The future of AI-enhanced people development and performance: a YakTrak perspective
In the contact centre industry, there’s a common belief that more coaching automatically leads to better performance. However, our experience at YakTrak has shown that it’s not just about coaching frequency, but about integrating QA, compliance, and development efforts to drive holistic performance improvements.
"Without visibility into development quality and its impact on performance, leaders risk focusing on isolated interventions rather than driving meaningful improvements." Seb Cox, Head of Customer Experience at YakTrak
For example, we’ve seen team leaders in some contact centres get caught in a cycle of reactive coaching—trying to fix issues after they’ve occurred. Without the right data or visibility, coaching sessions become a guessing game. "It’s like driving with only the rearview mirror," as one leader put it.
Peter Grist, MD of YakTrak + GRIST, often emphasizes that the real challenge is creating a continuous learning culture. He shared an example where a contact centre struggled with inconsistent performance because leaders defaulted to task management rather than focusing on structured development. By embedding continuous learning practices, such as microbehaviours and real-time feedback loops, the team saw a significant shift in agent confidence and performance, leading to measurable improvements across key metrics. He says, "We see leaders defaulting to task management because developing people requires time, structure, and deliberate effort. When structured development is embedded, performance transforms."
The shift: AI-powered people development that drives real results
At GRIST + YakTrak, we believe the future lies in AI-enhanced people development solutions that help leaders make learning and performance improvements more targeted, consistent, and impactful. We’re not talking about AI replacing human leaders—we’re talking about AI as an enabler that provides real-time insights and recommendations across QA, compliance, and coaching efforts.
Key benefits of AI-powered people development:
Real-time insights – AI analyses performance data to highlight what’s working and what’s not, providing real-time feedback to leaders.
Consistency in assessments – AI helps reduce variability in QA and development assessments, ensuring alignment with best-practice frameworks defined by GRIST.
Focus on the right capabilities – AI identifies specific skill gaps and development needs, so coaching and training efforts are more targeted.
Now: how YakTrak is already improving people development and performance
Today, YakTrak + GRIST are already laying the foundation for AI-driven insights by enabling leaders to improve performance through structured workflows and integrated processes by:
• Linking QA insights directly to development workflows, ensuring performance reviews and feedback sessions are informed by real data.
• Providing visibility into development frequency and quality, so leaders can identify trends and address skill gaps faster.
• Highlighting task completion and workflow automation, helping leaders ensure that QA, compliance, and coaching activities drive real improvements in performance metrics like FCR, QA scores, and NPS.
Peter Grist explains this concept further: "Breaking down big goals into small, actionable steps—what we call microbehaviours—is key. It’s about making progress achievable and sustainable, turning small wins into a high-performance culture."
In a recent YakTrak deployment, we saw firsthand how structured feedback transformed team performance. One team leader shared how the shift to data-driven coaching led to more focused development conversations, resulting in faster skill-building and increased confidence among agents.
Future: AI-powered people development that drives continuous improvement
Looking ahead, AI will play an even bigger role in enhancing performance and development efforts. Imagine a scenario where AI provides real-time feedback during a coaching session, pinpointing specific skill gaps or highlighting positive behaviours to reinforce. For example, during a live coaching session, the AI could identify that an agent is struggling with objection handling and immediately suggest specific techniques or scripts to address the issue. This ensures that coaching conversations are always data-driven, practical, and focused on real-time improvement. This would ensure that coaching and development conversations are always data-driven and focused on what will have the greatest impact. In the future, YakTrak’s AI capabilities will:
Identify specific capabilities to focus on, ensuring development efforts always target the right areas for improvement, while providing a timeline of progress to show how specific actions have improved key metrics over time.
Provide real-time recommendations to help leaders refine their approach to development, QA, and coaching.
Track performance quality and impact, giving leaders a clear picture of which activities are driving the best results.
"AI will highlight not only what needs improvement but also suggest specific behaviours and skills to focus on, ensuring performance development is always relevant and timely," says Seb Cox, Head of Customer Experience at YakTrak.
The impact: AI-enhanced people development for a high-performance culture
When AI-enhanced development becomes the norm, the results are clear:
• Higher performance quality drives improvements in key metrics like FCR, QA, and customer satisfaction.
• Faster capability development leads to more capable agents who can handle complex customer interactions with confidence.
• Sustainable performance improvements result from a culture of continuous learning and development.
YakTrak + GRIST are committed to making this future a reality by providing contact centres with the tools and insights needed to build high-performance cultures through smarter, faster development pathways.
Ready to drive high-performance through smarter, faster development pathways?
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