Contact Center Strategy 2013 event brings in call center professionals from around the state

EDINA, Minn. - April 4, 2013 - PRLog -- Bloomington, Minnesota—April 3, 2013

Over 70 managers and business owners filled a conference room in Bloomington on March 21 to listen to call center experts, participate in discussions, and share expertise in the first Contact Center Strategy 2013 event to be held in Minnesota.

Recognized experts in call center strategy
The all-day conference featured well-known speakers in the industry:

·         Dayne Petersen, Lead Instructor and Consultant for Benchmark Portal, & Principal and Consultant for Call Center Solutions. Petersen has 30 years of experience as an expert and consultant for national and international call center businesses.

·         Eric Berg, Director of Doherty Customer Contact Solutions. Berg has over 20 years of experience in developing management and staffing strategies for contact centers, and is a regular contributor to Contact Center Pipeline magazine.  

·         Doug Splinter, Chief Technology Strategist at Avtex Solutions. Splinter is an in-demand public speaker on call center technology, technological strategy, and overall solution architecture.

Event exceeded expectations
The invitation-only crowd filled the room, and exceeded the expectations of organizers and co-sponsors. Organizer and co-sponsor Eric Berg said, “We knew that there are many, many call centers in the state, both independent and internal, but we weren’t sure what to expect for participation in a local conference. We were very excited to see the high level of enthusiasm. Contact centers have specific challenges and opportunities, and typical business conferences don’t address these. We are definitely soliciting feedback to find out what was valuable to the audience, with an eye toward an even bigger and better Contact Center Strategy conference in 2014.”

Doug Splinter of Avtex, which also co-sponsored the event, said, “This was a good way to get people to come together and talk to each other and to engage with their peers. Contact centers are a repository of so much knowledge, information and business intelligence—I think this is a great opportunity to share what we know with each other.”

Seminars on trending topics in the call center industry
The day began with breakfast and introductions at the recently renovated Double Tree by Hilton Hotel Bloomington. The seminar agenda kicked off at 9:00 a.m. and continued until 4:00 p.m., with a break for lunch. Topics covered by the speakers included:

1.     Communicating Mission, Vision & Strategy, presented by Dayne Petersen. Petersen explained the need for all organizations to identify their mission, vision, and long-term strategy. She presented research showing that contact center perform best when management recognizes the importance of aligning its goals with all the other strategic goals of the company.

2.     Agent Retention Strategies, presented by Eric Berg. Berg presented a case study on the continual problem of attrition in call centers, and offered actionable solutions to reduce turnover through improved hiring processes, specific onboarding techniques, and cultural changes.

3.     Managing a Multi-Generational Contact Center, presented by Dayne Petersen. Petersen introduced the participants to new research about the employment characteristics of Boomers, Gen X, Gen Y, and Millennials, and how to best manage the 4 groups in call center environments.

4.     Contact Center Mixed Media Strategies, presented by Doug Splinter. Splinter examined the technological and cultural issues that can impede communication between the call center and IT, and the call center and upper management. Splinter recommended specific communication solutions to directly and positively impact business intelligence for all departments.

5.     At-Home-Agent Strategies, presented by Dayne Petersen. At-home jobs are expected to increase anywhere from 10-50% in 2013. While companies like the reduced overhead and increased productivity associated with at-home agents, Petersen shared some screening and management tips to ensure good outcomes with the new workforce model.

6.     Caller Satisfaction and the New Metric, Customer Effort, presented by Dayne Petersen. Petersen explained an important new metric emerging in the call center industry. Customer Effort measures how many hoops a customer must jump through in order to achieve their objective; it is important to ensure that new processes and technologies do not become roadblocks to customer satisfaction.

Presentations from Contact Center Strategy 2013 are available for viewing and downloading on the Doherty website at www.dohertystaffing.com/contact-center-resources.

Contact Center Strategy 2014
Planning is underway for the 2nd annual Contact Center Strategy. If you have questions, comments, or suggestions for next year’s event, please forward them to Eric Berg, eberg@dohertycontact.com.

About Doherty Customer Contact Solutions
Doherty Customer Contact Solutions has served call centers for over 30 years, providing staffing services, call center consulting, and outsourced support to a variety of industries. Visit us at www.dohertycontact.com. We are a division of Doherty, one of the Midwest's largest and most experienced providers of contract and temporary staffing services. Headquartered in Minneapolis for more than 30 years, Doherty offers customized workforce solutions to companies doing business in the Midwest and across the nation. Doherty is Minnesota’s largest staffing firm, Minnesota’s 2nd largest woman-owned business, and the nation’s 10th largest diversity staffing firm. Learn more about our temporary, temp-to-hire, direct hire, onsite staffing management, and placement services at www.dohertystaffing.com.  

About Avtex
Avtex is a leading technology provider to the contact center industry. Our mission is to use our technology know-how to enable our clients to deliver an exceptional experience to their customers. We focus on optimizing our clients' interactions with their customers, employees, partners and prospects through the use of communication and collaboration technologies. Founded in 1955, the Avtex team is focused on research and development and building solutions that ultimately benefit our customers. Learn more at www.avtex.com.