Transcript Gill Nutt

Gill Nutt
CCIM Ltd
CEO
Background
► 1989
Contact 24 – Outsourcing call centre
 Supervisor - Call Centre Manager
► 1995
Ionica – Telecommunications
 National Call Centre Manager
► 1997
Pell & Bales – Outsourcing call centre
 Operations Director
► 1999
CCIM Ltd – call centre consultancy
 CEO
CCIM Ltd UK -1999 to 2003
Consultancy and Interim Management
► Sanderson – Head of CS and Sales
► Virgin Net – Senior Project Manager
► Bush Internet – Head of CS and call centres
► Fuller Peiser – Project Manager
► Matthew Clark Wholesale - CC Director
► Royal Bank of Scotland – Comms PM
► Capita – CC Bid Team Planning PM
► Kingston Communications – General Manager
► Tiscali – Consultant
► Tiscali – Customer Services Director
CCIM Ltd India 2003 – 2004
Migration and Management Consultant
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Tiscali – IB Technical support, pre registration and Email
Time Computers – IB Technical support helpdesk
NTL – IB Technical support helpdesk
Supanet – IB Technical support helpdesk
Demon – IB Technical support helpdesk
NTL – Outbound sales Consultancy
KCC – Consultant (performance management)
Mainstay – Consultant (HR processes and operations)
CPP – Consultant to migration teams in UK and India
CCIM Ltd India 2004 – present
CCIM projects
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Inbound Technical Support
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Time Computers
Supanet
V21
Murphx
Outbound sales
 T mobile, 3G, Orange
 Homecall, OneTel, Talk Talk
 V21
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Consultancy (India & UK)
Recruitment and Training
Own call centre
Migrating Tiscali – case history
► One
of the UK leading ISP’s
► Growth through acquisition – Purchased Gateway,
Line One and other ISP customer bases
► 2002 – over 1 million customers
► Technical support and customer services through
UK outsourcer
► Service level at 24%
► High cost and poor service
► Poor relationship
Cont…………
► Quoted as being the worst customer service
► 3 customer bases needed help to migrate
► Billing platform issues resulted in claims of fraud
and incompetence
► Call centre had only 60 agents
► Sweat shop
► Paid seat per hour – micro management
► Customers churning
Things had to change
The change
► Provided
consultancy in October 2002
► Reviewed the end to end service delivery
► Reviewed the customer service strategy
 Insource at Milton Keynes
 Outsource to alternative UK outsourcer
 Outsource offshore
►India
►South
►Other
Africa
India
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Reviewed centres across India
Sent out RFI – tough questions to assess
actual ability to provide service
Spent 2 days with each centre drilling
down and monitoring behaviours
Got through the smoke screens, empty
promises and enticements
Researched the centres and conducted
due diligence
Selected the centre
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KCC in Bangalore
Owner occupier call centre
Experienced international management team
Dual network links and strong technology
Purpose built centre of exceptional quality
Enough seats for entire project and ramp up
Right mind set and ‘can do’ attitude
Good quality agents
Sound HR and training processes
Tiscali - results
► Migration
commenced November 2002
► Go live Jan 2003 25 seats – IB sign up support
► Ramped up to 400 seats across all services
► Service levels rose to over 90%
► Cost saving of £1.3m
► Customer churn reduced by 38%
► March 2003 quoted as being one of the best ISP
CS support in UK (Internet magazine)
Migration – key learning
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Manage from both sides
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Work with client to put together a joint project team
Create a joint project plan and work to it
Understand the risks and issues and jointly address
Daily war rooms / conference calls
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Don’t let them transfer their problems to you
Migrate one process at a time
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Documents should address the audience – your managers and agents
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Recruitment and soft skills training
Management selection and training
IT and networks – set up and thoroughly tested
Processes, structures and culture
Rostering, facilities, HR processes
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As agents leave – you replace with staff in India
Make sure client has all processes in order in UK before transferring to India
Ensure the client provides comprehensive up to date process and training manuals / documents
Prepare your centre while the client prepares
Send your managers and trainers to them / their trainers and managers to you
You must be ready by the time the product and process training commences
Support from client during ‘Go Live’ they push – you pull
Ramp down in UK and ramp up in India simultaneously
After stabilising – migration team hand over to operations team
CCIM Migrations
UK
► Ntl outbound
► Tiscali – IB broadband
TS, sales, chat,
correspondence centre
► P&B - OB fund raising
► Ionica – IB & OB sales
India
► Tiscali – IB TS, Email,
SUS
► Time Computers x 3
► Supanet - IB TS
► Ntl – IB TS
► Demon – IB TS
Understanding the issues of
Offshoring
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Remote management
Inexperienced management teams
Culture of over promising and under-delivering
Ask for one thing and get another
Outdated and inappropriate recruitment methods
Voice and Accent
Do not understand our culture or our customers
Over complicated and drawn out processes
Communication gaps
Hierarchical structures and culture
Quality in customer service and sales
Remote management
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Managers from India should attend the client site
Must understand the company culture, priorities and
objectives
Instructions should be clear and concise and double
checked – much can be lost in translation
Customer retention is paramount – UK companies want to
stay close to them – help them by getting to know the
culture of their customer base
Take time to get to know each other, do not be faceless
voices
Something goes wrong – they get scared – how do they fix
it from 5k miles – keep communicating and building
confidence
Inexperienced management teams
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Agent to manager in less than 1 year
Must take up references and conduct intensive assessment centres
Run an ongoing comprehensive management and development programme
Managers understand part of the big picture – need to work alongside
professionals to gain end to end knowledge
With a lack of inbound voice experience need professionals to mentor
Managers say ‘yes’ but mean no or maybe – ensure that yes means yes and
deadlines and agreements are kept
Managers should not operate a Closed Door policy
Managers should take or listen in to calls – so that they understand the floor
and customer facing issues
Departments must meet on a weekly basis so that all work in a common
direction and all understand how they fit into the big picture
Senior managers must be available and not be remote to the team
Junior managers must learn to manage upwards and keep their managers
aware of the issues and risks to achieving the common goal
Over promising
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Do not say yes when you mean no or maybe – better to
manage expectations
Do not say that things can be done today when you mean:
Tomorrow
In 2 days time
Next week
Say that something can be done when it can’t
Say that something is understood when it isn’t
Say you know how when you don’t
Say it’s okay when it’s not
And tell a client not to worry
Because they will
Ask for one thing
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get another
► 25 technical agents with experience of UK
► 10 non technical agents, experience of US
► An
OOH message from 8pm – 8am
► An OOH message from 8am – 8pm
► Do
not change any of the fields on this report
► A report with 3 of the fields changed and 1 added
Recruitment
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It’s not necessary for agents to have a degree
An Indian recruiter should not listen for UK accent
Ensure assessment is pertinent for each role - written
essays are not needed for a voice role
Keep interviews to a minimum – time is precious
HR must be fully briefed on the skills required
Tests should assess the right things and at the right level
Tests should assess the behaviours as well as the skills
Sales agents should be recruited by a sales person
Walk in recruitment should be well organised with enough
people to manage it effectively
After all the tests we normally only recruit 10% - 20%
Voice and Accent
► Britishisation
or Nuetralisation – Clarity
► Test listening and understanding skills
► Mother tongue influence – some cannot be trained
► Should be developed incrementally not just at
induction – weekly sessions
► Question or statement – which is which?
► Tone of voice cannot be clearly heard
► Managers should be more skilled than agents
► We select only 30% of agents after voice analysis
Culture
► Managers
who have been to the UK should
share their experience and learning
► Most managers and agents have not been
outside of their own state
► Know little about the UK people, their
culture, customs or what customer service
means to us
► UK companies do not teach enough about
their customers and how to deal with them
Over complicated and drawn out
processes
► 10
stage processes that need only be 2
► HR policies and procedures should be less
complicated and more straightforward
► Technology should be used more
► Britain in the 1950’s – need to enter the 21st
century
► Parkinson’s Rule
► Outdated methods – most are paper driven
Communication gaps
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Senior Managers need to adopt an open door policy
Call centre managers need to be seated on the calling floor
Hierarchical structures can prevent good communication
Don’t allow misinterpretation of directives and
requirements between UK and India – keep clarifying
We need to understand each others culture and customs
Always tell the truth – lies will be found out
Agents should be encouraged to raise issues to managers
Procedures must be put in place for good company wide
communications
CCIM scope of services
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Projects – inbound, outbound, non voice
17 years of experience and expertise
Strategy, project planning and implementation
Communication, Culture, managing the client; building the relationship
and bridging 5K miles
IT and technology planning, implementation and management
Recruitment and training – agents, TL’s, quality and trainers
Selection, Training and development of the management teams
Managing upwards – influencing the senior managers / owners
Resourcing, rostering, reporting, analysis
Operational management – reactive and proactive
Building and farming the business, ramping up and developing the
operation
UK account management
Key learning across the UK
► Choose
your vendor carefully
► Cheapest is not always best
► Think about the brand implications
► They have much less basic knowledge than UK
centres would
► Can’t do enough training
► Transferring voice calls needs experience don’t try
to do it yourself
► Don’t move multiple processes at once – one step
at a time
Lessons learnt
How do you manage your customer relationships from 5k
miles
► Need to be careful – Indian managers love to say yes
► We only recruited 20% of the workforce our outsourcing
partner wanted
► Use professionals to help both the UK and outsourcing
partners to achieve their joint goals
► Don’t try to move the world – be selective, some things
work and others do not
► Don’t let out of sight become out of mind
► Choose a consultant who can provide continuous
professional support
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Call Centres
► UK
has half a million seats
► India has achieved huge success
► Pakistan has:
 Skilled and talented labour force
 Excellent telecommunications and IT
 Ambition and foresight
 Finance and government backing
With the right support - Success is assured
Thank you