Leveraging the Seven Intrinsic Motivators in 2025 to Attract and Retain Highly Skilled, Engaged BPO Teams

The Seven Intrinsic Motivators for Call Center Success

1. Autonomy

Autonomy refers to the ability to make decisions and have control over one’s work. Employees who feel empowered to take ownership of their roles are more likely to feel motivated and engaged in delivering a quality service product.

How It Applies to Call Centers in 2025:

• Empower skilled agents to handle customer issues without always needing supervisor approval, within certain guidelines.
• Include senior team members in client-facing calibration meetings to observe direct client feedback and to achieve greater alignment.
• Give agents more control over how to most efficiently resolve customer issues. This is especially important in high-touch BPO and Helpdesk roles.
• Request feedback from experienced/proven team members regarding where the process could be made more flexible or efficient to improve the customer experience.
• Allow flexible scheduling, or the ability to work from home several days each week to reward disciplined employees.

Why It Matters:

When employees know they are trusted, they fight to maintain that trust and don’t leave your employ for a job with similar pay that micromanages all aspects of their work or where their feedback is not heard or appreciated.

2. Mastery

Mastery is the desire to improve and excel at a skill or task. For call center employees, continuous training and opportunities to develop new skills can greatly enhance job satisfaction. Offering structured professional development and upskilling opportunities gives employees a sense of mastery in their roles.

How It Applies to Call Centers in 2025:

• Provide employees with access to online courses and training sessions to improve their communication, technical and problem-solving skills.
• Outline a clear path of progression for those employees who wish to participate in professional development to be considered for future promotions within the team.
• Include your team in identifying opportunities for process improvements. There’s no limit to what you can learn in performance environments like lead generation or telesales campaigns.
• Implement gamification within training programs, where employees earn rewards for mastering certain skills or achieving performance goals.
• AI analysis can’t replace frontline insight. Incorporate team feedback into monthly client meetings and attribute recommendations to the members of your team who shared their observations.

Why It Matters:

Employees are more engaged when they are constantly learning and improving. Mastery can also lead to increased job satisfaction and employee retention, as workers feel a sense of progress in their careers.

Check out this article from Forbes from just one year ago that really makes the case for continuing to update our skills: Half Of All Skills Will Be Outdated Within Two Years, Study Suggests

3. Purpose

Purpose is about connecting the day-to-day work with a greater mission. Employees are more motivated when they understand how their roles contribute to the success of the company and its customers. In a call center, purpose can be communicated by showing how agents’ efforts directly impact customer satisfaction, brand reputation and overall company growth.

How It Applies to Call Centers in 2025:

• Share customer success stories with agents to show how their work makes a difference. For social impact programs like non-profit fundraising or disaster response, it’s easy to quantify contribution and highlight impact. But for other programs that have less immediate or direct quantifiable results, you’ll need to look for stats re: improvement or efficiency to illustrate our role in a larger relationship or sequence of events.
• Celebrate individual and team contributions at regular intervals, citing individual contributions as evidence of your team’s shared purpose and combined efforts.
• Track and publish target goals and actual results alongside standout individual performances to create a sense of community and productive competition.
• Build strong connections between personal improvement and program success to emphasize the role of each individual in your overall results.
• Create team challenges or goals tied to company-wide achievements, such as reducing churn or improving NPS (Net Promoter Score).

Why It Matters:

When employees see the bigger picture, they feel more connected to their work and motivated to contribute to the company’s success.

4. Relatedness

Relatedness refers to the feeling of being connected to others and being part of a team. In call centers, where remote or hybrid work environments are increasingly common, fostering a sense of community is essential for building team cohesion and loyalty.

How It Applies to Call Centers in 2025:

• Encourage team collaboration through virtual tools and platforms, ensuring that remote workers feel included and part of the team. We use Snowfly and other employee engagement systems to help build a sense of community with integrated rewards, recognitions and incentives.
• Bring senior members of your agent group into the training process to ensure institutional knowledge becomes documented program intelligence.
• Organize virtual or in-person team-building activities to strengthen relationships between team members.
• Implement peer acknowledgement programs similar to employee of the month nominations, but focused on collaboration, teamwork, empathy and other team culture-drivers.
• Create a formal employee referral bonus program so that your top performers will bring friends and professional connections into the company because they know they would be exceptional.

Why It Matters:

Employees who feel a sense of belonging and camaraderie are more likely to stay with the company, reducing turnover and improving overall team morale.

5. Competence

Employees want to feel confident and competent in their roles. For call center workers, this means receiving the training and support needed to handle various customer interactions and technical challenges.

How It Applies to Call Centers in 2025:

• Offer customized training programs for new hires and ongoing learning opportunities for experienced agents.
• Ensure supervisors are available for real-time assistance, impromptu education and feedback/ intervention when needed.
• Implement real-time coaching using AI-driven tools that provide feedback and guidance during live calls.
• Leverage advanced analytics and topgrading software to coach your employees into success, not micromanage them into paralysis. . .
• Make extra effort to reinforce the positive things your team is doing. Point out improvement and emphasize the importance of practice over perfection.

Why It Matters:

When employees feel competent in their roles, they are more likely to provide high-quality service, leading to better customer outcomes and higher job satisfaction. Don’t make the mistake of majoring in correcting every minor detail. It’s more important to celebrate your team’s ability to think through problems, logically work through solutions and reflect upon how they might go about handling a similar interaction in the future.

6. Progress

Progress is the sense of forward momentum, both in individual roles and in overall career growth. Employees are motivated when they feel they are advancing and growing in their careers.

How It Applies to Call Centers in 2025:

• Create clear career paths that allow employees to advance into roles such as team leads, trainers or managers. Note: 80% of AnswerNet’s executive team was an agent early in their careers. This has led to our emphasis on mentorship, ongoing education and professional development across all specialty areas and disciplines of the business.
• Offer performance-based promotions and opportunities for employees to earn recognition for their achievements. Badging programs, certificates of completion, formal title changes and other achievement milestone markers are affordable and impactful.
• Design opportunities for individuals to self-educate at their own pace through interactive training modules, learning paths, certification courses, etc. Help your employees set goals for themselves so that you can be a partner in their success. Learning management software like SplendtasticLMS is affordable and easy to deploy for large or small teams.
• Perform individualized annual reviews to track advancement and mastery in a written form noting where a person started, what they have accomplished and where you would like to see them focus their energy to maintain positive momentum. Tip: your supervisors should capture individualized observations and noteworthy events as an ongoing documentation effort in each employee file which makes the review process easier.
• Help your team members see the universal value in each skill and subject area they master. It’s important that your team sees their own growth and understands the value of the skills they have learned.

Why It Matters:

A clear sense of progress keeps employees motivated, ensuring they remain engaged and focused on their long-term career goals within the company.

7. Balance (The New Motivator)

In 2025, achieving balance has emerged as a critical intrinsic motivator. With the rise of remote work and changing employee expectations, offering flexibility in work schedules and locations has become essential. Employees now value the ability to choose where and when they work, balancing their personal and professional lives.

How It Applies to Call Centers in 2025:

• Offer remote work options or hybrid models where employees can split their time between home and the office.
• Implement flexible scheduling that accommodates individual preferences and allows employees to choose shifts that fit their lifestyle.
• Encourage physical activity like taking a walk to get fresh air.
• Take regular breaks and schedule time off for decompression, relaxation and reflection.
• Encourage employees to take care of each other and their own wellness as a core aspect of your company culture.

Why It Matters:

Balance is increasingly important in attracting and retaining top talent, as employees now expect greater control over their work environments.

Leveraging the Seven Intrinsic Motivators for 2025 Hiring and Retention

By leveraging the seven intrinsic motivators—Autonomy, Mastery, Purpose, Relatedness, Competence, Progress and the new motivator Balance—call centers can attract and retain highly skilled, engaged teams. Expanding the hiring pool beyond traditional BPO professionals and looking for candidates with diverse skills in sales, retention, customer care and technical support will be essential for creating an innovative, motivated workforce. Need help? Our solutions consultants are here to help you figure out what’s next.