9 Best Practices in Handling Quality Assurance in BPO

For any business to maintain a high standard and a positive reputation, assuring quality is of utmost importance. Quality assurance is one of the few factors for a company to trust any service provider, especially in the BPO industry. It is only fair for any client to expect a proper and regular quality audit since lack of transparency can cause a company’s standards to fall, causing harm to a business. In worst-case scenarios, small mistakes in quality and integrity can even cause a company to fail. Having a well-planned, well-executed quality audit process is critical to the success of any BPO engagement.

Here are 9 best practices BPO companies should apply to assure quality across all processes at all times.

1. Align metrics with business goals

When identifying your quality metrics, you should consider how it will help you achieve your business goals. The reporting prepared by your QA team should focus on helping the business measure and assess the quality of each output and process being implemented. When identifying your metrics, you align them with your key performance indicators (KPIs) and implement measurable strategies to make sure the team meets these KPIs.

2. Clearly define quality metrics

An effective quality management plan requires clear, concise metrics. It is also essential that everyone on the team is familiar with these metrics, as this will give them direction on how to do their tasks properly and be able to achieve the company’s desired goals. Management should ensure team members receive proper training to achieve these metrics. Moreover, manager should regularly monitor performance and know their current standing based on the established quality metrics.

3. Create a QA checklist

Aside from preparing your production team, make sure that your QA team is prepared to accomplish their tasks auditing the production team’s performance. To make it this process easier, create a QA checklist that your quality auditors can use as their guide when doing process audits. This will help make the process more systematic, more consistent, and more efficient to complete.

4. Prepare a detailed improvement plan

Apart from having a well-organized audit process, establish a performance improvement plan. Without an improvement plan aligned with your quality metrics, all your efforts for regular performance audits will be wasted. The goal for conducting audits is to identify your team’s opportunities for improvement and along with any other aspects of your business that can be enhanced for efficiency.

5. Make ongoing feedback a regular practice

Feedback is an essential part of improvement. It helps individuals identify improvement opportunities and helps with practice evaluation. Giving team members regular feedback allows them to maintain good performance that will benefit your business in the long term. Better employee performance comes with better output, which translates to improved operations and revenue for your business.

6. Use performance data results for coaching

After every quality audit, your QA staff should schedule coaching sessions thereafter. This will allow them to better discuss their findings with the team. Effective coaching can help build more concrete and positive change in an individual. This can also improve the transfer of knowledge from the QA coach to the employee being coached. To make coaching sessions more effective, discuss critical findings in detail. Allow the individual being coached to ask questions and openly discuss with the current process. This way, you can better understand thought processes and help refine methods to perform tasks better.

7. Screen and train your QA team properly

For a QA team to be effective, members need to be properly trained regarding your company’s products and services. Whether you decide to outsource your QA needs or hire and build a team in-house, choose a team that will understand your industry, your business goals, and your processes. This will enable them to conduct quality audits more effectively and efficiently.

8. Incentivize your team appropriately

One of the best forms of motivation is an incentive. Reward your team whenever your quality goals are met. This can help boost their motivation to excel at their tasks and accomplish them based on the quality metrics you have set. With enough encouragement and proper guidance, you will soon find your quality improving with results reflecting on your business’ overall performance.

9. Outsource your quality auditing

While some businesses choose to outsource processes and quality assurance together, others rely on outsourcing for QA alone. In these cases, companies with established in-house teams and processes turn to an outsourcing partner to help confirm quality while they handle data processing in-house. Not all companies have the manpower and the capacity to handle their quality audit needs in-house. But that should not stop you from implementing rigorous quality management for your team and your processes.

If you need professional quality assurance solutions, outsourcing it might be the best option for you. And if you need more detailed guidance on how you can outsource your QA needs, talk to us here at Assivo. We’ll be happy to help you come up with an appropriate quality audit process that suits your processes and your business model.