2025 Best Practice Guide
Raising Standards

Learning Academy On-Demand Modules

Over 100 modules of learning form the backbone of our academy, allowing you to focus on what is most relevant and important. Join the courses as online modules for just £65pp and pace yourself, to build a development plan for the year that is bespoke to your needs. If you have interest in a specific category click on the link below any module to see more in that topic.

Calibration

Calibration

This module explores Quality Calibrations, focusing on methods to ensure consistency and clarity in quality assessments:
 - Purpose of Calibration: Emphasises the importance of calibration for maintaining consistent standards and ensuring fairness in quality assessments.
 - Key Steps to Calibration: Details essential steps such as identifying variances, focusing on critical issues, understanding discrepancies, defining standards, and implementing actions.
 - Calibration Strategies: Advocates for customising the calibration process and involving relevant personnel like quality assessors and frontline advisers to align with organisational goals.
Objectivity and subjectivity & The challenge of accuracy

Objectivity and subjectivity & The challenge of accuracy

This module explores the balance between objectivity, subjectivity, and accuracy in quality assessments:
 - Consistency Challenges: Highlights the difficulties of achieving perfect accuracy in quality checks, noting limitations in both human and automated evaluations.
 - Objective vs. Subjective Criteria: Explores how subjective assessments can sometimes offer more reliable insights due to their flexibility in interpreting context, compared to the rigid nature of objective metrics.
 - Quality Check Optimisation: Advocates for regular calibration of quality systems to improve accuracy, while warning against overemphasising precision at the expense of broader quality improvements.
Safeguards vs Checks

Safeguards vs Checks

This module covers the importance of implementing safeguards and checks to enhance quality processes:
 - Risk Identification: Focuses on finding and correcting mistakes, but highlights the limitations of manual monitoring and the negative impact on team morale.
 - Safeguards Over Checks: Advocates for implementing safeguards to prevent errors, reducing the need for constant checks and improving efficiency.
 - Proactive Measures: Encourages exploring safeguarding options before adding more checks to the quality framework, ensuring a more sustainable approach to risk management.
Aligning Quality Measures

Aligning Quality Measures

This module explores aligning quality assurance measures with organisational goals to enhance quality and demonstrate the value of the quality function:
 - Quality Focus: Emphasises improving actual quality rather than just scores, integrating customer experience, company alignment, colleague support, and compliance.
 - Customer-Centric Measures: Uses feedback like CSAT and NPS, along with operational metrics such as First Contact Resolution (FCR) to reflect real customer satisfaction.
 - Business Perspectives: Considers financial impacts, evaluating handle times, sales effectiveness, and churn to align quality actions with business objectives.
Types of Framework

Types of Framework

This module delves into three types of quality frameworks suitable for diverse organisational needs:
 - Performance Frameworks: Measures and targets performance with scoring mechanisms, aiding in performance management and meeting organisational goals.
 - Coaching Frameworks: Supports individual improvement without direct measurement, focusing on future actions and collaborative development across the organisation.
 - Customer Journey Frameworks: Generates insights for continuous improvement by analysing the entire customer experience, identifying both pain points and best practices.
 
What does good quality look like?

What does good quality look like?

This module examines quality frameworks and the essential components to include within diverse organisational contexts:
 - Customer Understanding and Interaction: Stresses the importance of genuinely listening and understanding customer needs, emphasising human interaction over scripted responses.
 - Outcome-Oriented Service: Advocates delivering appropriate outcomes by balancing customer expectations with business needs, avoiding overly rigid process adherence.
 - Efficient and Effective Communication: Focuses on efficient use of time, clear communication, and setting precise expectations to prevent unnecessary follow-ups and enhance customer satisfaction.
Customer Outcomes

Customer Outcomes

This module discusses enhancing customer outcomes through quality and improvement processes under regulatory frameworks:
 - Customer-Centric Outcomes: Emphasises achieving the right customer outcomes to enhance satisfaction and loyalty while reducing costs and boosting revenue.
 - Cultural and Measurement Shift: Moves from tick-box evaluations to outcome-based assessments, necessitating significant changes in performance culture.
 - Quality and Process Improvement: Advocates for a holistic approach to quality, assessing the entire customer journey to drive improvements across the organisation.
The Improvement Cycle

The Improvement Cycle

This module covers key aspects of The Forum’s Improvement cycle within an organisation:
 - Focussing on what matters most: Differentiates between measurement and improvement, focusing on activities that add value.
 - Operational Rythmn: Establishes measurement and monitoring systems to identify and analyse opportunities for improvement.
 - Diving Actions & Improvement: Encourages individual empowerment and actionable changes to foster ongoing growth and learning.

The Strategy Pyramid & The Four Lens model

The Strategy Pyramid & The Four Lens model

This module covers the strategy pyramid and three-lens model in an organisation, focusing on streamlined strategic implementation:
 - Strategy Alignment: Aligns all actions with organisational objectives, considering key stakeholders like customers, colleagues, and regulators.
 - Operational Strategies: Outlines specific strategies for various operational aspects, supported by precise performance measures.
 - Process and Quality Improvement: Emphasises refining processes through targeted diagnostic measures and quality checks to align closely with strategic goals.

Descriptive Statistics

Descriptive Statistics

In this module we be exploring the Descriptive Statistics tool in excel. We will cover:

 - How to use descriptive statistic
 - How to use the output to better understand your data
 - Alternative ways of calculating

Shrinkage (1) - Introduction to Shrinkage

Shrinkage (1) - Introduction to Shrinkage

Discover what shrinkage is and the correct way to calculate basic shrinkage and tiered (or primary and secondary shrinkage). In this module, you will;

 - Understand the problems caused by incorrectly calculating shrinkage
 - Learn about when it is best to use budget shrinkage targets and when using recent historical data will be to your advantage.
 - See the value of managing shrinkage and the return on investment that it can bring to your business.

This module is part of the Shrinkage Box Set

Shrinkage (2) - The Planning Wheel (Shrinkage)

Shrinkage (2) - The Planning Wheel (Shrinkage)

In this module, you will be introduced to our Planning Wheel, a device for illustrating how 100% of the time spent in your centre is being used.

 - Learn the critical factors of shrinkage management and the pitfalls to avoid
 - Discover the importance of forecasting human behaviour and shrinkage and how you can influence shrinkage through your work
 - Complete an exercise based on your own business to help you to understand the Planning Wheel

This module is part of the Shrinkage Box Set

Shrinkage (3) - Planning & Tracking Shrinkage

Shrinkage (3) - Planning & Tracking Shrinkage

Deeper dive into shrinkage, historical tracking, forecasting and incorporating in long and short term planning. Understand the importance of tracking and managing your shrinkages so they are optimised for your staff. Learning outcomes include:

 - How to ensure that you are able to track your shrinkage data across all time horizons: annual, Monthly, Weekly, Daily
 - The benefits of shrinkage categorisation when it comes to successful tracking
 - How the inter-connectedness of Shrinkage categories makes effectively managing shrinkage challenging

This module is part of the Shrinkage Box Set

Shrinkage (4) - Tiered Shrinkage

Shrinkage (4) - Tiered Shrinkage

Introduction into shrinkage calculations, tiered shrinkage, historical tracking.  Understand the importance of calculating shrinkages so they are optimised for your operation the key differences and impact on your resource requirements

 - What is included in shrinkage?
 - The importance of calculating shrinkage correctly.
 - Which method should you use for planning, budgeting.

This module is part of the Shrinkage Box Set

Shrinkage (5) - Benchmarking Shrinkage

Shrinkage (5) - Benchmarking Shrinkage

Benchmarking is important in understanding best practice, comparing ourselves with our competitors and becoming the best, but there are many pitfalls to avoid. In this module;

 - Learn different research and benchmarking methods that are available for you to use
 - Find out about the best types of questions that you can ask to assist your benchmarking
 - Get a plan for external benchmarking amongst your peers

This module is part of the Shrinkage Box Set

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