There were a few great articles listed that are well worth the read:

First up is this article – http://www.paymentsnews.com/2009/10/2009-gift-card-trend-report-from-archstone-consulting.html - that goes into the 2009 Gift Card Trend and surprisingly the concensus seems to be a flat to modest 5% growth this year in the gift card market.  Well worth the read.

Next was an article that was quoted on the site but appeared in The New York Times, Your Money – http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/your-money/06prepay.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all.  This article goes into several aspects of the pre-paid industry but is geared specifically towards reloadable cards.  Will reloadable cards go away simply because of fees? No – here is a quote from the article:

In 2008, for instance, customers loaded about $8.7 billion onto prepaid cards, a 125 percent increase over the previous year, according to the Mercator Advisory Group. The industry is expected to balloon to $119 billion by 2012, Mercator predicts.

If anything the industry is expected to boom in the coming years but with several regulations in the US on the table (CARD Act comes to mind) there will be greater oversight over what card issuers can and cannot do.

But what exactly is the unified desktop?  Is it just a grouping of programs that can be easily accessed?  Is there more to the unified desktop?

Lets start by providing an example of what unified desktop is by making an analogy to something we use everyday – the (lowly) cell phone.

In the old days, you had a cell phone.  It kept basic information, but you also had your desktop PC or notebook that held your contact list and other information that would be pretty useful if you were someone that was always on the road and travelling.

Maybe you had a PDA (personal digital assistant).  They were the rage, weren’t they?

You needed something – you started up your laptop and retrieved the information.

What a pain.

In comes the first of the smartphones – the BlackBerry.  Now you could get your corporate e-mail routed to your BB, you could even carry your documents with you.  Unified communications.

Out comes the Apple iPhone and now not only can you get your e-mail, but you could VPN into the corporate network and work as-if you’re in front of your PC.  Unified communications.

The unified desktop is very similar.  The unified desktop takes all your applications and converges – or integrates – them into one “super application”.  Think about it like this, depending on the industry you are in your customer service agents may need access to 5 or 10 application in order to fulfill certain requirements.  You could have the following:

• Accounting applications (billing and accounts receivable)
• Order placement
• CRM (Client Relationship Management) tools
• Inventory
• E-mail
• IM
• Softphone
• Knowlegebase

Though this presents a high-level overview, it is entirely possible that each item above is composed of one or more applications.

Trying to train and then have your agents navigate through dozens of applications is not an easy task.  You will build process upon process to handle simple enquiries – your agents may spend more time learning the process than mastering the tasks that are required to fulfill the job requirements.

The unified desktop integrates everything into one application, so that a look-up or change in one automatically makes updates in related applications.  It simplifies logins as well, the user doesn’t need to remember a dozen passwords but only one.  If they forget one, IT can reset one password.  If they forget 3 passwords, IT is working with multiple applications and resetting passwords.  Mulitply that by the number of customer service agents you have in your group.

There is a very good article on Contact Professionals’ website – http://www.contactprofessional.com/issues/article.asp?ID=375 that will give you more information about the unified desktop as it relates to the contact center.

So why would anyone want to spend the money on a unified desktop for their contact center?  Simple…

• Improves first call resolution
• Improved customer experience – they are not constantly on hold, or transferred from one department to another
• Improved agent satisfaction – agents don’t need to struggle to learn multiple applications or memorize dozens of logins
• Reduce call handling times – everything is in one place, you don’t need to keep 20 windows open on your desktop
• Reduced training costs – focus on building product knowledge, not application knowledge; spend less on building detailed and intricate processes to handle every issue the arises
• Reduce agent churn – a happy agent will stay with your organization; this will reduce costs overall with hiring and training new staff

The key in any contact center is to reduce costs.  It’s not always efficient to reduce staff as there will always be a need to retain staff to a certain level – so you need to look for operational efficiencies by looking at those items that are within your control that you can make changes to.

I would love to hear your take on the unified desktop, whether you use it in your organization and what types of results you’ve had with a unified desktop.

So I start asking the individual questions about their current job, what their dream job looks like and about their accomplishments.

That’s the trigger word: accomplishments.

When I ask this, most just look at me.  Then they say “well, I didn’t accomplish anything.  I’m just a programmer” or whatever their job is.

But this is where you are wrong.  You probably HAVE accomplished something.  Perhaps you coded some new procedures/functions/scripts that enhanced an application?  Maybe you helped design part of an application?  Maybe you even streamlined code that allowed the application to work faster/better/with less errors.

These are ALL accomplishments even if they were part of the job.

For example – as Director of Customer Support and Operations it’s my job to ensure that we meet service level agreements – the fact that I meet them is an accomplishment eventhough it is part of what I have to do.

It’s called “tooting your own horn” and friends, when you’re looking for a new job or the first job you do toot as much as you can BUT remember that you need to toot in such a way that you also show the value you will add to the prospective employer.

Now there are individuals out there that may not get the opportunity to make changes in their workplace, in some companies processes are so tight that you cannot make changes for various reasons – legal, regulatory etc., but there are always ways to streamline what you do — that is an accomplishment.

Let me give you another example.  One of my CS Agents prints out any memo that I send out and puts them into a binder.  He then builds his own “process” to handle those specific events.  He’s developed his own processes to handle those issues – that is an accomplishment.  He can bank that on his resume.

He can safely put on a resume “developed my own processes to deal with customer service issues” and in an interview expand upon that.

Regardless of the position you are in, you have the opportunity to enhance your work by looking at what you do and seeing if there are ways to improve upon it.  If you have spare time after having completed a project, look at it again and see if there is any way to optimize it.  Maybe there isn’t a way — but isn’t it better than just sitting around?

Be proactive in your career and you will find hidden gems that have the potential to propel you forward.

Use this checklist as a guide. The experience of other companies in training can provide additional guides. However, in thinking about a training program for your company, consider each question and answer with a “yes” or “no” in light of the training needs of your particular situation.

This is Part 1 of a multi-part series of posts on Developing a Training Program.

What Is the Goal of Training?

The questions in this section are designed to help the owner-manager define the objective or goal to be achieved by a training program. Whether the objective is to conduct initial training, to provide for upgrading employees, or to retrain for changing job assignments, the goal should be spelled out before developing the plan for the training program.

• Do you want to improve the performance of your employees?
• Will you improve your employees by training them to perform their present tasks better?
• Do you need to prepare employees for newly developed or modified jobs?
• Is training needed to prepare employees for promotion?
• Is the goal to reduce accidents and increase safety practices?
• Should the goal be to improve employee attitudes especially about waste and spoilage practices?
• Do you need to improve the handling of materials in order to break production bottlenecks?
• Is the goal to orient new employees to their jobs?
• Will you need to teach new employees about overall operations?
• Do you need to train employees so they can help teach new workers in an expansion program?

What Does the Employee Need to Learn?

Once the objective or goal of the program is set, you will need to determine the subject matter. The following questions are designed to help you decide what the employee needs in terms of duties, responsibilities, and attitudes.

• Can the job be broken down into steps for training purposes?
• Are there standards of quality which trainees can be taught?
• Are there certain skills and techniques which trainees must learn?
• Are there hazards and safety practices which must be taught?
• Have you established the methods that employees must use to avoid or minimize waste and spoilage?
• Are there material handling techniques that must be taught?
• Have you determined the best way for the trainees to operate the equipment?
• Are there performance standards that employees must meet?
• Are there attitudes that need improvement or modifications?
• Will information on your products help employees to do a better job?
• Should the training include information about the location and use of tool cribs and so on?
• Will the employee need instruction about departments other than his or her own?

Additional topics which will be covered in subsequent days will be:

What Type of Training?

What Method of Instruction?

What Audio Visual Aids Will You Use?

What Physical Facilities Will You Need?

What About Timing?

Who Will Be Selected as Instructor?

Who Should Be Selected?

What Will the Program Cost?

What Checks or Controls Will You Use?

How Should the Program Be Publicized?

In addition to providing a simple checklist that you can follow, we will drill into each of the topics to provide more valuable information.

Over time, each of these topics will be linked and we will feature the primary post on the right sidebar menu for easy access to this valuable information.

You are welcome to share your experiences on this topic by leaving a comment or if you wish, we would happily accept you as a guest poster to the blog – either way, just leave us a comment and we will be in touch!

How to Develop and Conduct Successful In-Company Training Program

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Blr Handbook of Training Techniques: How to Develop and Deliver Effective Programs

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The new trainer's self-study workshop: Learn to develop and deliver dynamic training programs using your real-life assignments

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A couple of gadgets that I feel are well worth the money are the iPod Touch (or the iPhone) and the netbook.

First the netbook.

Typical netbooks will have a screen around 10″ in size and are very portable – in fact, it makes the traditional laptop look and feel like a desktop!  I purchased a couple of netbooks over the last two years and use both to the max.

I most recently purchased two different HP netbooks:

HP Mini 110-1030CA 10.1" Netbook PC (1.60GHz Intel Atom Processor N270, 1GB RAM, 160GB Hard Drive, Windows XP Home Edition) (Black Swirl)

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HP Mini 2140 10.1" Notebook PC (Intel Atom N270 1.6GHz, 2GB Memory, 160GB HD, Windows Vista Business / XP Pro, 3 Cell Lithium-Ion battery)

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Both are great netbooks, the differences between the two:

The 110-1030C comes with Windows XP, has 1gb memory whereas the 2140 comes with Windows Vista Operating System and has 2gb memory.  You could upgrade the 1030C for about $50.00 and add an additional 1gb memory.  Running Windows XP 1gb should be enough, but it’s always nice to have more.

Other than that and some technical specs, they are almost identical.  The displays are very clean, and bright and I’ve been able to get anywhere from 6-8 hours of use out of the battery depending on how I use it. 

The one drawback with netbooks in general is that they do not come with a CD/DVD drive.  So you need an external one, here is the one that I purchased:

Sony DRXS70U/R External Portable Slim-Line USB 2.0 DVD Drive

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I am really happy with the Sony DVD – it is slim and can fit into the same sleeve that I purchased for the netbooks.

I opted for a slightly more expensive, slim drive – why would you want to lug around a HUGE CD/DVD?  The slim drive is also USB powered so feeds off of the netbook (this is where you may draw more power if running on battery alone).

Although netbooks are only intended for surfing the web and light applications, I’ve really maxed both netbooks out and run full versions of Microsoft Office Professional on them in addition to several other CPU intensive software packages in addition to an older version of JASC Paint Shop Pro (now owned by Corel and re-packaged as a Corel product).

Running graphics intensive applications does suck power and pushes the netbook to its maximum potential but to now I’ve not run into any significant issues.

The 160gb drive is ample, but I have also purchased a new external hard drive plus I have an older external hard drive from an old laptop that I took apart to make a digital picture frame (here is part 2 of the same post – digital picture frame).

Iomega 320 GB eGo Rugged Portable Hard Drive (Ruby Red)

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Whatever you decide to purchase, ultimately you want something that helps you become more productive.  I truly find that I can get caught up on personal work with my netbook – I can take it anywhere and combined with internet access I am truly mobile.

Training programs come in all shapes and sizes, there are companies out there that do sell pre-developed “white label” training programs that allow you to take from a base of solid content and customize it to your organizations needs.

As well many large organizations may already have well developed training departments that can help alleviate the challenges associated with the manager in developing their own content.

Regardless of the method you choose, putting together something that will teach and entertain is not easy.

When I develop any type of training for my team, I opt for lots of pictures and explanations so that my agents fully understand the product any limitations (such as support related inquries) along with all the benefits of the product.  I will ensure that they know which of our merchants sell the product, and the denominations it is available in plus any special terms and conditions associated with the product.

Most training that I’ve put together is only a few sheets and is generally sent via e-mail to the team and stored in a central repository or knowledge base that everyone has access to.  Depending on the type of training, we may also include it in our customer service manual.

When you are going to develop your own training material, you need to ask yourself some very basic questions:

• What is the goal of the training?
• At what level does the training need to be delivered?
• Will the training be delivered in a classroom setting, or through an informal e-mail to the team?
• Are images and detailed explanations required?
• What type of formatting?
• What should be included in the content?

These are only a few questions to consider – they all will play a role in the final product.

Regardless of the type of training you are going to provide, you need to ensure that it will fulfill an existing need – in most cases the needs come as you find issues with current processes.  Another method to identify training needs is by using a GAP ANALYSIS.

What is a Gap Analysis?

Just as it sounds – what the gaps in your existing processes?  For example, lets look at a Human Resource documentation GAP ANALYSIS.

You’ve been told that in order for your Human Resources employee files to be considered complete, each employee file requires certain information:

• Social Insurance Number
• Emergency contact information
• Hire letter
• Employee evaluations and review copies
• Company documentation such as confidentiality agreements

Of course there could be much more.

You’ve now got a baseline of what must be in the files.  Working with your HR department you review a certain number of files and find that you are deficient in certain items.  You’ve now identified the GAP and have just gone through a gap analysis.

The next step is to close that gap.  How will you do it?  If you know that you don’t have a hire letter for everyone, or evaluations then you need to methodically go through and ensure that the missing information is completed and put into that employees file.

I am over simplyfying the process – but essentially that is what it is.

You take the same view when developing training materials for your organization or department.

What does the process currently say you have to do.  For each of the steps in that process, do you need training?  If so, do you have some form of training — remember it doesn’t need to be fancy, even a single paragraph or sheet of paper could be the extent of the training needed.  If you don’t have the training, determine what is required and then from there you would begin the development of your training program.

I realize that this post just touches on the topic of developing a training program.  Over the next while I will go into more detail into this topic.

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It could be something as simple as taking extra time for lunch thinking nobody is looking, or coming in late just a few minutes each day or something that borders on theft such as taking home notepads, pens or pencils.  While the value of these items may be minor, the thought that will cross anyones mind is “if they are taking home a notepad/pen/pencil – what else are they taking?”. 

You want your reputation to be like sterling silver, gold or platinum where you work.  The people you work with are like an extension of your family.  Consider that you’re probably spending in excess of 8-hours per day with them.

Two things that can damage your reputation easily are workplace e-mails and voice mails that are replied to, or forwarded without thought.

E-Mail in the Workplace

You’ve just been lambasted about not doing something, in a fit of anger you decide to reply and in doing so pour your guts into the e-mail message.  Oh you didn’t have any intention of sending the e-mail, but accidentally you hit SEND and the message is gone.

Problem one – you’ve said some rather nasty things in the e-mail.  This person won’t be happy, but you can deal with one person – right?

Problem two – as you take a closer look at the e-mail, it’s sent to the ENTIRE TEAM!  Now, how do you fix that?

Solution for Workplace Email

First thing – NEVER, EVER send an e-mail when you’re angry or in a strong emotional state.  It just isn’t worth it.  You will say things you don’t mean and words written down are very difficult to recant.  Microsoft Outlook has a feature that allows you to recall messages – but normally it will only work if the receiver hasn’t already read the message and if they allow it.  It doesn’t happen magically without anyone knowing.

Next – set a delay on your e-mail to something like 15 minutes, so that it checks the server every 15 minutes and  only then will it send or receive any new mail items.  This gives you some grace time.

Here is how to do this.

From Microsoft Outlook go to TOOLS, then OPTIONS and select MAIL SETUP from the tab.

Next, click on SEND/Receive… BUTTON:

Set the “Schedule an automatic send/receive every” setting to any number that you like.  I’ve set mine to 15 minutes but I can still force send by pressing the Send/Receive button on the Outlook toolbar.

Note that I am using Outlook 2007.

Third – REMOVE the names in the “TO” field.

Remember (and I tell this to my team all the time) – what you say in an e-mail is there forever.  Over the last few years, we’ve seen what happens when companies delete e-mails, so many companies will archive e-mails and keep them for an indefinate period of time.

I keep all my e-mails, with the exception of SPAM or other automated reports.  I can go back to when I first started at my present employer and pull out e-mails.

Voice Mail Problems

I hate to admit to this one, but I made this mistake – ONCE.  It will never happen again.

I get a voice mail from one of my developers, saying that they are having problems getting a hold of the Business Analyst for the project and that they have some questions.  Rather than listen to the entire message, I happily forward it to the analyst.  Bad move.  The first part of the message was nice.  The last half was very critical of the analyst.

Now while there might have been truth to the message, it wasn’t the best move on my part.

The simple solution – listen to the ENTIRE message before you decide to send it to anyone.

What happened in this case?  I met with the analyst, and the developer and we talked it out.  All ended well, but was it ever embaressing for everyone involved!

The developer learned – NEVER, EVER leave nasty voice messages.

The analyst learned – REPLY to your e-mails and voice messages in a timely manner.

I learned – Listen to the ENTIRE message before it’s forwarded to anyone.

In todays business environment, e-mail and voice mail and even instant messaging play an important part in communications and as such we need to be even more diligent in what we are sending out.  A message spoken may have more or less impact that an e-mail – however an e-mail is a permanent record of what was said, and you can’t try and explain the meaning of the message to anyone – the message is black and white (unless of course you try to be coy in your message).

Protect your reputation in the workplace - don’t send an e-mail when you are in a charged emotional state, clear the TO field or better yet – leave the e-mail and respond when you’ve had a chance to cool off.  Voice mails – listen, listen, and listen.

I’ve not even touched on the dozens of ways you can ruin your reputation through the use of social media like Facebook, MySpace or the dozens of other social networks out there — including image hosting services like Flickr. 

We’ll leave social media and Web 2.0 for another post but let me leave you with something I found while looking for an appropriate image to add as part of this post:

Everything that you post on any site can effect your online reputation for better or worse. People may become more attracted to you and be willing to listen to anything you have to say or may ignore your from there on out, regardless of the quality of the content you add to the community. It is for that reason, that in this Web 2.0 world where interaction and user input is key, that you never let your reputation come under fire. This can only be accomplished by being critical of any material you choose to add to the web. Otherwise, the reputation of 1000 days could be tarnished by a single post.

image & source of the quote - http://beyondtheonewayweb.wordpress.com/2008/04/18/a-final-note/

How is this:

• Customer service is an organization’s ability to supply their customers’ wants and needs

How about this one:

• According to the ACA Group customer service is the ability of an organization to constantly and consistently give the customer what they want and need.

I think that that definition, from the ACA Group is accurate.

You want to be able to give consistent service to your customers.

On my team, I have a few individuals that shine all the time. They consistently deliver high quality service to our merchants. They also consistently recieve letters, and e-mails from those same customers about the quality and level of service that they have been able to deliver.

Maybe they get a commendation one for outstanding customer service – fluke. A second time – they got lucky. But how about the third, fourth, fifth… well, you get the idea. These people are good. They ensure every i is dotted and every t crossed. They don’t leave anything to chance. They check everything.

Why don’t the others?

Tough question to answer. Some perhaps were, and are now tired of the constant level of effort required day-in and day-out over the last few years. Some became agents because of the flexibility it provided, others because they didn’t further their education and possibly others because they no longer enjoy the work. Regardless of the reason you will always have people that shine and others that may glimmer every now and then.

Shine VS Glimmer – this is not just in Customer Service, but in any business area. When I was actively involved in Information Technology (IT) there were colleagues that always went above and beyond what they had to do. Their code was always “perfect” – they ran through their test cases in an efficient manner. They would find shortcuts and tips to help make their jobs easier. They would spend time looking at the best practices. They were excited about their work, and they enjoyed what they did.

Then you had the programmers, systems analysts, and even project managers and business managers that didn’t really care. They did just enough to keep themselves above the bar. You know – they are coasters.

I’ve seen this in Accounting and even in more technical areas of IT. I know someone that spends thousands of dollars (of his own money) to stay on top of the latest hardware and technology so that he can tackle anything anyone throws at him. He’s good. He’s very good. But he lacks people skills, that gets him. When something doesn’t work, and he knows its the clients fault, he lets them know. Not good.

How can you develop Customer Service agents of that calibre? It’s difficult. Lets face it, Customer Service isn’t for everyone. You’re asking someone to spend at least 7 hours per day on the phone (the other time is spent for breaks and personal development or other activities that are required). If you are in a high volume call center, your agent could be taking 10-20 calls per hour. If you’re in a low volume call center, perhaps 20-40 calls per shift. Or you could be providing complex support, which requires you to handle 1-2 callers per day but each call could take days to resolve.

Good customer service needs to happen consistently.

The ability to consistently deliver high quality customer service is what will set your company apart.

In my case we provide support to merchants that operate point of sale activation terminals. The paper has jammed. The terminal will not connect. They don’t have pricing set-up. Their IP connection doesn’t work. While the problems sound easy, it can take up to 30 minutes to resolve some issues. Our call center also provides support for financial products and gift cards – that adds a lot more complexity to what the team does, though I’ve approached support differently for these products.

In order to provide positive consistent customer service you need several things in place:

• Solid training
• Efficient distribution of product knowledge
• Knowledge base to track “random” bits of information
• Methods to keep the team in the loop with product launches
• Sufficient technology in place to ensure that processes are being followed

When you look at the list above – and by no means is this a complete list – you can clearly see that there is a cost associated with running a customer service center. When you look at companies like ICBC (Insurance Corporation of British Columbia) whose Customer Service group wins awards and scores high on exit polls from their customers you know that the company and its executives have decided to stand behind what they do. ICBC isn’t the only company – there are others out there that score high on the providing good service; I mention ICBC because I had a chance to visit their call center and speak with their employees.

Some companies opt to farm out their customer service — I can think of a Canadian telecommunications provider that did and speaking from personal experience, it was the wrong thing to do. I no longer make use of their services due to the total lack of professionalism that farmed out company had and the manner in which they treated their customers. I wasn’t the only one. When you keyed in the company name you would find many complaints about their service.

Many companies in the telecommunications field are farming out (the right term is outsourcing) their customer service. Provided the put in place proper processes, then service will succeed, and customers will be happy. But as soon as those processes fail, service also fails.

Good service doesn’t just happen, you and your organization need to make it happen by putting the resources in place to ensure that you can provide quality consistent service.

Upcoming posts on Customer Service:

• Good customer service
• Customer service tips
• Customer service skills

The Supernova Advisor: Crossing the Invisible Bridge to Exceptional Client Service and Consistent Growth

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Exceptional Customer Service: Handle Customers With Skill and Confidence

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The Customer Service Activity Book: 50 Activities For Inspiring Exceptional Service

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Customer Comes Second: And Other Secrets of Exceptional Service

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Exceptional Customer Service

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Yes, it’s true, we’re in a recession, and nearly 1 in 10 workers is unemployed. There are plenty of people willing to work for less money. But in other recent recessions salary growth hasn’t slowed this much. Going back to the early 1990s, base salaries never increased by less than 3.4% a year, according to Hewitt, which polled 1,156 large companies to get its latest data. Companies desperate to slash costs are turning to worker salaries more deliberately than they have in the past. Some 48% of companies have frozen salaries this year, compared to just 2% last year.

Here is the link to the article – Pay Raises Are the Worst in 33 Years.