scenarios of Collaboration Between Two Team
1. Outsourced Team Becomes an Extension of an in-House One
In this case, additional people join an in-house team, keeping the internal structure the same. All the team members share the same responsibilities, KPIs, and use the same Knowledge Base. The team is managed by an in-house Team Lead, with the help from a provider’s manager.
✅ Pros: two teams don’t feel separated or opposed to each other, the same approach applies to everyone, all team members are treated equally. In-house and outsourced professionals operate in coordination, as one big team.
❌ Cons: a client and a provider may have a different vision of candidates as well as different cultures and policies, which may create an inconvenient working environment for consultants. Team members may find subordinating to two managers at once challenging, and the conflict between two supervisors is also possible. Furthermore, easy access to team members from two different companies increases the risk of an internal information leak.
2. Outsourced Team Enforces an in-House One
Two teams cooperate, but work independently, managed by different supervisors. They may share the same responsibilities and KPIs or have different ones (a scenario especially fitting for two teams providing different levels of support).
✅ Pros: an outsourced provider is responsible for all the aspects of the team’s performance, which spares client’s management resources significantly. Two teams have as much in common as they need to. Consultants from both teams can productively communicate and not feel left out. If two teams have different responsibilities and performance metrics — there is no competition between them.
❌ Cons: two teams that do not share responsibilities cannot back each other up. Even if they do have the same duties and metrics, there is still a difference in consultants’ experience, skills, and performance quality, due to different recruitment approaches and management’s expectations.
3. Two Teams Are Completely Separated
An in-house team and an outsourced team are completely independent of each other, have different management, performance metrics, and responsibilities. This model works great if there is a need to divide customers according to some criteria (for example, customers from different countries are assisted by different teams in different languages).
✅ Pros: each team is clear with their requirements, processes, conditions, and benefits, and each supervisor is only responsible for their team. Each team is dedicated to their success, and consultants from two different teams don’t overshare internal information with each other.
❌ Cons: consultants from different teams may hesitate to reach out to each other for help, may feel excluded, or be treated differently. It is crucial to maintain a cooperative, friendly, and equal atmosphere for both teams, and make sure no one feels undermined.
How to Set on the Most Suitable Cooperation Model
To decide on the best scenario for a specific project, we can start with answering the list of questions that will help us get clear with our requirements and conditions:
- Would we like to set the expectations with clear KPIs and just receive reports on performance, or be included into the processes?
- Are internal policies, benefits, and loyalty programs applied just to an internal team, or can we extend it for an outsourced one as well?
- Is an internal team qualified, and can it resolve the most complicated cases?
- Do we want to have a clear division of responsibilities and have just one responsible person to reach out to?
- Which environment do we consider more productive: competitive or cooperative one?
As soon as we have answers to these questions, we most likely already see the most suitable scenario for the project.
Wrapping Up
While choosing the most suitable model, it is important to remember that we should always be reasonable. Efficiency is all about balance, proper communication, and considering the interests of all parties involved. With each project, we need to consider all pros and cons, test different approaches, and make our processes flexible. In the long run, our main goal is to keep customers satisfied, and all of our actions must work for this purpose.
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Yurii is a Chief Customer Officer at SupportYourApp. He became interested in the world of B2B about 20 years ago, and has since been accumulating diverse experience that helps him provide top-notch services to the SupportYourApp clients as a leader of the Service Delivery department. Yurii is responsible for creating a proper environment for professional growth of the Service Delivery team members and for effective communication between the Service Deliver and other SupportYourApp departments. Making clients’ experience with SupportYourApp excellent, keeping cooperation effective, and establishing trust-based long-term relationships with our clients are Yurii’s main goals and professional passions.
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