Working at Voicentric
The
vast majority of the people who work at Voicentric are from Durham University.
Many are undergraduates or postgraduates who work for Voicentric during their
studies. Equally others have finished or are on gap years in between University
and their formal careers.
As Voicentric is an agency, our programmes and work demands of our clients
does vary. You will normally be hired to work on a specific client programme,
and receive full client, product and relevant skills training before starting
to make or take calls.
Training
Much of the work we do is outbound, where we are calling potential customers.
Unfortunately outbound telemarketing has a poor public perception but this is
because most companies do it so badly - callers have poor interpersonal skills
and can be quite insensitive to the needs of the people they are calling. At
Voicentric we train you extensively to make sure you do not sound like a cheap
telemarketer. We like people to be pleasant, articulate, natural, good listeners,
and polite at all times. We encourage our people to 'be themselves' and to put
their personality in calling, as this is normally well received by customers.
Personal Development
You will learn a lot about the way you communicate when you work at Voicentric.
Apart from introductory training, we will participate in many frequent quality
and feedback sessions. You will get used to hearing your own voice and how you
sound when engaging with and talking to customers. Most people hate this at
first, but quickly get used to it. Actually you need to do it, and you will
develop a lot as a person through this process. Good interpersonal skills, which
is what you are learning, is a real life skill and will serve you well throughout
your life - both professionally and personally. Voicentric people are very employable,
and many find that their experience of working with is very well regarded by
potential employers.
Variety
'Variety is the spice of life', according to the idiom, and it is true for most
people who work for Voicentric. At any moment in time we will be running 4 or
5 client programmes, which themselves have start and end dates. Therefore you
are likely to work on multiple client accounts. Most people like this characteristic
of Voicentric, especially as our client base is so 'blue chip' and contains
so many companies marketing genuinely interesting products, usually at the cutting
edge of science.
Hours flexibility
The working hours are quite flexible, and students can invariably work for Voicentric
around their university commitments. We do require a minimum number of hours
per week.
A typical day is 7 hours 30 minutes and will contain a 45 minute lunch break
and 2 15 minutes tea breaks. Voicentric provide tea and coffee, and there
is a comfortable break out area.
Multi-cultural environment
One of the attractions of the company is its multi-cultural environment. Over
the years we have employed people from more than 40 countries from every continent
(to be precise every inhabited continent). You will hear many languages being
spoken in our office, including French, German, Italian and Spanish.