Call Center Frontline, the 2010 US Census

It’s a huge undertaking and that would be one of the reasons it only takes place once every ten years. Naturally it holds more value and is more practical to administer when its conducted every decade instead of annually. Many people are fearful of it and don’t trust the motivation behind it, others go to great lengths to avoid being captured by it. On the other hand economists remind us that if its not accurate then planning and funding are never going to be optimal, whether you’re looking at schools, doctors, new road construction or even gas stations. The fact of the matter is the decennial event is actually required by the US Constitution as a means for the Federal government to properly fund and plan matters for the population of the United States. You’ve surely gathered that we’re looking at the US Census which is back on the streets after a ten year break.

start counting....

This year’s event has already begun and the government will be assisted by some 140,000 full and part-time employees to help administer the door-to-door collation of information that takes years in planning. We wanted to focus on the infrastructure of a call center network that could support up to 308 million Americans that represent over 130 million households. The state of Utah is providing much of that support with a network of three call centers that become operational for inbound calls in late February although as you’d expect training has already commenced. The larger centers located in Sandy, Murray and Ogden Utah will employ as many as 3,100 staff to answer questions and concerns about the 2010 census from the nation, if that sounds like a feat of planning it is just the tip of the iceberg.

Planning a call center operation is far more complex than just assessing the inbound volume and a ratio of calls per hour. Any well planned program must be fully explored in terms of variables for recording data, metrics, IT, training and scheduling. The coordination required to service a project of this size reflects planning  unlike any other call center project especially as the entire program will be completed by August. In its entirety 8 other centers in addition to Utah will be in use, at their peak employing some 9,000 staff.   The peak period is expected from the middle of March until the middle of April. During that period 7 to 8 million calls are anticipated with a final total of some 15 million inbound calls when the support ends in August. Initially calls will be primarily inbound questions about the survey with a second phase to follow where the centers will call to clarify surveys that have been submitted with errors.

Language is another challenge for the hiring process as the centers must have staff able to assist in English, Spanish, Chinese, Korean, Russian or Vietnamese. The entire project is being coordinated by Lockheed Martin as the government’s contractor and though it will be ten years until the next census the planning will start long before that.