Fear is a non-starter in terms of motivation. Unfortunately, all too often that’s what organizations use to drive performance in their call centers. By contrast, social environments, combined with well-defined metrics and meaningful rewards, can create positive programs that increase employee and thereby customer satisfaction.

Organizations that use crowdsourcing and gamification tactics, according to this article (registration required), create an enjoyable and productive work environment:

… collaboration between agents and their peers not only serves as an effective motivator, it can also provide a great benefit to the entire organization. For instance, setting up a knowledgebase that also allows agents to ask their peers questions, can be socially gratifying and motivating for individual agents who assist each other, while helping to build a central repository of data for all employees to leverage. Gamification can also be tied in by assigning badges to, or ranking the employees who participate and collaborate most often in the conversation.

The peer recognition inherent in these techniques, especially those that use a knowledgebase, invites all frontline employees to contribute. Traditional recognition programs, on the other hand, tend to focus only on the top 2 percent that the organization can afford to send to Hawaii or call up on stage at a ceremony.