AWE Enterprise Breakout • November 11, 2021 • Sajeel Hussain, CRO, CareAR
I recently spoke at the Augmented World Expo (AWE) in Santa Clara, California, where I shared how The Great Resignation of 2021 has affected the service industry. It has been contributing to an ongoing labor shortage and skills gap, both of which have negatively affected customer satisfaction.
According to The Bureau of Labor Statistics, 4.3 million people voluntarily resigned during August 2021. And that’s just the beginning. I believe the labor shortage will only get worse—50% of the industry workforce is expected to retire in the next 5 to 10 years, which will further contribute to the labor shortage and skills gap.
The skills gap creates unnecessary expenses for companies. When there is a problem, one out of three calls result in a truck roll, which means about 33% of service employees are dispatched to fix issues. The cost of an onsite field visit costs between $200 and $1,400, which can be a significant expense, depending on the industry—for example, two to three people are frequently dispatched together in the telecom industry. That can really add up.
The skills gap is also making it hard for field techs to do their jobs well. They want to do an amazing job and solve problems for their customers, so when they can’t find the right information on their own, they use FaceTime, What’sApp, or other means to call team members to help resolve the problem. Sometimes it’s hard for them to connect to the right people and get the job done.
The natural result of this lack of manpower and knowledge is a drop in customer satisfaction, because as people leave, the service experience is negatively impacted. Fifty-one percent of consumers today cancel their contracts. Why? Because they’re not happy with the level of service that they’re getting.
So, I truly believe that it behooves us as an industry to reinvent the service management experience.
Note: this is the first part of a three-part series taken from Sajeel’s recent AWE Enterprise Breakout presentation. If you haven’t already, check out the full series: