Voice of the Customer

Contact (Call) Center History: Supplier Formation and Consolidation

Moderated by:  Jason Alley

Are you interested in how the contact center market evolved?  Knowing, reviewing what events shaped the industry?  When components of technology were delivered to market, in what order?  When companies were formed and whose hands their respective technology innovations ended up in, at what price?  Ever had your head spin trying to keep track of who acquired who?

If you answered “Yes” to any of the questions above, download a copy of my blog paper Contact Center Supplier Formation and Consolidation - Making Sense of a Crowded and Complex Market.  This document provides an overview of the formation and consolidation of companies in the contact center space, together with historical commentary and reflections.

Enjoy, and please contribute your thoughts and insights through the comments section of this blog entry. I will be updating the paper based on your feedback. My hope is that this can be a living resource that will prove useful for many over time.

Companies Tracked:  Acuity, AIM, Alcatel, AMAE, Amdocs, Answersoft, Apropos, Aspect, AT&T, Audium, Avaya, Blue Pumpkin, BlueNote Networks, BocheTelecom, Bosch Telecom Group, Brite, Broadbase, Calabrio, CellIT, CenterForce, Cisco, Clarify, Contactual (White Pajama), Convergys, CosmoCom, Davox, Dialogic, Echopass, Edify, Egain, Envox, Eyretel, Finali, Five9, Fluency, Genesys, GeoTel, Golden Gate Capital, Hipbone, HotSIP, HP, IBM, IEX, Ineto, Inference, Informiam, InStranet, Intel, Interactive Intelligence, Intervoice, Kana,Koral, Latigent, Lucent, MediaStreams.com, Melita, Mercom, Microsoft, Mustang, Nabnasset, Next Age, NICE, Nimcat, Noble Systems, Nortel, Nuance, Nuasis, Opus Group, Oracle, PeopleSoft, Performix, PlaceWare, Positive Software, Quintus, Remedy, RightForce, RightNow, Rockwell, Salesforce.com, Salesnet, SAP, Scansoft, Scopus, Selsius, ShoreTel, Siebel, Silknet, Silver Lake, Sitebridge, Sophisticom, Spanlink, Syntellect, TCS, Teleo, Telephony@Work, Telera, Tellme, Teloquent, Tenovis, TPG Capital, Ubiquity, Unveil, Vantive, Verint, Versatility, VoiceGenie, VoiceTek, WebEx, Webline, Wicom, Witness.

Technologies Tracked: Automatic Call Distribution (ACD), Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR), Case-based Reasoning (CBR), Computer-Telephony Integration (CTI), Contact Center Analytics, Contact Center Reporting, Customer Relationship Management (CRM), Email Response Management Systems (ERMS), Enterprise Routing (Pre and Post Call), Interactive Voice Response (IVR), Multi-media Routing/Blending, Knowledge Management (KM), Outbound (Predictive) Dialing, Performance Management Optimization (PMO), Quality Management (QM), Service-oriented Architecture (SOA), Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), SMB Contact Center, Voice Extensible Mark-up Language (VXML), VoIP, Web Self-Service, Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), Web-Collaboration (Chat, Co-Browsing, Conferencing), Workforce Management (WFM), Workforce Optimization (WFO).

Call Center Agent Motivation, Performance: $100K a Year to Answer Phones?

Moderated by: Jason Alley

My father fired over a recent Businessweek.com article he ran across titled, “Call-Center Jobs That Pay $100K a Year.”  This definitely caught my attention…  The article highlights a case study of a U.S. based outsourcing company, iQor, that has “added nearly 3,000 jobs in the U.S. over the past four years, making it the company's fastest growing region.”  The author, Vivek Wadhwa, uses the case study to support a theory of his.  He explains, “Yes, outsourcing will continue and globalization will change the world's economic landscape. But the U.S. is hardly helpless. With smart processes and the proper incentives, U.S. companies can keep jobs here in America, and do so in a way that is actually better for the company and its employees.”  As a proud American and someone who believes many U.S. companies have been short sighted and missed the mark by sending customer-facing (and other critical) roles overseas, this got me pretty fired up.  However, I believe strongly that “customers” need to be added to the list of those who can benefit from such a movement.

Remote Agents Remain a Hot Topic

A recent client call included some interesting dialogue around why someone would move forward with deploying remote/home agents.  Some see it as an opportunity to motivate existing agents - top agents being rewarded with the opportunity to work from home.  Others see it as an opportunity to gain access to an expanded pool of talent - companies in an area with high attrition or just the wrong resource base can hire agents from outside the area, including more highly educated people willing to take on variable, part-time work (e.g., stay-at-home parents).  Some see it as an opportunity to reduce costs by minimizing their real-estate footprint and/or gaining access to less costly talent.

Improve Customer Experience by Putting Your Customers Second

Moderated by: Linda Van Doren, Vanguard Communications

In these challenging economic times, everyone’s making sacrifices.  Headlines inform us that employees are taking voluntary time off, furloughs and pay cuts.  Overtime is a thing of the past.  Call centers especially have been impacted by these tough times.  Turnover is at its lowest in years, giving us a great opportunity to engage our employees.  There have been many studies linking job satisfaction to increased productivity – so the question is, how can we make our contact center employees happy and motivated, especially in these dour times?

A Peek at the Playbook

Moderated by: Anne Keefer, Vanguard Communications

There have been more than one or two posts about the importance of metrics and why they matter.  I would like to share three of my own real life experiences.   My experiences may give you insight that will lead to improvements in your own call center environment or help you find a new way of looking at an old problem.

Just Because the Economy Slows Down Doesn’t Mean You Have To

Moderated by: David Powis, Vanguard Communications

In my last few entries, I’ve talked about the option of hosted technology to help reduce capital costs in these recessionary times.  But what if you’re lucky enough to have pretty robust technology in place?  If things are slowing down in the call center, perhaps now is the time to look at some of your operating processes to see how you can improve things.  If you have some extra agent time in the schedule, put together a team(s) to identify ways to improve effectiveness – and the bottom line.  Here are some thought starters:

Making Metrics Meaningful

Moderated by: Jason Alley, Vanguard Communications

In a recent Internet Telephony Magazine article, The Numbers Trap, Elaine Cascio makes some really good points about how we often get too hung up on numbers, benchmarking rather than what's best for customers and the business.  She explains, "People may adopt a key statistic from a benchmarking study in their industry as a goal, assuming it's a best practice. But often, benchmarking exercises expose not best practices, but common ones...One of the keys to running a successful contact center — or business — is to clearly identify what it is you want to measure, not just what you’re able to report on. The 'wrong' numbers not only mask bigger issues, they also send the wrong messages up and down the line, from agents to senior management...The key to having meaningful metrics is to tie them to strategic enterprise-wide goals."

Have you been bitten by the numbers trap?

Have you been successful in tying metrics to enterprise goals?

BTW - I am embarrassed to admit that I can't wait to place my American Idol votes this year!  I'm listening to my favorite Idol of all times at this very moment (not intentionally...funny).  Any guesses?  First name starts with C, last name starts with D...  Last year my favorite was David Cook.  Looks like my mild case of dyslexia has snuck up on me again...:-)

Are Your Quality Scores in Sync with Your Customer Experience Initiatives?

Moderated by: Linda Van Doren, Vanguard Communications

In earlier posts, we’ve discussed measuring the customer experience, and how many of you are working on what that means to your organization.

So, if you’re like many of our clients who are in the midst of initiatives focusing on understanding what the customer experience is (e.g., Customer Experience Management, Balanced Scorecards, Net Promoter Scores), what are you doing in the contact center to support those efforts? Specifically, what is the state of your quality department?

A day in the life…

Moderated by:  Anne Keefer, Vanguard Communications

You may not be a Wall Street Financial Analyst, or a candidate running for political office, but you are a leader and manager of people.  You’re a Contact Cente Manager and times are tough.

A new day, a new month, and a quick look at your schedule this morning reminds you:

How Will Contact Centers Respond to the Economic Crisis?

Moderated by:  Jason Alley and David Powis, Vanguard Communications

How will we respond to the current economic crisis?  This question is permeating every board room across America.  In turn, every contact center should be asking, “What can we do to proactively help our company survive and be poised to emerge as a market leader?” 

Will we…

Eliminate “Unnecessary Excellence?”

This one requires a bit of an explanation…