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White Paper: B2C Customer Support and Contact Center Secrets that B2B Can Exploit & Vice Versa
In a business environment where products and even operational efficiencies are commoditized, winning companies are dominating their markets by providing unique and exceptional customer service and experience. These companies think out of the box and exploit high-impact strategies, innovations and best practices from outside their specific industry sectors and markets to get beyond “me too” customer service and support. For example, leading B2B companies are leveraging B2C customer service secrets and vice versa.

This white paper outlines examples of these strategies, innovations and best practices, and explains how you can exploit them to deliver unique customer experiences, improve customer loyalty and ultimately reinforce your brand.

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HR Accelerates Immigration Processing with VISANOW
VISANOW, an immigration solution provider, has announced the introduction of VISANOW 2007, the latest version of its user interface, with simplified navigation and enhanced functionality for easier immigration processing. Working closely with immigration legal specialists and clients from leading corporations, VISANOW developed the new, more user-friendly system to provide easier access to account information, more online search capabilities and increased speed and performance. VISANOW 2007 makes it even easier for HR departments and individual employees to process and monitor their immigration applications.

Workplace Options Acquires EAP Solutions
Workplace Options, a provider of work-life employee benefits in America, has announced the acquisition of EAP Solutions, one of Ireland’s leading providers of employee assistance and work-life services. This acquisition significantly expands WPO’s European presence and international provider network. EAP Solutions, based in Dublin, currently provides services to more than 55,000 employees throughout the Republic of Ireland. The new entity, Employee Advisory Resource Ireland, will serve over 100,000 employee lives.

Pivotal Employees’ Impact on Business Results
In today’s competitive global economy, organizations cannot afford to make poor workforce decisions. According to research by Hewitt Associates, a global human resources services company, the attraction and retention of pivotal employees plays a critical role in increasing shareholder value.

Hewitt analyzed the HR data of more than 1,000 large companies and 20 million employees – a microcosm of the U.S. labor market – to determine the financial impact of human capital programs. Results showed that the flow of pivotal employees – defined as employees in the top quartile of their peers in pay progression – into and out of an organization is a strong predictor of changes in Cash Flow Return on Investment (CFROI1) and shareholder value.

Hewitt captures this information in the form of “Talent Quotient” (TQ), a human capital metric that quantifies the financial impact that pivotal employees make on an organization’s business results. According to Hewitt’s research, for the average Fortune 500 company, a 10 percent increase in a company’s TQ score adds approximately $70 million to $160 million to its bottom line over the next few years.

Hewitt’s data by industry sectors shows a range of TQ performance. For example, the financial services sector has TQ scores ranging from 86 to 138, energy ranging from 88 to 124, and IT 96 to 123.

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SMB Managers Reveal Startling Work Hours and Habits
Almost half of U.S. small business managers work during time meant for family and admit to making business calls and checking e-mail while driving, according to a national survey exposing the unusual lengths taken by today’s workers to manage increasingly 24/7 jobs. Conducted on behalf of Staples, the telephone poll explored the balance between work and personal time for 300 leaders of companies with fewer than 20 employees, a group representing nearly 90 percent of all U.S. businesses, according to the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB). Overall, respondents reported long hours, diminished vacation and an ever-blurring line separating work from time-off.

The survey revealed some startling work habits, such as nearly one in five managers (18 percent) admit to reading work-related e-mail and documents while in the bathroom and nearly half (49 percent) work while driving.

For most of the managers surveyed, the standard 40-hour work week does not apply. Nearly two-thirds (62 percent) work well beyond a 40-hour week, and one in five (21 percent) work a double week, logging an extra 40 or more on-the-job hours. Participants cited business growth (9 percent) added responsibility (7 percent) and “trying to keep up” (5 percent) for their heavy workloads. Some managers have compensated for these increased work demands by letting work trespass into once-sacred personal time. For instance:

• One in five (21 percent) work while eating dinner at least 4–5 times per week.
• More than a third (37 percent) could not readily remember their last vacation. Of those who did vacation, nearly half admit to working during some portion of it.
• Additionally, the pervasiveness of mobile phones and hand-held e-mail devices has only contributed to these long hours at untraditional times.
• More than two-thirds (68 percent) work on days off, checking e-mail, voicemail or making work-related calls.
• Two-thirds (66 percent) work after hours and at night.
• Half (51 percent) work on holidays.
• Almost half (47 percent) work during what is supposed to be family time.

Generally, surveyed leaders of younger companies and those with fewer employees expressed the most lopsided work-life balance, and the vast majority (92 percent) characterized their workload as about the same or heavier than from a year ago.

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Global Outsourcing Drives Business Growth
The Software & Information Industry Association has announced the release of a major survey and report on the current state of global software development.

A sampling of the research results indicates that companies are increasing their global development efforts: 57% of the participants have significantly increased offshore work in the past 18 months and many plan to add still more in the next 18 months. Growth strategy was cited as an “important” or “critical” driver for 84% of respondents, while increasing speed to market and productivity were the next most important drivers. No single business model was cited as optimum for offshore development, with roughly half of respondents working with an offshore provider, a third operating a subsidiary or captive, and a quarter employing a hybrid model of both approaches.

Respondents claim to be achieving 80-100% of their cost savings goals. While gains in productivity appear to be less than expected, 73% of respondents reported a positive impact on profits. In addition, fully two-thirds of companies who work offshore claim the quality of work is above average when compared to onshore staff, with 25% rating the quality as “excellent” or “outstanding.”

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Are Telecommuters Less Likely to Advance?
More than half (61 percent) of 1,320 global executives surveyed say they believe that telecommuters are less likely to advance in their careers in comparison to employees working in traditional office settings, according to the latest Trends@Work Quiz from Futurestep, Korn/Ferry International’s outsourced recruitment subsidiary.

Despite this assertion, nearly half (48 percent) of respondents indicated that they would consider a job which involved telecommuting on a regular basis and the vast majority (a combined 78 percent) stated that telecommuters are either equally or more productive than those who work in offices. When asked which type of flexible working arrangement they found most attractive, nearly half (46 percent) of respondents most preferred the option of working flexible hours.

Smart employers know that flexible working conditions can be an effective means to creating a productive workforce, says Futurestep execs. Often when employers offer the option of flexible hours and telecommuting, they help employees maintain balance in other parts of their lives which, in turn, fosters loyalty, satisfaction and retention.

The Trends@Work Quiz also examined whether sabbaticals or extended breaks have any effect on one’s career. More than half (a combined 64 percent) believe that they are either somewhat or extremely beneficial.

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CIOs Will Spend More on Channel, Less on Staff in 2007
Spending on internal IT staff remains the largest part of IT budgets, but CIOs expect to shift more resources from staff to consultants and integrators in 2007, according to the quarterly CIO User Survey released by Merrill Lynch.

CIOs expect to spend an average of 11 percent of their IT budget on external service providers in 2007, up from nine percent in the same survey one quarter prior, according to the survey. Conversely, CIOs spent 37 percent of their budget on staff in 2006, down from 42 percent in 2005.

Spending on internal IT staff, however, still remains the largest part of IT budgets, according to the report. Still, it has come down from 42 percent in 2005 to 37 percent in 2006.

Seventy-two percent reported allocating more for the channel in 2007, up from 46 percent in the third quarter of 2006 and 58 percent 12 months earlier, as spending on IT services represents an increasing part of overall IT budgets.

Offshore outsourcing is on the rise, but CIOs' top choices of vendors for projects included ACN and IBM as well as Indian vendors for these types of projects. Systems integration remained the top IT spending priority for CIOs, with consulting holding the second place.

CIOs indicated a substantial increase in the pricing for IT outsourcing in the report, up to 2.7 percent from 2.0 percent the previous quarter. A 2 percent increase in the allocation for offshore vendors was expected to increase to 2.8 percent, should pricing trends remain positive. In the previous four surveys, the allocation for offshore outsourcing had been only 1.1 percent.

Despite the fact that projects with an offshore component decreased from 44 percent to 36 percent between the Q3 and Q4 2006 reports, the report predicted that offshoring of IT service will continue to grow rapidly, noting that demand remains strong and expectations of cost savings are high.

Indian vendors such as Infosys and Satyam continue to stand to benefit the most from this expansion.

IT spending as a whole is expected to grow 4.2 percent in 2007, according to the report. IT spending finished 2006 up 3.4 percent, but slower than the increase of 4.4 percent in 2005. However CIOs at that time had expected growth of only 3 percent, the study notes, leaving the 3.4 percent final number more on-target.

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Profiles of Small Business to be Radically Different by 2017
The face of small business will dramatically change as seasoned baby boomers, kids fresh out of high school, mid-career women, "mompreneurs" and new immigrants come together to create the most diverse pool of entrepreneurs ever. Those are among the key findings of the Intuit Future of Small Business Report, a study that looks forward 10 years and examines the prospects, influences and profiles of small business.

The first installment of the study focuses on new entrepreneurs who break the mold, the coming proliferation of personal businesses and the emergence of entrepreneurship education.

The first installment concludes that the newest entrepreneurs will be far more diverse than their predecessors in age, origin and gender. By 2017, the white, middle-aged men who traditionally launch small businesses will be outnumbered by Generation Yers — those born after 1982. Among this and other age groups will be a large number of women, immigrants and "un-retiring" baby boomers opting for entrepreneurship as a second career.

The report identifies three major trends: the changing face of small business, the rise of personal business and the emergence of entrepreneurial education. Those trends led to five major findings:

• Entrepreneurs will no longer come predominantly from the middle of the age spectrum, but instead from the edges. People nearing retirement and their children just entering the job market will set the bar as the most entrepreneurial generation ever.

• American entrepreneurship will reflect a huge upswing in the number of women. The glass ceiling that has limited women’s growth in traditional corporate career paths will send a rich talent pool to the small business sector.

• Immigrant entrepreneurs will drive a new wave of globalization. U.S. immigration policy and the outcome of the current immigration debates will affect how this segment performs over the next decade.

• Contract workers, accidental and social entrepreneurs will fuel a proliferation of personal businesses. Economic, social and technological change — and an increased interest in flexible work schedules — will produce a more independent workforce seeking a better work-life balance.

• Entrepreneurship will be a widely adopted curriculum at educational, trade and vocational institutions. As a result, artists, musicians and others not traditionally exposed to business education will learn not just their trade but small-business management skills as well.

• Many baby boomers nearing retirement age will launch new businesses in far greater numbers than their counterparts from earlier generations. Their motivation: diminished job security, disappearing pensions and health benefits, and the need to match savings with longer life expectancies.

The line between small and large businesses will blur as more entrepreneurs form free-agent contracts with large companies as a natural response to the demise of lifetime employment. By 2017, free agents will thrive with less job security — they will have clients, not employers — but, in trade, will exert far more control over their time and working conditions.

For some professionals, entrepreneurship will complement a corporate career, but not replace it. The reason: Corporations and government agencies will see the entrepreneurial spirit as key to innovation and will train promising candidates accordingly. As a result, professionals will spend their careers alternating between two related worlds, sometimes running their own businesses in the free market and at other times running a virtual business within a larger organization. Experience in the former will help bolster the latter.

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Executives See Dramatic Rise in Competition for Talent
More than nine out of 10 North American business and HR executives surveyed in late 2006 say their companies are experiencing increased competition for talent — leading to higher compensation packages, slower time to new hires and reduced business flexibility. As a result, executives say they will increasingly look inward, to their existing workforces, to find and develop the competencies they need to address changing requirements in their markets.

These and other findings were part of a study that includes responses from 726 business executives and HR professionals. The research was conducted by SuccessFactors, a global provider of performance and talent management solutions, in cooperation with the Business Performance Management Forum and the Human Capital Institute.

The study shows that economic expansion and business growth are major contributors to the current human capital shortage, but so are more fundamental shifts in the economy, which are creating the need for new and different competencies at most companies. Eighty-eight percent of respondents say the critical competencies needed in their organization are changing, and nearly half say they are changing to a “high” or “very high” degree.

The survey also underscores the growing need for improved processes and systems for talent management and development, as well as the significant positive impacts that the implementation of performance and talent management solutions can make. Yet, it also demonstrates that a large percentage of companies don’t have adequate performance and talent management practices in place. For example, nearly three quarters of all respondents either strongly or very strongly agreed that talent management was a strategic priority within their company. However, only 57 percent said their companies have formal plans to identify, grow and retain talent.

Among other key study findings:

• 98 percent of respondents say competition for talent is increasing in their industry, and 65 percent say it’s increasing to a “high” or “very high” degree.

• Nearly 95 percent say the cost of acquiring and keeping talent rose in 2006, and two-thirds say costs increased more than slightly.

• The most profound impacts of growing competition are increases in the time it takes to find talent, and a growing requirement to develop internal talent.

• Talent development was indicated as the number one human capital management challenge of 2007, according to respondents, followed by retention and turnover, and talent acquisition.

• 55 percent note higher salaries were required in their organization in 2006. And 68 percent identified the need to implement internal talent development in their companies.

• Company growth is expected to be the leading driver for new talent acquisition in 2007, followed by evolving corporate cultures and changing market demands.

• Only about one quarter of respondents say their companies have formal talent scorecards, and only 29 percent say they know how to measure talent performance and productivity in terms of business value creation.

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Maintaining Common Corporate Culture a Chief Concern for Global Execs
Executives at the world’s largest companies say their chief concern as their businesses become more global is the ability to maintain a common corporate culture around the world, outweighing even geopolitical issues, according to results of a survey released by Accenture.

The annual survey of more than 900 C-suite executives in the United States, Italy, France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain, Canada, Japan and China is designed to identify the business priorities and major concerns of executives at some of the largest companies around the world.

When asked to identify the greatest challenges to building global enterprises, the greatest number of respondents — 49 percent — selected the “ability to maintain a common corporate culture,” followed by “understand local customs and ways of doing business,” selected by 44 percent of respondents. Forty-one percent of respondents selected the ability to “service remote clients/customers effectively” as a major challenge, and more than one-third of respondents (36 percent) selected “the impact of the global economy.” Only 25 percent of respondents selected “the impact of different geopolitical issues” as a major challenge.

In addition, nearly one out of four respondents (22 percent) said that their organizations are poorly equipped to succeed as global enterprises, despite the fact that the majority of respondents said that their employees, suppliers and customers are more global now than they were five years ago. This issue is particularly noteworthy in two countries, as one-third of respondents in Japan and almost half (48 percent) of respondents in China said they believe that their organizations might face difficulties adapting to the global market.

Only 55 percent of the executives surveyed said they believe their organizations are able to develop leaders with the aptitude and skills to adapt to rapid change and new learning. There are significant geographic differences: two-thirds (67 percent) of respondents in Germany said they believe that their organizations are developing global leaders, compared with less than half (45 percent) of respondents in Japan.

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White Paper: The Role of Web-Based Self-Service in the Support Organization

Today, as enterprise knowledge and content management takes on greater importance, self-service technologies are allowing users to search disparate, dynamic data sources using such sophisticated search mechanisms as natural language processing, precision optimization and adaptive learning. Not only are users exploiting Web-based channels to find answers to questions, diagnose problems and download fixes, but to perform such transactional duties as product registration, email opt-ins, user profile enhancements, service agreement updates and more. (please note – you will need your member log-in to view this white paper)

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The Immigrant Technologist
Immigrants account for almost half of Ph.D.-level scientists and engineers in the U.S., and are prime drivers of technology development. Increasingly, however, Chinese technologists and entrepreneurs are returning home rather than staying in the U.S. to pursue opportunities. In this Q&A, Professor William Kerr discusses the phenomena of technology transfer and implications for U.S.-based businesses and policymakers.
Full Article...

Key Drivers Of Employee Engagement In Manufacturing Organizations
Today's business landscape has presented new and challenging demands for manufacturing organizations. Customer requirements for lower prices, higher quality and greater value are unprecedented and unyielding. Many companies look for quick fixes in the form of plant consolidations, expensive redesigns of operations, or relocations of their operations overseas. As most manufacturers continue to seek fractional reductions in cost, one of the most important drivers of improved business performance and profit margin is all but ignored — the ongoing development of skills and effectiveness for all employees.
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Workforce Planning Without the Guesswork
In cities and counties nationwide, officials’ interest in learning management systems and e-learning has been growing for several reasons, workforce experts say. Much like their private-sector and federal counterparts, state and local officials must try to reduce their training costs and still train a large workforce in a timely and efficient manner.
Full Article...

The Boss and You: A Survival Guide
Whether you're a CEO accountable to a board of directors, a CIO under the lock and key of your CFO or a newbie service-tech reporting to an IT manager, you've got to form a healthy bond with the boss if you desire some control over your career. That means understanding your manager's expectations of you (even if he's not clear on them), managing said expectations, communicating effectively with him and even finding ways to cope with his quirky ticks that drive you mad.
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What Have You Done for You Lately?
It’s a new year — often the time when we see lots of articles on resolutions. This article will not be a list of resolutions that all tech managers should make. Rather, it’s designed to get you to take some time to get you to stop and think about the last thing that is usually on your mind—yourself. As a technology manager, it is easy to get caught up in the swirl of issues that define your job: the budget, weighing the pros and cons of new technology choices, your employees, your department, your parent organization, your boss, your customers, upcoming projects, etc. However, you need to think about your well-being — because no one else is.
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As customers, we have been served by people who quit but never left. As employees, we have been managed by bosses who quit, but managed to stay. As managers, we have managed people who physically attend, but mentally pretend. We call them disengaged workers —a deadly virus that’s spreading throughout businesses worldwide. Disengagement statistics are telling, but they don’t convey the entire story. You must look at the human issues behind the numbers. That’s why much of I Quit, But Forgot To Tell You is premised on real-life experiences.

State of IT Outsourcing Report Released
In September 2006, Supportindustry.com and McGarahan & Associates conducted a survey on the state of IT Outsourcing. Impressively, 93.30% of respondents said they would outsource again and 94.10% said they would recommend outsourcing. However, although you can easily save money outsourcing, if your customers are not being serviced and it starts to affect productivity and have business impact – then the cost savings is not what it appears to be on paper.

Get your free copy of the executive summary here...

Research: 2006 Service and Support Metrics
The valuable research provides insight into a range of issues and challenges important to service and support executives, including the channels organizations are leveraging to deliver support, the technologies they’re deploying to improve service delivery, the metrics they’ve established to measure their performance, and the salaries they’re paying their help desk staff, contact center agents and higher-level support executives. Click here to get your free copy!

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