Breaking Barriers: Why You Should Look at Visually Impaired Agents for Your Contact Center Needs?

India is home to about 12 million visually impaired people, which is over a third of the world’s visually impaired population.

Only 29.16% of the visually impaired in India have access to the education system, and less than half of these find a job after completing their studies, even though most of them actively search for a job.

Most visually impaired people fall out of the job market due to unequal opportunities and inadequate facilities.

The contact center industry is no different. Visually impaired people face the same level of challenges and inadequacies when it comes to making them successful.

Why Is It Necessary to Include Visually Impaired Agents as a Part of Your Contact Center Workforce?

Apart from being socially responsible, this inclusivity can bring a lot of tangible benefits to your organization.

• Have you ever looked at anything from the perspective of a visually impaired person? You get the drift, right? Visually impaired agents will bring in diverse perspectives, which is essential in the customer experience space.
• Would you agree that visually impaired people have better listening skills and strong attention to detail? Wouldn’t that be great for your customers and your CX function?
• Do you believe that a diverse and inclusive workforce will serve a diverse customer base better, including customers with disabilities? Besides, with heightened empathy, visually impaired agents can make customer interactions personalized.
• As they are swimming against the tide, visually impaired agents often develop unique problem-solving skills that can come in handy in your customer experience function.
• Organizations that practice inclusivity attract more customers, partners, and top talent, but isn’t that the recipe for success?

What Challenges Do Visually Impaired Agents Face in a Traditional Contact Center Environment?

These are some of the questions you should ask yourself as a contact center if you want to make your environment inclusive for visually impaired agents.

• Is my platform fully optimized for screen readers or assistive technologies like JAWS (Job Access With Speech)?
• Can I do away with visual cues like color coding, charts, or small texts while retrieving data to make it inclusive for everyone?
• Do you have custom training programs for your visually impaired agents, or does your programs assume visual capabilities?
• How much of your collaboration and communication is dependent on visual cues and gestures?
• How do you introduce new software and features? Do you keep your training inclusive?

Can Technology Come to the Rescue?

It is just a matter of time before contact centers in India will have to adhere to the norms of inclusivity of visually impaired agents as a part of their workforce. Besides, they may have to meet legal and regulatory requirements related to accessibility.

When you demonstrate your commitment to this inclusivity, your CSR profile gets stronger, leading to positive PR and increased customer loyalty.

By proactively investing in accessibility technologies, you can show your commitment to inclusion and provide the best possible infrastructure to offer equal opportunities for everyone to succeed in their work.

How Does ClearTouch Help?

Our platform assists visually impaired people in having equal opportunities and adequate facilities to do their jobs better.

We provide visually impaired people with the necessary tools to do their jobs exceptionally well.

When you look at it deeply, visually impaired people want to be independent and provide for themselves. Nobody wants to be slotted in the bias of low expectations from colleagues and supervisors. Technology can help them do this.

Some housekeeping features for visually impaired people include:

• Adjusted lighting and color contrast
• Voicemail or email messages as opposed to written notes or memos
• Screen reader software or screen magnifiers
• Large font sizes 
• Large monitors and scanners
• Braille materials or large prints

Besides these, we offer comprehensive training and support to maximize the productivity of visually impaired agents, and we include features like clear labels, hotkeys, and signal tones.

Our platform is tightly integrated with JAWS (Job Access With Speech), the leading assistive screen reader technology. This helps agents navigate the platform, read text, and interact with various tools without any barriers.

With JAWS, your agents can perform all tasks without relying on a mouse. It supports full keyboard navigation, making it easier for your visually impaired agents to access different features and functionalities quickly.

Our platform helps you customize your screens by adjusting font size, contrast, and layout to suit the needs of visually impaired agents. This helps improve visibility and reduces strain on the agents.

Did I say that we offer audio prompts and real-time feedback? It helps visually impaired agents minimize errors and inaccuracies during customer interactions.

Our reports and analytics are compatible with JAWS, which allows agents to review their performance and feedback without relying on visual aids.

We work with an agency that provides training for students who are visually impaired to achieve gainful employment. Our association has allowed them to train their students with the opportunity to thrive in the customer service and contact center field.

Recruitment of visually impaired agents should not be viewed just as a socially responsible or charitable thing to do.

They bring diverse perspectives and excellent skills to excel in the customer experience space because of their empathetic nature and innate listening skills.

Many of our customers who employ visually impaired agents have reported that their performance has been on par with the others and, in many cases, better than the rest with visual skills.

Most contact centers that are inclusive have reported lower interview-to-hire ratios, reduced turnover, and longer job tenure.

With accessibility tools and assistive technology, it makes a lot of sense to leverage the skills of visually impaired agents.

Become inclusive and benefit your customers as well as your organization.