Customer Service

Diversity and inclusion in support services: Rethinking hiring practices for better customer connections

Building a diverse work environment is not just an option in today’s hectic, interconnected world but a requirement. However, the objective of workplace diversity is still primarily idealistic. According to a report from 2022, 35% of businesses in the tech sector claim to be in the early phases of building their DEI programmes, while another 30% concede they don’t even have any such programmes or are moving at a slow pace.

Businesses with a diverse culture and inclusion support services are more inclined to prosper. Diversity goes beyond checking boxes. Diversity entails hiring to create a dynamic workforce that encourages compassion, originality, and creativity. Businesses should intentionally cast larger nets during employment to combat their default tendencies.

Tips to integrate diversity and inclusivity into the workplace

Firstly, evaluate your hiring practices – which will help you build a diverse customer connection support service. To identify unique talent, go over the following:

Reconsider crucial credentials and skill sets

Many businesses often create a standard for job openings based on the highest-performing individuals who currently hold these positions. As a result, employers tend to favour applicants with the same backgrounds and skill sets as their current workforce. Thus, it’s critical to be aware of this attitude and work to overcome it. For instance, the company should reevaluate and compare how vital technical skills are to being an effective team player.

The requirements and desirable credentials for a position significantly impact the applicants, so it is crucial to consider all these components. Considering the importance of someone’s drive, mentality, and character has always been an important aspect of building a team.

Ensure versatility in the job boards and ad platforms

Businesses that post job openings in all the typical areas will receive all the usual candidates. Instead, it’s crucial to deliberately target groups and individuals who would contribute to the diversity of your staff.

There are job recruitment websites for nearly all kinds of applicants, including people in the military, people over fifty years of age, and people who belong to particular racial, ethnic, and cultural groups. Your candidate pool will be more diverse if you reevaluate where you post advertisements.

Contact potential employees directly

Businesses often hire people from their own networks and social groups. Therefore, it is crucial to network in various contexts and groups intentionally.

Long before they apply, businesses can identify underrepresented prospects, develop a personal rapport with them, aid in their professional development, and motivate them to apply for specific positions, such as customer support outsourcing services, as they become available.

Expand the recruitment team

Usually, when candidates for a position arrive for an interview, they interact with various recruiting team members. This hiring team’s homogeneity can be unsettling to the candidate. 

The answer is straightforward: Businesses must broaden their hiring team by including various people who reflect the diversity they hope to attract. Organisations not lucky enough to have this variety within their ranks must get imaginative. They may bring in diverse investors and board members or hire consultants to help the organisation demonstrate its dedication to diversity and inclusion.

Provide education on diversity

Consider implementing diversity training for all staff, from top executives to entry-level workers. These training programmes can emphasise the value of inclusiveness, educate staff members about various cultures, and help raise awareness of unconscious biases. You can create a more compassionate and understanding work atmosphere by educating others.

Create programmes for mentoring and sponsorship

Launch mentoring and sponsorship programmes that link senior leaders with underrepresented personnel. These initiatives aid in removing obstacles and shattering glass ceilings by offering insightful advice and professional development opportunities.

What is skills-based hiring? What are its benefits?

The talent acquisition climate is evolving. Companies are moving their hiring practices away from hiring based on degrees and prior experience and towards hiring based on agility and creativity.

Possessing a particular college degree or years of experience is no longer a requirement for employment at many companies. Every organisation wants to bring in and keep highly qualified employees who will help achieve successful business goals.
Some benefits of skills-based hiring are:

• Recruiting managers can expand the talent pool
• Applicants prefer judgment based on their talents
• No criterion for education levels invites more skilled personnel
• Consistent improvement in diversity and inclusion expands an organisation’s productivity

*For organisations on the digital transformation journey, agility is key in responding to a rapidly changing technology and business landscape. Now more than ever, it is crucial to deliver and exceed organisational expectations with a robust digital mindset backed by innovation. Enabling businesses to sense, learn, respond, and evolve like living organisms, will be imperative for business excellence. A comprehensive yet modular suite of services is doing precisely that - equipping organisations with intuitive decision-making automatically at scale, actionable insights based on real-time solutions, anytime/anywhere experience, and in-depth data visibility across functions leading to hyper-productivity, Live Enterprise is building connected organisations that are innovating collaboratively for the future.

How can Infosys BPM help?

Our inclusion strategy is governed by our code of conduct. The support services offered by Infosys BPM employ a specialised recruitment team. This team matches the profile of potential candidates with the client’s requirements. We also have the infrastructure and expertise to provide customer support automation to your support teams.