Inter-Active Technologies

"It starts with inception"

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Fri, 05 Jul 2013 08:12:00 +0000

Being a call centre agent is one of the most stressful jobs in the world. Dealing with irate customers, one after another isn’t easy. Keeping staff can be very tough. It all starts from inception. Recruiting the people correctly. We believe that every time a potential employee comes into contact with Inter-Active Technologies, the experience is important; be it via an advert or walking through our building, every single touch point is imperative. The people we employ must want to work here and not have to. They have to walk into the environment and think, “this is a great place to work.” Next, it’s about training. Our focus is not to tell staff what to do, it’s about engaging them in the way the company works. It’s about the employee.

Once they have passed the induction phase, they move into the “incubator” stage. They are on the phones and taking calls, but they know there is someone around to assist them . Inter-Active Technologies team leaders are approachable and have to have high level people skills to be appointed to that position. At middle to upper management level, we also recruit on the basis of the person’s ability to transfer knowledge. The ability to train people in hard skills is one thing, but to be a good leader in this environment, you have to enjoy working with people and transferring knowledge. You spend most of you time at work. Why not make the most of it and have fun?

Big Data, Small Data

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Tue, 15 Jan 2013 08:35:00 +0000

Nowadays it is not hard to find an article about “Big Data”. It seems like all of us have to start preparations for its imminent arrival, right?

In reality, Big Data has been with us for some time. Data has been accruing at an increasing pace, and the ability to analyse this large and forever growing volume of data has been pushed forward by specialised areas like weather forecasting and NASA’s space mission programmes.

What defines Big Data? Some people might think of data as being “big” when it cannot fit into Excel anymore.

Others might argue that data is “big” when they need to appoint someone specifically to manage and maintain the data. Academically data is considered to be “big” when it is difficult, or far too tedious to manage using conventional methods and technology. Some experts include phrases like “spanning hundreds, even thousands of servers”, and “with an electricity bill exceeding a million dollars” when defining Big Data. In reality the threshold of when data becomes “big” is different for most people and is reflected in the disagreement amongst experts around the exact measures of Big Data.

Instead of getting caught up in the definition of Big Data, rather consider how important your data is, regardless of its size. What is the real value that can be derived from analysing your data and exposing the secrets it conceals. How can this information be used to improve the performance of your business and to increase the effectiveness of your efforts? Can you use the data at your disposal to better understand your customers and their behavioural tendencies, their likes and dislikes? In the words of Aaron Levenstein: “Statistics are like bikinis. What they reveal is suggestive, but what they conceal is vital.”

Our customers discover real value in everyday statistics and trends, using the smallest data bases to some very large, complex and varied sources. It is a pleasure to bear witness to the adventures they embark on and the achievements they accomplish by allowing their data to tell them a story. To new adventurers starting their own data-driven quests we say: “It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.” (Ernest Hemingway). So make sure you have the right partners and the right tools to make your journey a fruitful and an enjoyable one.

Meyer Theunissen
Product Support Specialist

Social Media... New weapon of mass destruction?

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 07:26:00 +0000

So there you have it… Social Media has become the new weapon of mass destruction when it comes to levelling accusations of bad service and failing products by the bold consumer to all facets of business and supply companies that are in the firing line. Well perhaps it’s not that bad but let it be said that in many instances, consumers are now using the Social battering ram to exploit businesses that are customer service centric and these companies often lose large sums of money in their attempts to placate consumers who have downright abused the Social Media system in the hope of gaining a freebie at the expense of the company concerned.

Customers fail to see that this practice will undoubtedly drive prices up as businesses look to recover the expense of meeting consumer needs in order to keep themselves from the limelight whether they are guilty of an offending product or not. We had a situation recently where a customer bullied us into having us believe that a “product delivery and logistical issue” was the fault of our Customer Contact Centre and that this individual would wreak all types of media havoc for us should we not attend to their problem immediately. Needless to say we bent over backwards to meet this customer demand, a course which cost us dearly for a situation which frankly had nothing to do with our business processes but in the interest of saving the reputation of our supply partner and our own name, we took strides to placate the consumer and solve the problem, at great expense to our operation.

Once can appreciate the frustration of consumers. I too am a consumer and I too have experienced the pain of poor service delivery. That however does not give me the right to bully the supplier which at the end of the day is run by human beings who are less than perfect and who will fail to deliver to scratch every time. I guess the point I am trying to drive home is that when one gets frustrated beyond a certain threshold, basic human reason tends to fly out the door and emotional outbursts are generally the flavour of the day. So next time I decide to fly off the handle at some unsuspecting poor contact centre agent, may I pause and consider whether I am being reasonable or not and whether I am trying to exploit the situation at the expense of someone else.

Social Media and customer service can work very well if the system is treated with the respect it deserves. Social Media has no place for emotional outbursts which reflect poorly on the individual as well as the business operation under siege. So, as business stays on its toes and consumers monitor their service levels, may reason prevail and may we all work together to foster great relations between business and consumers.

Compliance.. A company's own internal conscience

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Mon, 22 Oct 2012 09:14:00 +0000

Few people comprehend what the compliance department does and what value it adds to the Company.

In order to understand compliance fully you have to take into consideration the rapid transformation that business has undergone. The information age coupled with globalisation brought along with it significant advances, challenges and changes resulting in the businesses becoming more effective and complex. This transformation also creates vulnerabilities which can be exploited. Many of these issues are regulated by law.

The regulatory landscape consists of acts and regulations written by lawmakers who involve themselves in the operational environment with the aim to increasingly protect consumers. Often the lawmakers have no operational experience however which results in huge volumes of complex regulations with severe cost implications.

The root definition of compliance means conforming to a rule such as a specification, policy, standard or law. Regulatory compliance ensures that businesses adhere to relevant laws and regulations. Those rules and regulations are designed to ensure that such business activity in the markets is fair and transparent.

Chris Coggrave, a managing principal in the securities practice at Hewlett Packard, says that compliance is a long-term project. “It is back to the simple things – people, processes and technology. You are looking at your effectiveness so you need to define key measures and see how good the processes are. Compliance is not a one-off event – it is a journey.”

Traditionally executive management was only concerned whether the company was compliant whilst Operations wanted to reduce the impact of compliance related interventions to a bare minimum. The Finance department aimed at staying within budget whilst the Compliance department struggled with keeping up in a fast changing regulatory environment.

The compliance journey can be a positive one with numerous benefits. Employees are not only monitored but a great deal of time, energy and money is invested in developing necessary skills.

A process-centric regulatory platform which links legislation and governance requirements to organisational processes and risks (at a detailed level) will result in a value driven partnership between Compliance and other departments. Technology value is enhanced by developing better, faster and safer solutions both to consumers and internal customers.

The primary focus for regulatory compliance is to ensure that the Company complies with all the relevant acts and regulations. Compliance can be referred to as the Company’s own internal conscience. This should include all spheres and levels of business and will be accomplished through monitoring and creating awareness.

Value driven compliance will link back new improvements from a compliance requirement to improved processes. Increased business intelligence can be derived from analysing available data stemming from basic compliance reports. This also lends the opportunity to be increasingly proactive rather than reactive.

Lee-Anne Bianco

GM: Finance

What They Don't Tell You In Your Interview

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 08:56:00 +0000

When recruiting new personnel, especially new, highly skilled personnel, HR cannot afford to be less than truthful about the facts before a new employee joins the company. Why? Firstly, the lies are not worth going to prison for. Just kidding! Informed employees will have done their homework on the company they want to join, before going to an interview. Applicants less insightful than their studious counterparts, may as a result, be at the mercy of unscrupulous recruitment agency practices, unethical, personnel consultants and inexperienced HR/Line Managers who will want to fill positions as quickly as possible without considering long term, detrimental affects on all parties concerned. For applicants who cannot differentiate between recruitment hype and facts relating to a company’s culture, working conditions, people performance and remuneration policies, many will only fail to realise their mistake until they are in the depths of a mine and daylight will not be forthcoming any time soon.

From an employer’s perspective, South Africa with its high unemployment rates and an economy which is still dragging its derrière out of a slump, the job market may appear to be easy-pickings. HR has to have its wits about it to ensure the applicant of choice is in fact going to deliver on expectations. It’s important to have honesty and integrity in the forefront when selecting potential employees. A win-win solution is what is sought right from the interview; why else would so much time be wasted on not achieving such a result? A recent study conducted amongst employees on why they joined their company of choice only to resign after a short period of time, were unanimous that they had been ‘duped’ in their recruitment interview. Fundamental disparities between employer-employee expectations existed. Employees believed they had been misinformed and/or deliberately misled during the interview stages. One company when challenged on such disparities cited that all of its non-disclosures could be covered by the generic requirement of “Must have a good sense of humour!”

Fortunately, whilst there are charlatans aplenty, fortunately there are more trustworthy, professional HR practitioners who uphold the walk the talk principles of their profession. But, beware of not paying attention to the fine print on contracts, or failing to ask important questions and most importantly, not conducting your own research before attending an interview, because what appears too good to be true, normally is.

Customer Experience Management Summit 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 09:31:00 +0000

Thursday 02 and Friday 03 August 2012 saw the CEM Africa summit play out in the heart of the Mother City. This was a remarkable event, well produced, well organised and certainly well attended due mainly I believe to the variety of panel discussions, keynote addresses and partner workshops throughout the event. There was never a dull moment and the topics were relevant, the sessions comfortably appropriate and run well within their allotted time frames.

So, after all the aforementioned accolades, what did this thing offer up to those who managed to attend both days of the CEM Summit? Well in my humble opinion, I believe most walked away enlightened or certainly entertained by some of the presenters, most notably the fellow who “unplugged” the First National Bank RB Jacobs campaign, a at times smug but entertaining look at how the Social space can impact on a brand and the “after effects” it might have left on some of the customers it may or may not have tickled. On the topic, Social Media seemed to almost “push in” and in a way dominated the themes of discussion.

The importance of not only knowing what is being said about one’s brand in the Social Sphere, but what to do about what is being said was most topical and it was interesting to learn how many operations are starting to expose themselves in a business to business and business to consumer domain where traditional fear of “hanging out the underwear” took precedence. I found the focus on Customer Interaction very interesting and it was gratifying to see the nods as many placed emphasis on getting the customer interaction right first, which should then deliver a better customer experience which by all accounts would offer a fair shot at building the all-important “customer relationship”.

The truth be told, our customers are managing the relationships with us more than we are with them. In the past we sort of “owned” the customers… now they own us, they tell us what they want, how they want it and when they want it and if we don’t listen they tell the whole wide world out there in a social atmosphere that can be as beneficial as it can be damaging. Focus on what differentiates good customer service from not so good customer service was equally enlightening. “talking” to people and their emotional connections to brands stood out significantly and lending humour and joy to many pitches was the order of the day. People want to be associated with fun brands and want to have fun telling each other about fun brands, so this was great to see particularly in watching how the “savanna premium cider” and the “mighty lemon” were married to produce a light hearted and emotionally intelligent campaign aimed at keeping people and refreshing cider drinks real.

Ultimately, the thing pointed to the customer Experience as being key. A lousy experience will last longer and permeate more than we can begin to fathom. A lousy experience comforted with a sharp “fix it” approach is more likely to be appreciated at all levels and this is what sets many ‘proactive” and “maverick” brands apart… they take the risks to satisfy the customer need. Listening, Understanding and Delivering… what a cool ethos… I know a company with this ethos…. Do you?

Brendan van Staaden

CEO & Founder: Inter-Active Technologies (Pty) Ltd.

Tax Season is Open

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 13:09:00 +0000

It’s now time to complete and submit your Income Tax Return to SARS. By doing so early and honestly you will be joining the vast majority of taxpayers who make an invaluable contribution to the development of our country. Every taxpayer who meets their tax obligations and responsibilities strengthens the culture of tax compliance, making it easier for SARS to focus its resources where they are really needed, on those citizens who refuse to pay their fair share of tax and who go to great lengths to avoid and evade paying what is rightly due from them.

Who should submit an income tax return?

· If you are under the age of 65 years of age and received an income of more than R59 750 form one or more sources or received more than R120 00 from a single source of employment, during the year of assessment 1 March 2011 – 29 February 2012.

· If you are between the ages of 65 and 75 years of age and received and income of more than R93 150 from one or more sources or received more than R120 000 from a single source of employment, during the year of assessment 1 March 2011 – 29 February 2012.

· If you are over 75 years of age and received more than R104 261 from one or more sources or received more than R120 000 from a single source of employment, during the year of assessment 1 March 2011 – 29 February 2012.

· If you:

o Conducted any trade in South Africa

o Received an allowance such as a travel subsistence or Office Bearer Allowance

o Hold any funds or assets outside South Africa that have a value more than R50 000

o Have a local Capital Gain/Loss exceeding R20 000

o Received any income or Capital Gain in a foreign currency

o Held any rights in a controlled foreign company

o Received an Income Tax Return or you were requested to submit an Income Tax Return for the year in question

Deadlines

· The deadline for all taxpayers who submit their tax return manually, by posting it or dropping it off in a SARS drop box, is 28 September 2012

· The deadline for all taxpayers who submit their returns electronically at a SARS branch is 23 November 2012

· Non-provisional taxpayers who submit their returns via eFiling have until 23 November 2012

· Provisional taxpayers who submit their returns via eFiling have until 31 January 2013

eFiling Benefits

eFiling is a free, simple and secure way of interacting with SARS from the comfort and convenience of your home or office.

No more waiting in queues, finding parking or worrying about office hours. Once registered, eFilers can submit returns, view their tax status and make payments to SARS electronically 24 hours a day!

You also have a full history of all submissions, payments and electronic correspondence available to you at the click of a button through the innovative reporting tool.

eFilers can also receive SMS and email notifications to remind you when submissions are due.

The simplicity of the process results in fewer errors and creates a quicker processing cycle for individuals and businesses.

Isn't it time you joined more than 2.7 million individual taxpayers and 350 000 businesses who are enjoying all the ease, convenience and peace-of-mind that eFiling offers?

Source: Extracts from www.SARS.gov.za

Inter-Active into Africa

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Mon, 02 Jul 2012 08:03:00 +0000

Inter-Active Africa has gone live! It was with much excitement and delight that the Inter-Active Technologies team from Johannesburg worked together during the week of 11 June 2012 to equip, install, staff and train for our new call centre, which has been built, with our Zambian partner, Celpay, in Lusaka.

The call centre went live with our first client on Friday 15th – a mammoth accomplishment! A big thanks to all those involved. The calls are currently being handled expertly and we have a happy customer who wants to move from a pilot to a longer engagement.

The next steps are to add more new customers and keep growing, emanating the success and reputation of Inter-Active Technologies South Africa.

Rosemarie Pringle-Smith
Regional Development and CRM- Africa

Long Service Awards

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Tue, 19 Jun 2012 08:24:00 +0000

Someone once remarked, “If you want loyalty, get a dog.”

Does loyalty to a company really count for anything these days? The other week, 18 employees received their 5 Years Long Service Awards. It wasn’t the certificate, or even the award itself that the recipients felt proud about. It was about the recognition. Not just the recognition and congratulations from the Chairman, Managing Director, management and peers, alike. Rather it was about the passion and the sense of belonging which was acknowledged in a company which is still growing; developing, fast-tracking above average performers, valuing its human capital and striving for new successes to share in.

Yet many companies do not support long service awards, discouraging dead-wood syndrome, reducing unnecessary expenditure and of course, cutting the headcount for cheaper labour. Another cynical viewpoint is that people hang on to their “another day, another dollar” jobs because the consequences of being without employment as the recession bites deeper into the rapidly emptying pockets, is too frightening to contemplate. An employee’s suicide on receipt of a retrenchment notification is truly tragic. Yet, amidst all of this, unions will continue their members to remain loyal to their causes and squabble over the existence of labour brokers, exerting pressure, sometime violently, on businesses to grant unrealistic and unsustainable salary increases.

Can business afford not to endear loyalty and long service awards, especially during difficult economic times, with the very same resources with which it looks to build and strengthen its future upon? Can unions afford not to exercise caution when encouraging workers to bite the hand that feeds them?

Vanessa Chambers
Human Resources Director

Integrity of your Word

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Fri, 08 Jun 2012 06:29:00 +0000

Ever wondered whether your spoken words are worth a penny? You know what was said, the intention and the meaning, yet you find the other person destroying you and your organisations’ credibility. The mind goes on a journey, feverishly tearing through the cabinets of your memory in search of finding evidence! The question remains; is your perception of the event only attributes or is it backed by substantive information? Without the latter there is the possibility that you could have made an error of judgment in your mind.

‘Governance, risk and compliance will take centre stage in South African businesses over the next few years as consumer protection and personal privacy legislation comes into being. For Contact Centres, it will not be enough to simply have the right policies in place – risk mitigation in the form of recording of all interactions with customers or potential customers will be vital.’ IT Web 2 September 2010

Assuming that your organisation is already aligned with the Consumer Protection Act and your staff is fully versed on all relevant aspects of the act, in their daily interaction with the customer, they would be responsible for every promise made. Inevitably the act will drive towards the implementation of fair practices, which in turn will alter the common law in favor of the consumer. No longer do only the warranties and indemnities written in the agreement apply, but your organisation will be expected to provide proof that you are fulfilling those requirements, should a consumer challenge you.

Since much of customer interaction takes place as voice transactions, recording has become an essential part of the equation. Voice recording is a form of ‘documentary’ evidence. The only question mark lies within the evidence being admissible in court, should a dispute force the authenticity thereof. It is therefore critical that the recording’s integrity is maintained, throughout its obtainment, storage and production. Inter-Active Technologies (Pty) Ltd offers you the best-of-breed in ensuring your organisation’s evidence with Government ACTS Regulation Compliance.

Hilda Norton
Product Manager

Multimedia and unified customer communications – added complexity or greater simplicity?

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 05:32:00 +0000

The buzz words in the industry all sound very exciting - words much like the title of this blog make for interesting sounding titles for training programs or ‘best of breed’ innovations but for those of us who are actually running multimedia centres are we really finding the idea that romantic?

For some, the thought of a single agent handling customer interactions through a multitude of touch points seamlessly transferring knowledge to customers while trying to provide the customer with a certain experience or feel about how your organisation does business.. A fantastic notion - far too simple perhaps..?

Much of the reality of this type of solution is that it can very quickly increase costs, requiring multiple integrated systems and a customer management system which is capable of delivering across platforms. These expenses are compounded by the human costs, we find ourselves needing more agents, not less as we anticipated. Is this because the frequency of interactions has increased, the simpler we make it the more we inadvertently drive up volumes, and can these agents really delivery across all platforms or do we require more training programs, more quality assurance etc...?

From either perspective it is a very interesting challenge and one that if done well can change the customer service division into a real driving force behind customer satisfaction and moreover customer behaviour but if not approached with the big picture in mind could quickly become draining on the operation.

Bevin Sandras
General Manager: Operations

Workforce Management: To bother or not to bother…That is the question.

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Wed, 23 May 2012 07:47:00 +0000

With Workforce Management, there appears to be no middle ground. There is the side that refuses to acknowledge the existence or importance of this discipline and believes that as long as you can read numbers, then you can determine the requirements of your call centre.

I recently had an interaction with a call centre operations manager who said to me: “I am not convinced that our call centre needs this Workforce Management. I mean it’s pretty easy, all you have to do is work out a few numbers, like this…” He then proceeded to take a huge handheld calculator and furiously punched in numbers. “If we handle 500 calls and it takes an average of 4 minutes per call; then 500 divided by 4 is 125. So we need about 125 agents? That doesn’t look right” Deciding not to point out the several flaws in his assumptions such as that all 500 calls were coming in simultaneously, I advised him that actually he needed 39 people to man the phones, not taking into consideration off-phone activities such as breaks.

Realizing that he might have just been about to bankrupt his organization by completely overstaffing, he asked with incredulity on his face where such a huge difference came from. At this point I just could not resist. I responded, paraphrasing Barney Stinson, “If we analyse the seemingly random patterns of the calls, taking into account standard deviation, and of course, assuming epsilon approaches zero as the angle delta approaches pi, what can we conclude?” He replied: “We can conclude that you are hired??”

Then there is the other side that is in the “know”. This is the side that shrouds this field in so much mystery, employing systems that appear complex enough to launch human-inhabited rockets into space. You would not be remiss in thinking that there are secret societies of the Enlightened Ones where they gather to share their latest discoveries in the elite world of workforce management technology. This is the side whose standard answer to any questions by those who would like a little bit more insight into the recommendations and decisions that affect the organizations is: because The System says so.

There are several WFM tools out in the market which vary vastly in price, features, complexity, flexibility and extras. The common thread among them is that to some degree they should all incorporate the basic methodology of workforce management, which is to gather and analyse data, forecast workload, calculate staffing resources, allow for scheduling of staff and allow for real time management and reporting. What often happens is that the focus moves from the key fundamentals and methodology of workforce management to trying to understand the complexity of the system to a point where the system either becomes a very expensive admin tool or it acquires godlike status where the users do not understand that the old “Garbage In, Garbage Out” adage applies.

In both these scenarios, the value of EFFECTIVE Workforce Management is often underestimated. Simply put, Workforce Management is the science and the art of getting the right number of staff at the right times to delight your customers while minimizing costs.

In any business, people are the most expensive resource. In a contact centre environment, having the wrong number of staff means you are either overstaffing or understaffing at any given time. It is important to understand that both understaffing and overstaffing have consequences. Understaffing may have implications that can range from dissatisfied customers, to very unhappy frontline staff who are experiencing burnout due to the shortage. This may lead to declining quality in how the calls are handled, increased absenteeism and even attrition. Attrition implies more expense coming from recruiting new agents and skilling them up to the level of the seasoned ones.

On the other hand, overstaffing means you are unnecessarily spending money on additional resources you do not need and impacting your bottom line negatively. Also, the work is spread over too many people, which means the overall productivity of all your staff is greatly reduced. If you are in the business of answering customer contacts with customers who are not willing to wait forever, with limited resources, then workforce management is for you.

Inter-Active Technologies PTY (LTD) have yielded their intellectual capital into an effective and relevant training course aimed at up-skilling inexperienced resources in the discipline of effective workforce management. The course focuses on the fundamentals and methodology of workforce management and is suitable for all incumbents, whether they have systems or not. For those requiring an in-depth solution, Inter-Active provides professional services specializing in this area which also include mentoring of internal resources to ensure continuity of the solution.

Thulani Nyezi
Worforce Management Consultant

Doodle – using your Mouse!

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Fri, 18 May 2012 07:06:00 +0000

We all use keyboard shortcuts on our computers to boost our productivity. Some use them extensively while some restrain themselves to common tasks such as copy and paste commands. With around 105 keys on the keyboard, one can create any number of shortcut keys and use them to save time while working.

What if I tell you that you can do all those tasks with just two buttons and a tracker on your mouse? Surprising right? Well, today I will show you how you can draw gestures from your mouse to do most of the tasks by doodling on your desktop. Before we get started, let me tell you what gestures are.

What are Gestures

Suppose you want to say something to your friend who is at a significant distance from you and cannot hear you. You might use your hand to convey the message. In the same way, gesture on Windows is just like doodling some symbols using your mouse to control your computer. We will use a simple freeware app called gMote to convey the meaning of these gestures to Windows. So let’s see how to enable mouse gesture on Windows using gMote.

Gestures on Windows using gMote

Download and extract the files to a new folder in your Windows. After all the files are extracted, run the executable file as administrator to start gMote. After you launch the program, it will minimize to your system tray giving you a prompt that the gMote for Windows has started and that you can now use your mouse to perform gestures. Right click on the gMote icon on the taskbar and select Configure to begin.

The gMote window will open with some preconfigured mouse gestures for the most performed task on Windows machine. Before we set up any mouse gestures, let’s configure the tool first.

Click on the Option button on the tool and change how you want to invoke the mouse gestures. I would suggest, you select the option Hold right mouse button and drag the mouse option. In this way, you will not be dependent on the keyboard anymore.

Once you are done with the settings, let’s start with creating and using mouse gestures. The main interface of the program is divided into two parts. The left-hand side is the Gesture set, while the right-hand side is the testing ground. Try to draw one of the default provided gesture on the testing ground. Once you are comfortable with drawing the gesture, minimize the program and try them out on your Windows Explorer.

You can also record your personal gestures or edit the once that already came with the tool. To create a new gesture, click on the button Create Gesture. A new gesture action will be added to the list of gesture set instantly. Click on the new gesture to set the action you want the mouse gesture to take, record the gesture and save it with a name.

You can also create many set of mouse gestures that can used for different purpose. For example, a simple gesture can hold two actions when saved under different sets. If you don’t want the program to record your gestures, click on the Active button to deactivate the tool.

gMote for Windows is a must have app for every desktop (on laptops if you are using a mouse). At first you might be a little uncomfortable with using the gestures, and you might get irritated with the program not recognizing them but don’t lose hope in just a day or two. I insist you try it out for couple of days before you make up your mind.

Source Link

Michael Cross
Divisional Manager: IT

Inter-Active Technologies donates R20 000 to combat rhino poaching

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Thu, 10 May 2012 08:34:00 +0000

Inter-Active Technologies is playing its role in combating the cruel and unnecessary slaughter of rhinos in South Africa, by donating R20 000 to the online ‘Stop Rhino Poaching Campaign’ in May 2012. StopRhinoPoaching.com was established in July 2010 as an independent web-based platform, dedicated to raising awareness and support for the war against rhino poaching.

Photo Courtesy of StopRhinoPoaching,com

Shocking statistics for 2011 revealed that at least 448 rhinos were killed for their horns during that period. Sadly, the latest figures for 2012 paint a grim picture, with 210 confirmed rhino deaths at the hands of poachers, as of 08 May 2012.

According to acclaimed rhino scientists, if poaching continues at its current rate, South Africa’s rhino herds will go into population decline by mid-2012. Inter-Active Technologies managing director Jacqui van Staaden notes that the company is committed to ensuring that our country’s rhinos are not doomed to this tragic fate.

“Rhinos are magnificent creatures that have graced our landscape for millions of years. Greed and corruption have unfortunately placed them at the mercy of cold-blooded poaching syndicates. As a socially responsible corporate citizen, Inter-Active Technologies is committed to ensuring that the company plays its role in ensuring not only the survival of the rhino, but also its long-term prosperity,” she explains.

Although independent, StopRhinoPoaching.com enjoys a close working relationship with many recognised role players, and their opinion and experience is invaluable when establishing projects and allocating funds.

The charity has to date raised more than R843 000 for its worthy cause, and always appreciates any donations. Anybody interested in contributing to this worthy cause can visit www.stoprhinopoaching.com or info@stoprhinopoaching.com

Let the employers have a voice!

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Tue, 08 May 2012 05:33:00 +0000

Our government calls on business to create jobs and thereby improve the lives of the many unemployed in South Africa. Inter-Active Technologies does just that by hosting outsourced call centres, services and products to the call centre industry and to companies requiring improvement in their business processes.

Inter-Active Technologies currently provides employment for over 500 individuals and many of them are supporting large families. We have also initiated a learnership programme which accommodates individuals with no work skills and then train them to become call centre agents and provide employment for them within Inter-Active Technologies’ various call centres. This in turn creates more competent candidates for the South African job market.

However in order for this company to expand and supply more employment, our economy has to be such that it encourages overseas companies to want to bring their business to South Africa, and invest in this country. We need to know that the heavy taxes which are paid monthly and annually by the company and its employees are being used wisely. Sadly this is not the case. Politics and self-enrichment have become the order of the day and corruption is a cancer which is pervading every inch of our society. In addition compliance in terms of BBBEE compliance, Dept of Labour requirements etc... take more time and effort which means less focus on the main point and that is to ensure a profitable company which expands and creates more employment.

A personal bone of contention for me is that whilst government calls on private organizations to create more jobs and increase their social responsibility programmes, business is castigated and criticised for providing constructive criticism to Government. Do this like Reuel Khoza of Nedbank and one is labeled as being negative and attacked from every side of government which seems to be allergic to progressive statements aimed at improving the status quo.

Quite frankly as a tax paying company and citizen of this country we have the right to voice our points of view which will allow the people of this beautiful country an opportunity of freedom of expression.

Jacqui van Staaden
Managing Director
Inter-Active Technologies (Pty) Ltd

eGain Conference London UK April 2012

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 09:24:00 +0000

Inter-Active Technologies is a value added reseller of eGain, which is a modular product aimed at the contact centre to allow the agents to have multichannel interactions with customers using one common platform. The customer interactions are tracked and recorded in a central point.

eGain holds a conference approximately once a year for end users and partners in London, UK targeting the EMEA region, which includes Africa. This year it was held at the Twickenham Rugby Stadium. The conference is intended for the speakers to share experiences with current or potential eGain customers on the benefits of using eGain and of course to network.

The delegation from South Africa was 10 people strong indicating a great deal of interest in the eGain product. Other than Inter-Active Technologies, the companies from South Africa were MultiChoice, MTN and BPeSA attending the conference.

The user day was packed with plenty of information and presentation, with Gartner, eGain and companies across many different industries, such as Avon, Virgin Media, Cambridge University, NH Hotels, SAP, etc.... With free wireless internet access and a twitter hash tag of #ECS12, the delegates were tweeting away about the conference. The best tweet of the day was highlighted and the person won a rugby ball signed by Will Carling, England’s rugby captain from 1988 to 1996. During the day we managed to squeeze in a whirlwind tour of the Twickenham rugby stadium.

The evening was a gala dinner with Will Carling, as the guest speaker. It was an enjoyable evening with an entertaining speaker, great company and good food. Some of the delegation managed to obtain Will Carling signed memorabilia.

Next day, being Friday 20th April 2012, was for the eGain partners. It was another packed day with many interesting topics to compliment the wonderful user day. Roadmaps, new developments internally, partner successes and new demos were discussed.

Although it was a packed event, all the participants felt that they received great benefit from the event and managed to network with many new people in similar or different industries to what they are.

So you ask what or who is eGain? eGain was founded in 1997 to provide customers with an email management solution. The company has grown from the single customer interaction solution to a multichannel customer interaction solution. The solution allows customers to connect to agents via live chat, co-browse, social media and email using a common knowledge base in order to have consistent and accurate responses. eGain can extend that central knowledge base to the customer for self service on their website and to the agent answering phone calls.

eGain is a profitable NASDAQ listed company with offices based all over the world. In parts of the world that eGain do not have offices they use partners such as Inter-Active Technologies to promote their products.

If you are keen on understanding more about the eGain product please feel free to contact Inter-Active Technologies.

Debbie Lane
Product Manager

Should the private sector be asked to contribute to basic education?

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 10:32:00 +0000

Our Bill of Rights, contained in the South African Constitution (1996) stipulates that every person has the right to a basic education, which the State, through reasonable measures, must make available.

Basic Education receives the lion’s share of the country’s budget, in excess of R226 billion for 2012/13. This is a more than 50% increase in terms of investment in education over the last 17-years.

However, the government recently called on the private sector to fund an additional R6 billion towards basic education.

Now let’s consider the following…

We, in the private sector, are already contributing billions across all sectors towards initiatives such as skills development in the form of skills development levies, we also contribute towards social upliftment programmes, and the main aim of corporate social responsibility is to uplift previously disadvantaged communities and/or organisations to name but a few.

Furthermore, the private sector provides points-men at faulty intersections and the Pot-Hole Brigade repairs potholes on our roads.

As tax payers we contributed a figure in the region of R743 billion for the 2011 tax year. We are already funding our own roads and Road Accident Fund through petrol levies and the new Gauteng toll roads through the e-toll system. The cost of electricity has been hiked up exponentially , negatively affecting the private sector as well as the consumer.

At the rate we are going, pretty soon we will receive a bill for the air that we breathe. How much more will we be expected to do?

All things considered, what are your thoughts? Take our poll on the below link.
Click here to take our 2 seconds survey!

Jacqui Walter
Divisional Manager: Training & Development

The road to Financial Wellness

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Mon, 16 Apr 2012 11:17:00 +0000

Financial wellness means having an understanding of your financial situation and managing it in such a way that you are prepared for financial changes. Maintaining that balance consists of being comfortable with where your money comes from and where it is going. When starting the journey on the road to financial wellness, first analyze your current status and understand how it got that way, without beating yourself up- and always remember, your past wrongs can be fixed.

The next step is to get educated. Start getting acquainted with financial magazines and publications – many of which can be bought at a number of bookshops or shops including the Spar you get your daily bread, milk and cigarettes from. On the road to establishing your financial wellbeing, please quit smoking as cigarettes are not only bad for your physical health but for your financial health too. Find some financial workshops to attend, ask friends how they do it if you are comfortable talking to them about money, or consider talking to a professional about why it is you have resistance to facing up to money and its place in your life.

Clean out your wallet and count your money. Collect the loose change scattered in your house, couch, car, and pockets and put it in one place. An important step is setting time aside to review what income you have, and how you spend it - this may involve pulling together financial records or starting from scratch tracking the information. Pull out your bank statements, credit card statements and retirement and investment accounts and then examine them. On one sheet of paper, summarize how much you have and where it is and keep it up monthly to keep track of your financial status moving forward.

Save! Save! Save!

Eliminate unnecessary debt in order to save, not only for a rainy day or for when the car breaks down, but for retirement as well. Most people say “easier said than done” but not many people have tried it because they either don’t know their financial status or they are too scared to find out what their financial status is. Take the plunge, work out your budget, fix what you need to and sleep better at night knowing where your money is. Remember that “Ignorance is Bliss” does not apply to your financial wellbeing in life.

How to get a financial education without going back to school?

Look to financial magazines to begin your education or pick up a book or two to guide you in your understanding of financial matters, there are many out there on the shelves, from the simple and direct to the more complex, so pick up one that appeals to you and that you can understand given your level of knowledge. Then, attend a financial workshop or two, local business groups or continuing education centers offer them at convenient times and at little or no expense. Be sure to attend and learn, not buy anything. As you are in the learning phase, you need to gather information before taking action.

Lee-Anne Bianco

General Manager : Finance

Back to Basics

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Thu, 05 Apr 2012 06:47:00 +0000

There has been a growing trend in recent years of call centre managers becoming more and more fixated on new technologies that offer new solutions such as automation, self-service functionality for customers through the IVR, the web – and most recently – social media channels. Increasing amounts of time and effort are spent on these technologies, which are alternatives to the voice channel.

However, what can be sometimes overlooked is the fact that in order to successfully service alternate channels, it is imperative to ensure that the call centre consistently running at optimal performance levels. There will always be a place for the call centre, as new technologies take care of simple, routine transactions, the agents in the call centre will be made available to focus on resolving the more complex issues which could not be handled via the technology solutions. One should always be aware of the risk of getting caught up in the ‘bells and whistles’, bottom line, operational costs and customer delight aspects, and in-so-doing, ignoring the basics of what form the foundations of a solid customer experience.

Ideally a state of stability should be reached in the call centre and maintained at all times. This ‘stable’ state can be defined as one which meets the following criteria in the context of this discussion:

• Service levels achieved (answer rate, answer delays, abandon rates etc.)

• Utilisation levels cater to off-phone time to be used for training, coaching and most importantly one-on-one sessions with the supervisor/team leader, quality coaching sessions which can happen as frequently as once each week. A situation should not exist where agents are at maximum capacity, achieving service levels, but no time for investing in future performance of the agent.

• Agents who are cross-skilled across more than one function i.e. customer service agents could be developed to handle more technical queries as a secondary skill, as well as this being part of their career path.

With the basics in place, it should be an ongoing effort of the operational team to ensure that continuous improvements take place in the form of reviewing customer feedback and adopting changes in the process to make the experience more pleasurable for the agent as well as customer. In addition to this, the operational team should be constantly researching and reviewing tools that lead to increased first call resolution (such as the deployment of a knowledge base or guided help system); furthermore, creating opportunities for top performing agents to be developed into subject matter experts as well as future managers should also sit high on the agenda for the operational team.

A classic scenario is one where a call centre can be making its numbers in terms of call-handling, but the overall customer service experience is mediocre. As a strategic move, further communication channels are opened up, and agents inexperienced in dealing with the new channel are recruited, or promoted into handling these channels, which results in a situation where the best agents have been removed from the call centre and placed in an unfamiliar environment, the net result being a total degradation of service across all channels. Therefore, the plan to increase additional service channel options should always involve a development programme which starts with the experienced individuals who are already familiar with the products, systems, customers and processes –and proceeds to grooms those individuals for the next challenge in their careers.

There are many misconceptions when it comes to call center agents and the role they play in the organizations. A common one is view that agents are simply commodities which are deployed in the service of handling calls; this is in fact a very costly and detrimental mistake to make. In general, people are motivated by new challenges within their work environment – many individuals in the work place do not require external coercion in order to take part of in a new project or venture– most would jump at the opportunity out of their own volition. To avoid losing experienced team members, due to their feeling of being caught in a ‘no-win’ situation, it is important to provide additional stimulus: such as involving top performers in new projects whereby they are involved in finding innovative solutions as to how customers can be serviced better. These are the people most qualified to give insights into the organization’s customers, products and internal processes, unfortunately it is this great source of informational wealth that is often relegated to a career filled with routine transactions and very little stimulus – the long term result being that this talent, bored of their current scenario, leaves the organization to find growth and stimulation in a new setting, as the company continues to repeat the same cycles internally.

As call center leaders we have the ability to break this cycle, enhance the customer experience, and reduce our costs over the long run. There is no silver bullet, all that is required is going back to call centre basics, and making certain that development opportunities are created for the most talented members of the call centre team, readying the company for changes in contact strategy, new products, as well as grooming the next generation of management and creating customer advocates.

Gerald Terblanche

Operations Director

Our continued support - Bronwyn Truter

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Fri, 23 Mar 2012 12:34:00 +0000

December 2010 saw the Truter family being featured on local radio station 94.7 Highveld Stereo’s popular Christmas Wish List initiative when then ten-year-old Bronwyn Truter fell into a coma after being diagnosed with severe insulin dependent diabetes type 1. Following her three-month coma, Bronwyn suffered cardiac arrest, impaired vision and sustained brain damage to her right frontal lobe. Inter-Active Technologies responded to their plight and donated towards Bronwyn’s medical fees, contributing specifically to the 24-hour private nursing care that has allowed to her to continue her recovery from the comfort of her home…Over 2 years later, Inter-Active Technologies is still committed to providing Bronwyn with the specialised nursing care that she desperately requires in order to try and recover from the arduous ordeal she has been through.

Thank you to all the members of the public who have also made such generous donations to Bronwyn and the Truter family – each contribution/donation has made their life just that little bit easier..

Below is an update on Bronwyn’s progress since been featured again last year’s 94.7 Wish List initiative - as told by her father, Craig Truter..

“We had a good Christmas thanks to the help and generosity of Inter-Active and its staff. However, unfortunately we had to rush Bronwyn to Hospital on 29th of December as her tracheotomy tube failed, she was then taken into surgery to have the tracheotomy tube and the gastric feeding tube replaced. Luckily she was well enough after the surgery to come home on the 31st of December in time to spend New Year’s with us, her family.

Bronwyn had been recovering well from her relapse in December and was booked for her first throat surgery in February at Sandton Medi Clinic. We were all very worried as we were informed by the doctor that it is a major surgery and there were many complications that could occur.

Bronwyn was in surgery for just over 3 hours. The Paediatric ENT tried to remove the trachy from her throat, but her airway collapsed. He then cut all the scar tissue out and rebuilt her airway, putting a silicon stint in to hold the rebuilt airway open. He then put the trachy back in for safety reasons. We now have to wait for 6 months, then he will take the stint out and see if the reconstructed airway will stay open, if it does then he will remove the trachy and close the hole in her throat. If it does not, then Bronwyn will have to go back into theatre for more surgeries.

They also did Botox on Bronwyn while she was in theatre to try and loosen up her arms and legs from all the spasms she is having. A Physio works with Bronwyn once a week so that she can get the full benefit of the botox injections. Bronwyn has to go for the Botox injections every three months. The Physio is great because she is training the nurses to do stretches and exercises with Bronwyn every day to try keep her little body loose and spasm free.

We just hope and pray that her next surgery goes well so that we can finally remove the trachy from her throat.”

If you would like to make a donation or find out more about Bronwyn’s plight please contact me, or view the info on our website: www.inter-active.co.za

Jeanne Sandras
Inter-Active Technologies: PR and Corporate Responsibility

Social Media Monitoring and Engagement

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Mon, 19 Mar 2012 07:20:00 +0000

My wife claims I spend way too much time and money at hardware stores. When she sees me with the infamous yellow shopping bags she immediately adopts an attitude towards me as if I traded her and the kids for a golfing weekend with my friends.

You see I love DIY. I even smuggle new tools and gadgets into the house via the garage, where they have to wait a couple of weeks before the time is right for me to announce that “I have this great tool in the garage that we can use to. . .”

Then, one day the fairytale relationship with my favourite hardware store turned into a sad and torrid affair. I felt misunderstood (“don’t they know how much I love shopping here?), betrayed (“I spend so much money here that I would expect someone to listen to me”) and appalled (“how dare they treat me like this?”). So, like any scorned companion, I avoided the store completely and did my hardware shopping elsewhere.

After a couple of weeks I realised that I could not bear this impasse. I missed my regular visits - I needed to clear the air, but needed a vehicle to facilitate the resolution. So I turned to a complaints management site where I spilt my heart out, recording the events for posterity to see and expected someone from their large and powerful chain of stores to acknowledge my pain, their error and the mutual benefit of making things right. The disappointment when no one from the store made contact after two weeks drove me to another complaints management site. Surely they could not ignore me if I doubled my efforts!

Six months later I received a notification from one of the complaints management sites asking if they could close the complaint, seeing that it has been ignored by everyone except me. After dealing with the disillusionment, it struck me that I might as well try another route. In the six months since I logged the first complaint, I have learnt to tweet.

With a feeling of “here goes nothing” I shot an unemotional and concise tweet off to their Twitter account. GREAT was my surprise when I received a response within minutes (great is such an overused word so I use upper case letters to make you understand that I really felt GREAT). Within an hour I received a call and a couple of emails. “Wow” I thought, “this is service! Now I can go back to the store without dread!”

After two futile visits to the store and two reports on complaints management sites, it was the single tweet that did the trick.

I am pleased to say that the relationship has been restored, my voucher has been spent and I now see myself as an unofficial ambassador for this company!

I am aware though that not all companies were created equal, and such are their strategies around social media. In a lot of cases social strategies are merely an extension of existing complaints management processes. Does it warrant more? Perhaps. It all depends on your expectations, and those of your customers.

You might only want to monitor the online sentiment towards your brand or company, or you might want to dive in and explore the wonderful benefits of engaging with your online community. In either case a good strategy could make the difference between establishing your place or hiding your face in the social sphere.

Inter-Active Technologies (Pty) Ltd is a proud supplier of social media monitoring tools, as well as a full featured, best of breed social media engagement suite. We assist companies in establishing their customer service strategies across all platforms and channels - get in touch if you are ready to start your voyage into the wonderful world of social media and you want to integrate your online engagement and increase the effectiveness of your efforts!

Meyer Theunissen
PRODUCT SUPPORT SPECIALIST

People Do Matter!

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Tue, 13 Mar 2012 08:53:00 +0000

Any company which believes it can function without a professional Human Resources division in today’s job market is akin to believing a ship can do without lifeboats. Even the most plain sailing of working environments can shipwreck a Captain’s plans to navigate through stormy waters, let alone prevent a crew from jumping overboard when the ship starts sailing off course.

In a country desperate for job creation, and in a volatile job market susceptible to political, economic and social pressures, job applicants who have succeeded in navigating obstacles to obtain employment, need to be assured that the company in which they now work offers them opportunities and challenges to grow and develop in a career of their choice. The HR professional is the consummate juggler when guiding a new employee through numerous stages of his/her employment ; recruiter, interviewer, assessor, reference and credit checker, payroll and medical aid administrator, counselor, trainer, disciplinarian and advocate of fair play and last but not least exit interviewer. In times of joy and in times of sadness, whether ‘hatching, matching or dispatching, the fundamental belief for any HR professional is that people do matter in a company. It is the ability to wear all these different hats, sometimes at the same time that makes the HR professional stand out.

In a competitive contact centre industry, recruiting and retaining the cream of the crop of job applicants is critical. Along with fast and efficient systems, the quality of a company’s HR resources is what makes the difference between mediocre and cutting-edge delivery by an employee to a customer. HR helps to both steer and keep the ship afloat, and by doing so keep its Captain appraised calm or potentially stormy waters ahead.

Vanessa Chambers
HR DIRECTOR

Inter-Active into Africa

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Tue, 06 Mar 2012 09:33:00 +0000

Africa is the 2^nd biggest continent with the 2^nd largest populous in the world. It comprises 54 countries and has seen the greatest global uptake in growth for mobile telephony and mobile banking. Africa presents a Greenfields environment for the call centre industry, with very little specialist call centre or outsourcing services currently being provided as a norm.

Most mobile telephony organisations and several banks after some kind of customer service to their clients – but call centre management and exceptional customer service levels are not their key competency or core business focus.

South Africa is a highly developed environment for the call centre industry where we successfully offer our services to Local and International Clients alike. But move across our borders, and one finds that the understanding and recognition of customer excellence is often not even a consideration. The African content, especially Subs Sahara Africa, offers a well educated, well articulated resource pool in an environment which is often underperforming when it comes to national employment provision. A professional, in-country outsourced call centre environment addresses all these opportunities.

Africa has embraced the latest technology and leapfrogged to the highest levels when it comes to the uptake of mobile telephony, money movement, social networking and the internet. All these services require customer service and satisfaction to ensure growth and profitability. Are these providers focussed on their customers’ needs, and do they manage their expectations and requirements at the highest levels? In order to stay ahead and progress in the new age of Africa where governments are being toppled by dissatisfied “customers” , serious consideration has to be given to this service gap especially as in several countries at least 100% of the population are active mobile telephony users who expect to be treated with dignity and respect.

Being experts in the call centre industry, and seeing the potential to enhance the way businesses can manage their customer services – Inter-Active Technologies is actively servicing Africa through their South African Call Centres, in multiple languages, as well as setting up services in Zambia and Uganda in the short term.

For further information on Africa Development, contactRosemarie Pringle-SmithRegional Development and New Business Africa.

Are you Managing your Travel Expenditure Profitably?

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 07:19:00 +0000

Despite the ongoing controversy around the electronic toll collection planned for South Africa, the toll commencement date has been confirmed for the 30^th April 2012. Even though there have been several reports on road users drawing up petitions, promises of boycotts and numerous economists releasing calculations on how this will negatively impact on our daily expenses, a recorded 200000 citizens to date have registered their vehicles (20% of SANRAL’s target) to the eToll project. It seems inevitable, electronic toll collection is in our foreseeable future!

Face to face interaction has its unique strengths. Companies have for many years adopted some form of Business Travel Management, as a ‘tool’ to manage relationships with the essential constituencies within and outside of companies. It is seldom possible to confidently confirm, whether companies receive the expected value from travel expenditure, that include airfare, vehicle rental and accommodation.

We live in GREEN conscious times, whereby companies help by adopting an environmentally friendly attitude toward reducing their carbon footprint.

Video Conferencing is the future of Travel Management!

Contact me and I shall tell you why!

Hilda Norton
Product Manager

Do we effectively use our performance metrics?

noreply@blogger.com (Inter-Active Technologies) — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 12:09:00 +0000

As call centre people, we have become very good at knowing what metrics we want to achieve and we know how we want these metrics displayed in our various reports. We often display them proudly on wall boards or presentations to the boss, but I find myself asking how relevant they are and if we are simply sticking to these objectives because it is what we have always done?

As we work through our strategy for the year ahead, as with each year, we develop and decide on new objectives and strategies in order to stay current in the market and to make sure that we stay on top of industry trends. So each year we look to achieve different objectives, but how much do the key metrics in our managers’ KPI’s actually change? Einstein defined madness as doing the same thing over and over but expecting a different result…

I would suggest that perhaps the KPI’s are not changing nearly as dynamically as our strategies nor are they keeping pace with our vision for where we want to see our centres in the medium to long term – so then are we driving the right behaviour on the ground? Perhaps it might be time to relook at those visions and strategic objectives and decide if the metrics the call centres are driving are still relevant. If we look at service level vs. customer satisfaction it seems pointless to focus on how many calls we answer within a certain number of seconds when every interaction fails your customer’s expectations.

How important is service level these days, how important is social media, customer perception, customer advocacy ratings? Time to rethink our metrics…..perhaps.

Bevin Sandras
General Manager: Operations