By Martin Conboy

I’ve been doing a lot travel in the last few months and I was thinking to myself that this is stressful – at least it’s supposed to be. The problem is I don’t feel stressed. On the contrary I always seem to feel fairly balanced, levelheaded and up. I generally tend to go with the flow and not get too anxious about things. I do however come across a lot of people who are a few steps short of a massive heart attack caused by stress. Anyway it got me thinking and I did some research and here is some advice and tips that I found that I thought that you might find useful. Interestingly after reading through the list I find that by and large I’m doing most of them, so what I’m saying is they work. In this Chinese year of the rat remember at the end of the rat race you are still a rat!

Managing your negative thoughts is not easy. Human beings are dreamers. We love to imagine incredible worlds and a million possibilities and endings. This is great when you are dreaming up a scheme or your next holiday, but not so much when imagining all the upsetting things that might happen.

Humans often turn their thoughts against themselves as well. We nag ourselves and beat ourselves up over slip-ups or glitches

Negative self-talk slips out, sneaking out of your mind to push you down, and soon it becomes routine. You talk down to yourself without even realizing it- but don’t think just because you are not aware of it that it does not have an effect on your life. If you think of yourself as below par, then your lack of confidence will radiate outwards, and not in a good way. Your dud vibe makes a person want to stay away from you, which makes you feel like more of a loser, which makes you condemn yourself even more. It is a vicious cycle, however it can be broken.

THINKING POSITIVELY

Moving beyond this cycle of negative thoughts and energy and into a place of comfort for yourself takes action and a future-focus. Your actions have the power to boss your thoughts around, and soon they will see the improvement in your being and fall into line. You must declare nothing short of WAR on negative thoughts.

First of all, figure out what triggers your negative thoughts. Stepping on a scale? Looking in the mirror? Running into an overbearing friend? Realize what causes your downward spiral of negative thoughts to start to spin, and be ready for them.

Replace your negative self-talk with positive affirmations. Keep it light, uplifting and funny, like the positive side of you thinks the negative side of you is a little ridiculous for being so down in the mouth. Talk to yourself out loud if it helps. Remember- this is war.

Understand the benefits of being a positive thinker. Choosing to think more positively will not only help you take control of your life and make your everyday experiences more pleasant, but it will have countless benefits on your mental and physical health as well as your ability to deal with change. Being aware of these benefits can help you be even more motivated to think positively on a regular basis.

Here are some of the most important benefits of positive thinking:

• An increased life span
• Lower rates of depression and distress
• Greater resistance to the common cold
• Better mental and physical well-being
• Better coping skills during times of stress
• A more natural ability to form relationships and cement bonds

Take responsibility for your attitude. Remember that you experience about 50,000 to 60,000 thoughts every single day of your life. And they’re your thoughts –– nobody controls how you feel and think unless you let them. This might seem like a very challenging idea if you’re used to absorbing the emotions and preferences of other people, but you’re always making a choice to think positively or negatively.

• Own up to the reality that your feelings are something you can control. This will make you feel more empowered and able to change your thinking patterns.

Make a plan to stop being a negative thinker. That means deciding to conquer the negativity that is going on around you — and there will always be plenty of it. Think of what you can do today that is good for you and others that is positive and constructive. Decide how you will react in ways that will make a difference to your life instead of allowing people and situations to dictate what you think and do. Here’s how to have a bulletproof game plan for positive thinking:

• Don’t let other people ruin your plan. People will often make things seem more important or worrisome than they really are. By not allowing yourself to be swept away by crowd-enhanced anxiety and instead taking time to think it over and get an answer that works, you’ll feel less pressured to conform or to fall in line even though doing so doesn’t match who you are.

• Making a plan to be more positive will already be a move in the right direction. This will help you to stay positive because you will feel a greater sense of control over your life and your choices.

• Your plan can be simple: you can vow to identify and record your negative thoughts each day, and to take time to reflect on why you had those thoughts and how you can improve them.

• As you continue to execute your plan, you’ll see that identifying your negative thoughts becomes easier and maintaining a negative attitude will be harder.

Practice these pertinent techniques to lead a healthier life, and keep your sanity too!

• Avoid people who stress you out. Short of ending the relationship, limit your time with them.

• Learn to say no. Know your limits and stick to them

• Control your environment. Plan your time to avoid whatever makes you anxious like the evening news or bad traffic.

• Avoid stressful topics. If you’re hot button is religion or politics, steer clear by saying I rather not talk about this or by excusing yourself.

• Express your feelings. Bottling up feelings can lead to explosive situations. Pick a time to work things out respectfully and calmly.

• Be more assertive. Life is not a spectator sport. Take charge and deal with life head-on.

• Manage your time. Plan properly and decline less important things they don’t overextend your self.

• See the big picture. Ask yourself if what you’re worried about will matter in the long run. If it’s a no, then focus your energies elsewhere.

• Set realistic standards. Being a perfectionist often brings about immense stress. Set reasonable expectations, and be happy with good enough.

• Think positively. When something gets you down reflect on the things you’re grateful for.

• Don’t try to control the uncontrollable. There are many things in life that are beyond your control, especially other people’s behaviour. Focus on what you can control, like the way you choose to react to problems.

• Get over your mistakes. What doesn’t kill you will only make you stronger. Don’t keep fretting over mistakes, but use them as lessons the personal growth.

• Forgive and forget. Except that the world we live in is imperfect people make mistakes. You can only be free to forgive and work on forgetting.

• Make time for fun. Do whatever that brings fun and positive the to your life, as long as it’s not illegal

Source www.helpguide.org

Video 

As people are increasingly overloaded with information, the trend is for B2B websites and presentations to contain short, sharp, high-impact videos, which conveys the seller’s key messages and entices prospects to find out more. Sometimes this is in the form of a “why us” message from the CEO, a testimonial from a key customer, or a fun intro to your business. Videos aren’t always expensive to produce, yet when made well they go a long way to convey the image of a professional company moving with the times. Stand out from the crowd and think about including a link to your video clip in introductory emails to new prospects.

Media releases
If a company’s doing their homework on you, it may be a cause of concern to them if the latest press release on your website is dated 2010! Companies take confidence in regular good news stories, as a sign that your company is doing well, and here to stay! Parade your success in the market with media releases, where new clients are agreeable, and consider attaching the latest release as a PS on emails to new prospects. PR is an essential ingredient to the marketing mix and can be implemented with modest budgets if not in-house.

Case studies
If your company can reference similar experience to the needs of your prospect, then capture this in the form of a one page, easy-to-digest case study. Avoid just describing the services you provided, focus also on the benefits you delivered. Have a library of case studies at your fingertips to wheel out to appropriate leads.

Checklist
While each new lead requires a custom approach, have a checklist of common questions which will enable you to get to the next step – whether a proposal or meeting – as quickly as possible. Minimise situations where you have to go back with questions in a piecemeal fashion. Companies often appreciate if you can email them a checklist of everything you need to know to be able to formulate a proposal.

Proofreader
One of the greatest pitfalls when contacting a new business lead is an email riddled with spelling or grammatical errors. Take the time to re-read your email before clicking send! The same goes for responses to requests for information and proposals – it pays to proofread thoroughly. While spelling may not be a stated evaluation criterion, a poorly written document can leave an indelible, negative impression.

Thoughts for aspiring outsourcers

By Bernard Sia

Today’s article is a tad more technical; although I have attempted to simplify the mathematics as a function of relative strengths, the formulas are maintained because I sincerely believe that the industry is fundamentally missing the ability to concretely define and quantify the value of outsourcing to the customer and ultimately suffer a Pyrrhic victory through vendor price wars. This is unhealthy to outsourcers because of the bad after taste that customers experience through a shoddy workforce attained from a forcefully undersized execution budget.

Within this article we will breakdown the variables that make up the value proposition of a vendor to a customer and hopefully help both the customer and vendor come to an amicable outsourcing relationship inception.

1.1. The decision to OUTSOURCE (THE BUY DECISION)

Most customers arrive at the tipping point to outsource when managing and executing internal functions become unbearable, distracting or alternatively, require a quantum leap in performance. The formula below describes the situation, where negative outcomes are a function of cost:

$V_c is the value expected from the internal team; while, $CC is the customer’s cost of maintaining and managing the business function internally. Negative perception arises when the value of $CC is larger than $V_c; For example, when the cost of maintaining internal IT resources outweigh the skill set and capabilities available.

Now, here comes the outsourcing vendor who caught wind of your challenges and offers a price to take away your mess for less; $PV.

Unfortunately, most buyers of outsourcing are fixated with comparing only one dimension of cost; the salary of the internal personnel, and not take into account other encumbrances and risks of managing these resources. The challenge then is for the outsourcing vendor to quantify the vendor’s value, $V_v to the customer. In which case, the value of $V_v is expected to be larger than the price of the vendor’s services to the customer.

Not only that, the value of $PV is placed under tremendous pressure to be lower than $CC, otherwise outsourcing becomes moot to the customer. In the customer’s mind, he is already failing with internal IT resources; so why risk failing (or short falling) with an outsourcing service provider that demands a higher cost outlay; despite seeing the increase in value that can be attained from the outsourcer (remember this point; we’ll come back to it in the conclusion). So we can expand the relationship as follows.

Another common mistake from both the customer as well as the outsourcing vendor in justifying their services is to end the comparison of value at this very mathematical relationship.

The customer needs to remember that a management layer is still required to manage the vendor and similarly, the outsourcing vendor needs to keep this management overhead at a minimum. The vendor needs to prove that despite the management overhead, the overall cost is still cheaper than the customer’s internal business function.

Hence the equation now has an extra variable of $CM, the customer’s cost of managing the outsourcing vendor.

Lastly, by accepting the vendor, there are risks involved where the vendor can exhibit opportunism or any variations of principal-agency issues while offering their services; risk in this case, is also an element of cost, defined as $CR_V.

To which we come to the relationship below:-

Where the value provided by the outsourcing vendor $V_v, needs to be significantly larger than the current cost of the customer managing the business function internally, $CC. Also, the sum of the vendor’s price, $PV, customer’s management cost of the vendor $CM and vendor’s risk $CR_V, should also be smaller than $CC!

But there are more to this; essentially two sets of value proposition needs to be juxtaposed – one by the vendor, and the other by the internal customer team.

3.1. THE OUTSOURCING VENDOR’s VALUE DIFFERENTIATOR

Thus, in the customer’s mind, they are comparing two factions of value, $V:-

$V_c, value provided by the internal resources.

$V_v, value provided by the external vendor.

The readers would immediately recognize that in order for the customer to justify outsourcing, a situation where
$V_v > $V_c has to happen; and the excess value attained from the outsourcer should also be ideally be larger than the cost of acquiring the vendor’s services.

So finally, we come to the diagram that captures this comparison.

Bringing together the formula from the discussion on relative comparisons, we need to reiterate that the Value Differentiator $V, needs to be large in order to cover the cost of managing the vendor as well as the vendor’s price to the customer, otherwise, the customer may as well maintain the internal team.

r$V = ($V_v - $V_c) > ($CM + $PV + $CR_V)

By extension, the expected value returned, should ideally be larger than the internal cost of the internal team; bringing the formula together, is the situation where the customer will unreservedly accept outsourcing for his business.

Firstly, thank you for your persistence; the formula above is not a Grand Theories of Outsourcing, I have no such illusions of grandeur and the verbosity is required to break down the conclusions because the caveat lies in executing the recommendations.

Now we begin with the most important summary; the variables that every outsourcer needs to figure out are,

a)    Customer Business Function Costs, including all encumbrances, $CC

b)    The actual work vis-à-vis value delivered by the Customer Business Function,  $V_c

Most outsourcing vendors make the mistake of proposing their terms of services without even figuring out these two crucial factors. Suffice to say, propose at your own peril. Time spent baking the account with an inquisitive sales person does wonders. Having said that, the vendor cannot control $CC or $V_c and can only manage their own variables to put forward a winning case. The table below summarizes:

To end, outsourcing is both an exciting and extremely difficult business. It is a services business after all, and the vagaries of human attitudes are sufficient to throw an occasional wrench into the works. Discipline is paramount and process rigor crucial for success. Unless an outsourcing firm is established with such foundations it will not be long before catastrophic service failures destroys what little credibility the outsourcer has within the market.

Earlier, I mentioned the need to remember situations where customers willingly pay more in order to attain an even larger value payback from the vendor compared to the internal team.

That is a story for another day – cue in Strategic Outsourcing.

From Outsourcing Center, by Patti Putnicki

Business Process Outsourcing (BPO). The concept is relatively simple: instead of hiring employees to handle the necessary but non-core, transaction-based business functions in your company, pass these on to someone else.

But, here’s the thing: BPO is not like dropping off your dirty clothes at the dry cleaner and having them magically transform into fresh-pressed garments the next day. The client has to play an active role to make the engagement successful. However, that doesn’t always happen.

So, what are the most common missteps that cause potentially great BPO relationships to start a downward spiral? We asked our experts to weigh in on the biggest pitfalls – the seven deadly sins of BPO – as well as the best ways to get on the road to redemption.

See the full article below:

http://www.outsourcing-center.com/2013-03-the-seven-deadly-sins-of-bpo-and-how-to-avoid-them-55146.html

By Stevie Clapton

There are several factors that contribute to the running of an effective call center. People, technology and the process of serving customers are all important.  People make up the largest part of the running of a call center and a high turnover can cost you money. In order to decrease the turnover rate there are things you can do to keep your employees content in their job.

Accept Employee Ideas

Employees like to feel like they are a part of the company they work for.  One way to foster that relationship between the employee and the company is to hold team meetings and accept ideas from the employees.  Your employees know your customer best and many will have great ideas on how to better serve them.  Allowing them to share their ideas and even using some of them in your day-to-day operation can keep more employees from looking elsewhere for employment.

Build Teamwork

Just as your employees like to feel like they are a part of the company they work for, they also like to feel like they are part of a team.   Holding special days or celebrations for accomplishments can help bring employees together.  Allowing them to work on projects or training in groups can create friendships within the office.  When employees like who they work for and who they work with, are content employees.

Benefits and Insurance

Most employees have families to support and employee benefits are very important in today’s economy.  Employees are looking for companies that not only pay well but offer benefits such as healthcare, retirement plans and paid time off.  Employees that do not have health benefits and  paid time off are more likely to come to work sick.  A sick employee can spread the illness to other employees which can lower the productivity of your company, paid time off encourages those  who are sick to stay home until they are not contagious.

Another less thought of form of insurance is liability insurance. This insurance will protect your company and your employees.  There are  two types of liability insurance that call centers should have; regular  liability insurance will cover things such as injuries on the job and  error and omission insurance will cover your company in the event an  employee is accused of providing false information on a call.  Both  forms are important to your company and your employee because they  decrease the stress related to their job.  Everyone makes mistakes no  matter how good they are at their job.

Compensation and Promotion

One of the best ways to keep your employees happy in their job is to be  sure to pay them accordingly.  If you pay your employees less that other  companies pay for the same position, it is likely that your employee  will start looking elsewhere.  If you already pay the industry standard  rate of pay, you can also use promotions to keep them motivated.  Keep  in mind a promotion must come with a pay raise for it to be effective.  A  promotion will not only motivate one person but the entire office.  All  employees want to move up in the company and have the chance at making  more money.

By keeping your employees satisfied with their job, you will be  satisfied with your employees.  They won’t be out looking for a new job  and you won’t be facing a high turnover.  You may be paying your  employees more per hour but you won’t be spending as much hiring and  training new people to do the job.

By Martin Conboy

According to the study T2 market Pulse Survey that while businesses in APAC are optimistic about business growth in 2013, 55 percent of APAC Businesses don’t anticipate increasing their workforce

The majority of APAC businesses predict growth in the next 12 months, however interestingly many do not plan to increase their workforce numbers to support intended growth according to The Talent2 APAC Market Pulse 3 Study.

In the last few years there has been a mandate within Australian corporations to reduce internal operating costs and refocus on core business activities. Many companies are responding to this by outsourcing non-core business processes to third party providers.

The report finds a strong sense of optimism amongst the majority of APAC businesses, with 61% predicting growth for the next 12 months, and only 5 percent predicting decline. In Australia, the research shows that whilst more than half of businesses are forecasting economic growth in the next 12 months, only 40 percent expect to increase employee numbers.

This discrepancy could threaten to place great pressure on some companies and their employees and it is expected that as growth occurs without an increase in human resources, APAC businesses will turn to contractors. Businesses in APAC are however already using some growth strategies such as reducing headcount and investment in mature markets (36 percent) and increasing back-office services through shared service delivery (33 percent).

It is worth noting that Australia does not have a ‘people shortage’ problem, what we have is a ‘skills shortage’ problem. The mining and construction boom, mainly in Western Australia and Queensland, has acted like a giant vacuum cleaner, sucking up all available labour resources to fuel the insatiable demand of this sector. Not only do we have a skills shortage problem but our young people also have an adversity to working in the service industry. So even if there was no mining boom gobbling up available workers, we still cannot get people to work in call centres and local outsourcing shops.

Expansion is both a key driver and a significant benefit. In the Australian BPO study 2012 conducted by the Sauce and supported by IBM and Fuji Xerox, one factor emerged as the clear front-runner and that was global expansion. 40 percent of organisations considered access to skilled manpower as important

One possible explanation for companies looking for growth and reducing headcount is that they may not necessarily be able to identify the particular skills that they need in a fast changing market, and made thus turn to other methods to attract the required skills. These days growth does not always equate with increased FTE headcount.

The T2 research reveals that 66 percent of organisations across APAC currently employ contractors, a figure that is potentially set to grow as unemployment figures rise and job seekers accept contract positions.

Currently in Australia, with an unemployment rate of 5.1 percentage, it’s very hard for companies to find suitable staff to man their customer facing divisions. Consequently, if they want their phones answered, they may move to an outsourced solution, to access skills. This will be a major driver going forward. On the flip side, we have a community that demands that companies meet the highest standards of customer service.

Whilst awareness of the skills and benefits contractors can offer organisations is high, the research finds there are also challenges. 65 per cent of Australian businesses believe contracted workers increase workforce flexibility and scalability to support economic conditions and 37 percent feel contractors offer improved business performance by better matching specialist resources to company projects.

“It may become increasingly necessary for businesses across APAC to consider the flexibility of a contracted workforce in an oscillating economic climate, rather than resorting to cuts to full- time employees as a reactive profitability measure,” said Caleb Baker, Managing Director, RPO & Managed Services Asia Pacific, and Talent2.

“When unemployment rates rise, the demand for contractors also rises as people who were traditionally used to full time roles begin considering part time or contractor roles. It’s clear that whilst businesses are aware of the benefits a contractor workforce can offer, there are perceived barriers to adoption for businesses to overcome in order to consider employing contractors. These barriers can be easily addressed by working with expert providers who can offer ease of management and better visibility of contracted employees,” concluded Baker.

Contributor: Stephen Moore Contributor to SSON

10 tips to get off to a good start

For anyone thinking about implementing shared services to get the magic leverage out of the “people-process-technology” triumvirate, here’s an introduction to what you should be considering in the design phase.

Before you set out on any journey, you need to be clear about where you are going. Here are my 10 tips for designing a successful shared services.

Tip 1: Commit to change

When I was an apprentice, my mentor and good friend would regularly quote: “If you always do what you have always done. You will always get what you have always got!” So when introducing something new, the important thing is to commit to a new direction. Be confident and purposeful.

Tip 2: Know your starting point

You need to be clear on where you are starting from, so start by getting an as-is audit (you can do this in-house or contract a third party). This is vital for anything that follows, as it will be your benchmark for any progress. This evaluation should analyze volumes and current process times, as well as the variance in the service. I have lost count of the number of senior managers who say, “I never knew we did that!” Processes evolve and workarounds become embedded. Understanding where we are now leads to better planning.

Tip 3: Know your end goal

If you don’t know for sure where you are going, then, for sure, you won’t get there. Many companies tend to think of the end-goal in terms of financial saving.  My engineering background focuses me on a more structured approach. Ask yourself: “What will success look like and how will we measure it?”

Tip 4: Innovation is important, but …

However, let the service or the process drive the technology, and not the other way around. If you lead with all the groovy gadgets and technology, your team may have a hard time following through and the business will be disappointed. Bite off just what you can chew; it’s a long journey ahead.

Tip 5: How will you measure success?

A “one sizes fits all” approach just does not hold water. The design of the operating model must deliver a service that is valued by the customer. If the customer does not use the service, he’ll find ways around it, or complain; either way, it’s a lost opportunity and will cost you more. For example, if you design a process that guides the customer to using an online facility but half your customer-base has minimal access to a PC, that does not count as a success.

Tip 6: Think global, act local

Well, if not global, at least think broadly. But your implementation needs to take account of local needs. Never underestimate the need to engage with the local teams, as local knowledge of practices and policies is invaluable.

Tip 7: Manage your stakeholders’ expectations

Managing both business and customer expectations is key. If you promise your customer base that there will be no change from day one, and that you’ll be offering an “AS IS Service” – you are misleading your customers. Services will change. But it is part of a greater good. Prepare them for that.

Tip 8: Prepare customers for phones, not colleagues

One of the greatest transitions for your customers is that they no longer have “Mary” or “Bill” down the hall. Now they need to dial new numbers, and press “2” for information. They won’t like that. You are replacing local relationships and communications with a remote contact centre and an ACD system. Help them through this by preparing them for the change.

Tip 9: Feedback on progress

Working with the teams and providing regular feedback in a structured manner is a good way to progress. Get the teams on-board, and involve them in delivering the vision. That will go a long way to building a successful shared services.

Tip 10: If you are not sure – communicate some more

The investment in extra communication is far less than the investment required to fix problems. Communicate through the popular channels. And make yourself available.

In summary: here are the main take-aways to consider during a design phase:

• Understand the needs of the business / customer
• Manage those needs / expectations
• Be clear on the services to be provided
• Be aware of current service requirements / scalability
• Establish a robust platform to deliver those services
• Be consistent on how to measure success
• Stick to your budget
• Decide on a phased or a big bang approach, and be clear about what this means
• Communicate throughout

Steve has a long track record of successful business and operational executive appointments. He is an experienced change agent in designing, implementing and operating Shared Services on multiple sites in remote locations. He has delivered HR, Finance, Procure to Pay and IT Support services, for both the private, not for profit, and public sectors.

Steve has successfully led culture change whilst delivering improved commercial performances though business performance management initiatives and employee development programs. These strategies focus on ensuring future business growth. A core area of expertise is Six Sigma and Lean business strategies and deployments. Some examples of projects include: designing and delivering a target operating model to deliver an enhanced service delivery for HR and Payroll Services, reducing operating costs by 40%; and designing and implementing a Financial Shared Services model from 4 disparate Finance departments, delivering 15 % savings in Year 1 and 25% savings in year 2.

By Allison Mathiebe

It’s frequently the case that there are differences in performance between permanent and temporary staff, but there may also be a big divide between the two.

Alison Mathiebe looks at the practical steps that you can take to overcome this divide.

Temporary agents are often effectively employed in call centres to handle simple transactions and call peaks, or to run short-term campaigns. Call centres may also consider employing temporary agents on a longer-term basis in order to avoid a commitment to increasing or replacing permanent staff. In this case, the employer needs to be aware of staff resentment issues which can emerge when the same duties are performed by both temporary and permanent staff on a long-term basis, and how to prevent and resolve these problems.

Once temporary staff are fully trained and have sufficient experience, a performance division can occur between the temporary and permanent agent groups. In particular, where permanent staff are burnt out and no longer find the work challenging or interesting, they can be outperformed by newer temporary staff wanting to prove their capabilities so they can be kept on for more work.

At the same time, temporary staff can resent being paid less for the same work and being strung along with hopes of permanent work which may never materialise.

Despite ongoing positive feedback, temporary staff may feel that their good work is unrecognised because they haven’t been awarded a permanent role, when the reality may just be that these roles are rare because of the organisation’s hiring restrictions and there is a lot of competition when a permanent position becomes available.

When performance levels between temporary and permanent staffing groups become obvious to everyone in the team or centre (e.g. call taking or quality scores are consistently higher amongst the temporary staff) this can cause deep divisions within the team. Long-term permanent agents can resent the positive attention received by the outperforming temporary staff.  As a result, there may also be objections to reward and recognition schemes which publicly reward the best agents and, by default, reveal which staff are never or rarely rewarded.

Permanent staff may believe that their permanent status and long period of service for the organisation makes them superior to ‘the temps’, even when job descriptions and duties are the same. In some sense, this is correct as permanent staff will be treated more favourably in times of cutbacks; however, this feeling of superiority can set up a situation for bullying if left unchecked.

In addition, where there is a performance division between temporary and permanent staff, the call centre’s service provision will be more seriously affected if the higher-performing temporary agents are automatically let go at a time of staff cutbacks.

While these issues are usually caused by the organisation’s HR policies (such as a freeze on hiring permanent staff and/or a performance management system which doesn’t have strict consequences for consistent underperformers), the call centre manager can do a number of things to prevent and resolve any such problems:

• Where possible, differentiate the duties of permanent and temporary staff.
• Set expectations at the time of employment so that temporary staff has an accurate picture of how long their tenure will be, the likelihood of contracts being renewed and other opportunities within the organisation becoming available.
• Continue to call coach and performance manage all staff to encourage continuous improvement, goal setting and career planning.
• Encourage long-term staff to apply for internal vacancies including any parent/subsidiary company or wider government department opportunities.
• Unless there are clear ‘temp to perm’ guidelines in place, let temporary staff know where they can see the call centre’s and organisation’s vacancies and how they can apply. Do let them know that to be in contention for a permanent role they have to apply rather than receiving the job out of the blue as a reward for good work.
• Organise work placements where call centre staff can do buddy/shadow work in other sections of the organisation for a limited time during low call periods.  This is an opportunity for agents to increase their skills and creates awareness of what other work they may like to apply for in the future.
• Encourage career planning for all – good temporary staff to permanent roles, long-term permanent staff to other opportunities within the organisation, and succession planning within the centre such as training possible future team leaders.  While this may be detrimental to the call centre’s attrition rates (and even service level temporarily) it is better than an unmotivated workforce who see no future opportunities and therefore no need to improve their performance.

Alison Mathiebe is the author of How to Survive (& Thrive) in a Call Centre, available from amazon.co.uk

By Richard Margetic - Dell’s social media guru

Social media is too hard, too scary or too ridiculous to waste time on. I hear these sentiments constantly from business owners of all ages. Of course, prolific users of social media probably find these attitudes archaic. But they are real – and more common that you’d expect.

For example, I recently met a business owner who runs a small nutrition practice. He told me that he studied Facebook for six months – researching what it does and how it works – before finally registering for an account. Six months! Seriously, Facebook is not akin to nuclear physics. It doesn’t require this level of study.

Similarly, I recently did a video interview with a business owner, profiling her work and products. At the end of the interview, she told me that she didn’t want it on YouTube. I was perplexed. She was happy for us to film, she saw us set up the cameras. I wondered if I had unwittingly offended her or if she was unhappy with the interview. It turns out that she thought the interview was just fine. “I just don’t want it on YouTube.”

Still confused, I asked if she cared if the video was uploaded to Vimeo, or Blip.TV or any of the other video-sharing sites. “Oh yes, that’s fine, just not YouTube. I don’t want to be with the silly cat videos.”

Sin #1: Overcomplicating social media

The incidents above illustrate that there is a clear lack of understanding of what social media is and, more importantly, how powerfully it can impact your business. It’s a trend that social media expert Richard Margetic often sees as well. Margetic is director of Dell’s Global Social Media. “Small business owners are afraid of social media because of a lack of knowledge but also a lack of familiarity with social media tools,” says Margetic, who was in Sydney earlier this week. “This develops an element of insecurity. They don’t want to jeopardise their business.”

Margetic says small business owners are also scared by social media horror stories that range from “stupidity” to those that spawn legal issues. “If common sense ruled, then Twitter would make sense to them,” he says matter-of-factly.

To this end, Dell has produced an updated version of it’s free resource “Social Media Toolkit: A guide to how small and medium businesses can make the most out of social media.”

Sin #2: Broadcast versus conversation

Margetic says that many business owners confuse social media with traditional marketing. That is, while they may understand that it’s a different channel, they don’t grasp the fundamental tenet that social media is a conversation.

“People look at social media like it’s a broadcast mechanism,” says Margetic. “That’s the wrong way of looking at it. And that means they’re missing the opportunity that social media brings to the table.”

You can see examples of small business owners who merely use it to “shout out” sales, promotions, marketing campaigns and company information. Social media users eventually tire of this approach, preferring to engage with businesses that take the time to interact with followers or customers.

“The benefit of social media is that it’s not one-way messaging. It’s a dialogue – you engage in conversations. Too many companies just use it as a way to broadcast campaigns…and that happens far more often than it should.”

Sin #3: Spray and pray

Too often, I see small business owners plunge headfirst into social media, because they know they need to “be there”, without a clear idea of where to expend their energy. Instead, they end up with accounts on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, LinkedIn, and every other social networking platform out there. But few get traction because their efforts are spread too thinly thus leaving little opportunity to interact or engage. The “one-way broadcast” approach strikes again.

Margetic discusses two pillars that small business owners need to be aware of in order to make the most out of social media: value to the customer and value of the business. “You need to play in the area where they intersect,” he says.

So what does that actually mean? Margetic points out that you first need to determine the value of the social media interaction to the customer. “Understand the reasons why people are motivated to engage socially,” he says. “There could be any number of reasons: to create meaningful relationships; to be heard; to have meaningful interactions with others, and so on. All those things are what bring value to the customers.

“The other side is the value these interactions bring to the business. You need to understand the elements that drive your business – that could be anything from conversions, or web traffic and so on.

“When you focus on where the customer value intersects with the business value … that’s the core of being successful in social media.”

Sin #4: Talk then listen

Again, this underpins the concept that the biggest mortal social media sin is the one-way broadcast. Margetic says: “A fundamental truth about engaging with anyone in any situation you’re not familiar with is that you don’t lead by talking,” he says. “The very first thing you need to do is listen.”

Margetic emphasises that this is particularly true for anyone new to social media or unsure of how to develop a social media strategy. “If you listen, you will get all the signals you need to understand what your customers are talking about. You’ll understand the nuances and determine how to involve people in conversation.”

Sin #5: Assuming it costs a lot a lot of money

Clearly, a company like Dell has a big budget to spend on social media strategy and implementation. However, Margetic points out that you don’t need big dollars to embrace social media. “There are a lot of free ways to monitor conversations – using tools ranging from Google Alerts to Hootsuite. There are a number to monitor your social media presence that don’t require a dollar investment. It just requires time.”

This is where I see many business owners fall down. Many assume that mastering social media takes far longer than it really does. I spoke to a business owner last week who told me: “I know I need to understand social media. I just haven’t had the time. I’m going to do that when I’m next on holidays – I’ll have two weeks when I can immerse myself in it full-time so I can do it properly.” Honestly, it’s not rocket science. It won’t take you two weeks to understand this. (Granted, if you have 10,000 employees and need to train them in how to use social media, it’s a different story).

My personal advice to people is: just get on it. Lurk and observe. It’s like going to a party. If you’re new to a crowd, you don’t hog the limelight as soon as you walk in the room. Watch, listen and at some point you’ll be comfortable enough to join into the conversation. When that happens, the rest occurs naturally.

Sin #6: Get your tech priorities right

Margetic says he believes that commerce and social media will become inextricably combined. He also realises that late adopters may feel the need to embrace a range of new technologies at once.

While the desire to become tech-savvy is positive, it’s important to prioritise your efforts. “It’s a lot better to socialise an ecommerce site than it is to commercialise a social site,” says Margetic.

In other words, if you’re not yet selling products/services online, do this first. Focus on ways to conduct sales online. This is typically a scalable and essential element to growing a business. Margetic says you then bring in the social element.

Sin #7: Ignoring visuals

Pinterest. Infographics. Instagram. Videos. And so on. Margetic predicts that the emphasis on shareable visual elements – like photos – will become more popular.

“Images provide you with the ability to communicate information quickly,” he says. “Because of a lack of time, people will increasingly need to get their message across quickly. They’ll focus on visual entities to do this.”

We live in a world where our short attention spans are only getting shorter. Mastering the art of conveying your message in a single image will become a valuable skill, particularly if people then feel compelled to share that image with their friends/followers. This is the new “word of mouth”.

Ultimately, if you commit one of these seven deadly sins, you might end up in purgatory. However, forgiveness can be right around the corner. The key is top remain authentic, sincere and, as Margetic points out, simply “use common sense”. Social media doesn’t have to be too hard, too scary or too ridiculous to waste time on. It can be a powerful tool to grow your business. It just depends on whether you want to see it that way.

Follow Valerie Khoo on Twitter @valeriekhoo

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/small-business/managing/blogs/enterprise/seven–deadly-sins-of-social-media-20130228-2f7ck.html#ixzz2MWLE3SIp

Here there and everywhere

After decades of sending work across the world, companies are rethinking their offshoring strategies, says The Economist’s Tamzin Booth

Early next month local dignitaries will gather for a ribbon-cutting ceremony at a facility in Whitsett, North Carolina, USA. A new production line will start to roll and the seemingly impossible will happen: America will start making personal computers again. Mass-market computer production had been withering away for the past 30 years, and the vast majority of laptops have always been made in Asia. Dell shut two big American factories in 2008 and 2010 in a big shift to China, and HP now makes only a small number of business desktops at home.

The new manufacturing facility is being built not by an American company but by Lenovo, a highly successful Chinese technology group. Founded in 1984 by 11 engineers from the Chinese Academy of Sciences, it bought IBM’s ThinkPad personal-computer business in 2005 and is now by some measures the world’s biggest PC-maker, just ahead of HP, and the fastest growing.

Lenovo’s move marks the latest twist in a globalisation story that has been running since the 1980s. The original idea behind offshoring was that Western firms with high labour costs could make huge savings by sending work to countries where wages were much lower (see article). Offshoring means moving work and jobs outside the country where a company is based. It can also involve outsourcing, which means sending work to outside contractors. These can be either in the home country or abroad, but in offshoring they are based overseas. For several decades that strategy worked, often brilliantly. But now companies are rethinking their global footprints.

The first and most important reason is that the global labour “arbitrage” that sent companies rushing overseas is running out. Wages in China and India have been going up by 10-20% a year for the past decade, whereas manufacturing pay in America and Europe has barely budged. Other countries, including Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines, still offer low wages, but not China’s scale, efficiency and supply chains. There are still big gaps between wages in different parts of the world, but other factors such as transport costs increasingly offset them. Lenovo’s labour costs in North Carolina will still be higher than in its factories in China and Mexico, but the gap has narrowed substantially, so it is no longer a clinching reason for manufacturing in emerging markets. With more automation, says David Schmoock, Lenovo’s president for North America, labour’s share of total costs is shrinking anyway.

Second, many American firms now realise that they went too far in sending work abroad and need to bring some of it home again, a process inelegantly termed “reshoring”. Well-known companies such as Google, General Electric, Caterpillar and Ford Motor Company are bringing some of their production back to America or adding new capacity there. In December Apple said it would start making a line of its Mac computers in America later this year.

Choosing the right location for producing a good or a service is an inexact science, and many companies got it wrong. Michael Porter, Harvard Business School’s guru on competitive strategy, says that just as companies pursued many unpromising mergers and acquisitions until painful experience brought greater discipline to the field, a lot of chief executives offshored too quickly and too much. In Europe there was never as much enthusiasm for offshoring as in America in the first place, and the small number of companies that did it are in no rush to return.

Firms are now discovering all the disadvantages of distance. The cost of shipping heavy goods halfway around the world by sea has been rising sharply, and goods spend weeks in transit. They have also found that manufacturing somewhere cheap and far away but keeping research and development at home can have a negative effect on innovation. One answer to this would be to move the R&D too, but that has other drawbacks: the threat of losing valuable intellectual property in far-off places looms ever larger. Also, a succession of wars and natural disasters in the past decade has highlighted the risk that supply chains a long way from home may become disrupted.

Third, firms are rapidly moving away from the model of manufacturing everything in one low-cost place to supply the rest of the world. China is no longer seen as a cheap manufacturing base but as a huge new market. Increasingly, the main reason for multinationals to move production is to be close to customers in big new markets. This is not offshoring in the sense the word has been used for the past three decades; instead, it is being “onshore” in new places. Peter Löscher, the chief executive of Siemens, a German engineering firm, recently commented that the notion of offshoring is in any case an odd one for a truly international company. The “home shore” for Siemens, he said, is now as much China and India as it is Germany or America.

Companies now want to be in, or close to, each of their biggest markets, making customised products and responding quickly to changing local demand. Pierre Beaudoin, chief executive of Bombardier, a Canadian maker of aeroplanes and trains, says the firm used to focus on cost savings made by sending jobs abroad; now Bombardier is in China for the sake of China.

Lenovo, as a Chinese company, has its own factories in China. The reason it is moving some production to America is that it will be able to customise its computers for American customers and respond quickly to them. If it made them in China they would spend six weeks on a ship, says Mr. Schmoock.

Under this logic, America and Europe, with their big domestic markets, should be able to attract plenty of new investment as companies look for a bigger local presence in places around the world. It is not just Western firms bringing some of their production home; there is also a wave of emerging-market champions such as Lenovo, or the Tata Group, which is making Range Rover cars near Liverpool, that are coming to invest in brands, capacity and workers in the West.

Such changes are happening not only in manufacturing, but increasingly in services too. Companies may either outsource IT and back-office work to other companies, which could be in the same country or abroad, or offshore it to their own centres overseas. Software programming, call centres and data centre management were the first tasks to move, followed by more complex ones such as medical diagnoses and analytics for investment banks.

As in manufacturing, the labour-cost arbitrage in services is rapidly eroding, leaving firms with all the drawbacks of distance and ever fewer cost savings to make up for them. There has been widespread disappointment with outsourcing information technology and the routine back-office tasks that used to be done in-house. Some activities that used to be considered peripheral to a company’s profits, such as data management, are now seen as essential, so they are less likely to be entrusted to a third-party supplier thousands of miles away.

Coming full circle

Even General Electric is reversing its course in some important areas of its business. In the 1990s it had pioneered the offshoring of services, setting up one of the very first “captive”, or fully owned, offshore service centres in Gurgaon in 1997. Up until last year around half of GE’s information-technology work was being done outside the company, mostly in India, but the company found that it was losing too much technical expertise and that its IT department was not responding quickly enough to changing technology needs. It is now adding hundreds of IT engineers at a new centre in Van Buren Township in Michigan.

This special report will examine the changing economics of offshoring in the corporate world. It will show that offshoring in its traditional sense, in search of cheaper labour anywhere on the globe, is maturing, tailing off and to some extent being reversed. Multinationals will certainly not become any less global as a result, but they will distribute their activities more evenly and selectively around the world, taking heed of a far broader range of variables than labour costs alone.

That offers a huge opportunity for rich countries and their workers to win back some of the industries and activities they have lost over the past few decades. Paradoxically, the narrowing wage gap increases the pressure on politicians. With labour-cost differentials narrowing rapidly, it is no longer possible to point at rock-bottom wages in emerging markets as the reason why the rich world is losing out. Developed countries will have to compete hard on factors beyond labour costs. The most important of these are world-class skills and training, along with flexibility and motivation of workers, extensive clusters of suppliers and sensible regulation.

As a global leader on China Outsourcing and Market, Devott released its annual forecasts of Top 10 Trends in China Outsourcing via its international informational portal www.chnsourcing.com on December 25, 2012. Based on extensive data from its customers around country and globe, Devott studied the mechanism of the vertical transformation and undisclosed the drivers of the trends along with industry standards and own methodologies. Devott predicts that under the native influence of the shrinking global markets and sluggish recovery in major economic powers, national protectionism as demonstrated in US Presidential Election, China-Japan Island Conflict, reducing growth rate in China, there are numerous challenges and adversities China Outsourcing will face in 2013.

Prediction 1: The market size of onshore and offshore will be contracted slightly; Competitions over prices will be intensified.

It’s a bumpy road to recover the global economy. The unemployment rate keeps going up and the international offshore market will further shrink. As to Chinese outsourcing service enterprises, the European and American market will shrink dramatically with the re-emergence of trade protectionism and insourcing restart. To Japanese market, due to the declining Japanese economy as well as disgusting impact from political factor that the dispute on Diaoyu Island between China and Japan ,Japanese outsourcing market is getting fewer opportunities for China in 2013. Under high expectations, Chinese domestic market is still waiting for breakout because of without enough driving force from the State-owned enterprises and government agencies although domestic market increases fast. The overall recession of the onshore and offshore market directly results in more fierce market competition. Meanwhile, the majority of the companies are on the low end of the industrial chain that resulting from Chinese outsourcing industry’s remaining on primary stage, the price war is going to be intensifying in 2013 both for offshore and onshore market.

Prediction 2: Overseas investment from China based sourcing corporations will get more consensus; More Chinese companies will plan and implement their global strategies onshore in developed countries.

More and more work is called for being shifted back to local caused by American president election, which has become a big feature in the second industrial transfer for global service outsourcing. As the worldwide largest outsourcer, the United States leads the “outsourcing backflow“ trend which will drive the global outsourcing enterprises to reformulate the strategy of development and market. To set up branches and delivery centers locally in the U.S. will become one of the core trends for Chinese outsourcing industry in 2013. Many countries’ outsourcing enterprise will launch fierce rival in the U.S., especially the competition between China and India.

Prediction 3: Growth Drivers of China Outsourcing will be transformed rapidly, depending more on capital and market instead of incentives and low cost talent.

Through the rapid growth of the industry size, the development of the whole Chinese outsourcing industry is evolving from the basic embryonic stage to the upgrade stage, during which every factor coordinates and interacts with each other to establish an ecosystem for service outsourcing. Chinese outsourcing industry’s growth pattern is onto a turning point. “Market + capital” model is going to replace “policy + talents” to facilitate the future industry, so as to lead the industry’s transformation and upgrading.

Forecast 4: M&A activities will be increased considerably; so are hidden risks and negative impact of the Investments.

Under the shrinking domestic market and intensifying competition, as well as being driven by some industry giants such as Pactera, Achievo and The Devott Fund, the trend of investment and acquisition within outsourcing industry will further be continued in 2013. The trend of industrial integration will be intensified. However, due to the great risks of M&A, all kinds’ of problems gradually appeared in the process of M&A at the later stage. Consequently, the number of failing cases will be on an increase accordingly.

Prediction 5: Focus of the growth will be more on innovation than cost reduction.

Due to incapable of affording the innovation and transition for some enterprises after economic crisis such as market survey, trial operation, and risk and opportunity costs, they crave for outsourcing enterprises with professional abilities and practical experience as their intellectual strategic partners to help them improve efficiency and transform their businesses. Therefore, the value of outsourcing service is predicted to shift from cost reduction and core competence enhancement to innovation support to reshape their core competence. Meanwhile, the status of the outsourcing enterprises will be improved as well.

Prediction 6: “Big” is no longer growth objective. Fast deployment, flexible practices and vertical solutions are 2013 Performance Indexes in corporate board rooms.

In 2013, the global service outsourcing buyers will become more cautious on outsourcing strategy decision making and service providers’ choosing. Resources resolutions become very popular in this industry. With the development of the global buyers’ demand, the development of China’s outsourcing service providers will change their direction to “flexible structure, rapid iteration and fast reaction”. Global buyers pay more attention to enterprise solutions and service capacity and request the enterprise develop professionally.

Prediction 7: New Delivery Models and Business Processes Developed by “Cloud Platform” will penetrate deeper of enterprise markets.

Starting from 2013, cloud outsourcing based on the “cloud” platform and “cloud” model increasingly become the mainstream and trend in the development of outsourcing industry. With the core element – CCES (Cloud Computing Enabled Service) model, could sourcing drives the whole industry to achieve the transformation and upgrading and extend to 3.0 eras. The whole industry will be endowed with new connotation. At the same time, crowdsourcing as a new mode will get more and more respected and application by global buyers.

Predictions 8: New Outsourcing Models and Process Management Methodologies will appear widely in Big Data Era.

As data becomes a new hub to promote industrial development and the core element, a new service outsourcing segmentation field appear and rapid development – that is, great data outsourcing. As a new field of KPO, great data outsourcing based on data mining will be got full development in 2013. A large number of great data outsourcing enterprises will appear and gather abundance data outsourcing solutions. At the same time, the development of great data outsourcing will give rise to a new business model and accelerate technological progress.

Prediction 9: The weight of BPO in outsourcing industry will be increased. It’s expected the first public company in BPO vertical emerges in 2013.

In 2013, China’s BPO industry will develop rapidly from the document entry, data processing and other low-end level BPOs to high-end level BPOs which related to the core businesses. At present there is no one real BPO enterprise in 29 local service outsourcing listed companies. Until 2013, the situation will be broken and the industry will appear “competitive advantage gets sustainable” situation, the leaders will enjoy extra income.

Prediction 10: Supports and incentive policies and regulations remain key driving forces to China Outsourcing’s transformation and innovation

In 2013, the public platform construction funds and services tax and other services outsourcing policy are expected to extend. The whole service outsourcing industry will get a further development by personal training of service outsourcing, developing the international market, intellectual property protection and other aspects. At the same time, the state will take new measures on the new features appeared in the development of service outsourcing industry such as support large enterprises mergers and acquisitions and increase the management training subsidy of service outsourcing enterprises.

According to the problems China service outsourcing industry may face in 2013, “Forecasts and Suggestions of Service Outsourcing for China 2013” gives ten core development suggestions from the government and enterprise aspects. For more detailed information and download, please visit: http://www.chnsourcing.com.cn/top/tenforecast/2013/

By Mark Atterby – Senior Staff Writer

For nearly two decades organisations have used off-shoring as a strategy to reduce costs, mainly through labour arbitrage. ( BPO 1.0) For the most part the pros and cons have been well ventilated. The advantages gleaned from offshoring are becoming harder to obtain due to rising wages in traditional BPO and outsourcing locations (India and The Philippines), serious competition for quality talent, abating English language skills, volatile energy costs, global security concerns, and the worldwide economic crisis. In fact the whole process is now basically commoditised.

Organisations need to plan carefully when deciding to offshore, near-shore or onshore their outsourcing projects.  A variety of factors need to be considered when picking a location that will support and complement their business objectives. Are near shore locations such as New Zealand or Fiji more suited to our language and cultural needs? Or are onshore options such as regional cities (Ballarat or Launceston) or other towns better to ensure compliance to data privacy and security considerations. And if off-shoring, maybe Africa or Mauritius will offer better opportunities to service customers in Europe or the Middle-East, than setting up in say Malaysia?

In the last few years, according to the Everest Group, over 30 countries in Asia, the Pacific and Africa have opened up their economies, with their governments providing incentives and the regulatory framework to attract outsourcing and ICT- BPO investment. In evaluating which shoring option to adopt, organisations need to understand and calculate all the real costs associated with each choice.

A recent webinar held by The Everest Group[i] highlighted how many of the standard metrics and much of the common wisdom used for evaluating locations is flawed or provides an incomplete and accurate picture.

Quite a number off-shored outsourcing and ICT- BPO projects have turned out to be more expensive than anticipated, where time schedules were not met, cooperation proved difficult, cultural differences were amplified and many organisations were dissatisfied with results. The reason for these failures, or limited success, was the one-dimensional nature of the outsourcing procurement decisions made. The decisions were based primarily on cost, driven by labour arbitrage, which failed to account for other factors such as productivity, quality levels, operating risks, manpower availability and cultural and political issues.

The cost benefit analysis to decide which shoring option to adopt needs detailed consideration of all relevant and associated costs. Apart from wages, other factors to consider include the availability of qualified personnel, buffers for Murphy’s Law, client side project management  costs, quality cultural training, productivity issues, and possible wage increases. Many companies who shifted production processes to Eastern Europe underestimated the rate of subsequent pay increases, which in some regions were in the double-digits[ii].

As well as the obvious costs of labour, property, facilities, power and water, telecommunications etc., every country has hidden costs related to the legal, cultural, and infrastructure details that need to be negotiated when setting up operations. Costs in managing resources in a distant location as well as the efforts required in transitioning operations are frequently not fully calculated. After all having to jump on a plane and travel all day to fix a problem is no small thing.

A successful ‘right shoring’ strategy is based on understanding which region or country is best suited to produce a certain product or deliver a certain service as well as all of the costs associated with doing business in that location. And don’t get stuck in the quality versus cost argument. On-shoring doesn’t necessarily mean better quality just as much as offshoring doesn’t necessarily mean less expensive.