Process Improvement or Enhancements

PIE/PEP – whatever you want to call it, process improvements or enhancements has the potential to disrupt normal workflows and really upset your staff and possibly customers or vendors.

Process enhancements will bring change in the organization, as such it is important to look at the change carefully and perform the necessary analysis before implementing the change.

When you decide to undertake any process change you need to examine the need for this change, what is the imputes for the change?

All changes in any size of organization has risk – you need to weigh the risks to decide whether the change will benefit the organization.

Lets put together a scenario in a fictitious consumer electronics business that sells its products through retail outlets which in turn sells those products to the  consumer – you and I.

This company ABCD Consumer Electronics (ABCDCE) sends out hundreds of packages per day, they also receive dozens of packages from the merchants they supply.  These are either RMAs or defective products being returned.

Facts:

ABCDCE charges merchants to ship product to them.

ABCDCE does not charge merchants for returned merchandise, either RMA or defective.  They issue a CALL TAG to have the items picked up at their cost.

ABCDCE expedites ALL defective items back to the merchant using overnight service once the item is repaired.  This cost is not charged back to the merchant, though is mentioned in the contracts that the merchant signs with ABCDCE.  The merchants have come to expect this service.

ABCDCE has been doing business this way for 5 years, however in the recent downturn has started to look at processes in all departments – from Accounting to Sales, to Customer Service and in Shipping and Receiving.

As part of this process review, the company management has also decided to review expenses related to the core business to see if other contracts for services can be renegotiated.

After having reviewed their manufacturing processes, it’s determined that the rate of returns of defective merchandise is will within and in fact is below estimated rates – so no changes are needed with respect to manufacturing.

The management decides, upon review of sales contracts and discussion with the RMA department that they need to start charging merchants for shipping costs of items being sent back to them.  The contract specifies that ABCDCE will ship items to the merchant upon completion of repair using ground shipping.  However for years it’s been done via overnight.  This added 30% to the cost of repairs.

The decision has been made.  What are the risks?

In part two of this post, we’ll go into just a few of the risks and the process change that needs to be put in place in order to minimize the impact to internal teams (remember, this change will impact more than the RMA department if ABCDCE wants to recover the shipping costs from the merchants they serve).

How To Minimize Productivity Failures

In my last post, a few weeks ago I spoke about Increase Your Productivity In 2010.  When anyone mentions ways to increase productivity, most people jump up and show their PDA/iPhone/smartphone or whatever method they use to plan their days, meetings, keep in touch with the office etc.,  But beyond these basic tools, there are other measures to increase productivity that are sitting under your nose.

Managing a call center, you quickly learn what these productivity enhancers are — and if you haven’t figured it out yourself, then most certainly your staff will tell you (very LOUDLY).

There are some simple enhancements that you can make you your users workstations, depending on their function and what they need.  Other enhancements are as simple as ensuring that they keyboards work, the mouse works and they can start their computer up in the morning without waiting for 30 minutes.

Quick Fix #1

Function keys on the keyboard don’t work.

Most managers will roll their eyes at this, and chalk it up to yet another complaint – but until your function keys DON’T work you will never know how important they are.  Much of what I do involves accessing multiple websites (internally hosted, of course) so access to the F5 key (refresh) and F6 key are crucial.  When my keyboard stopped (well the function keys stopped working) it means that I now need to use my mouse or hit tab a gazillion times to perform the same function.

So you might be thinking to yourself – it’s only a few extra seconds – but could those seconds up and it could end up to be15-30 minutes per day in lost time.

If you’ve got an IT support team - make sure you use them to fix these types of minor irritants.

Quick Fix #2

Multiple monitors.

Who doesn’t want multiple monitors – but most IT departments won’t spend the money on them.  They also won’t support multiple monitors for one or two people, because soon everyone will want one because its essential to their jobs.

Sorry but that argument does not hold water.

As a manager, if you can make a solid business case for your staff to have multiple monitors and you can make the case for an increase in productivity via smoother workflows then what’s holding you back.  Though an expense, depending on how many systems your agents need access to, and how many applications they keep running at anyone time on the dekstop a second monitor might be an expense that will pay off in smoother workflows for your staff.

Quick Fix #3

Equipment that WORKS.

Whether this is printers, faxes or simple stuff like mice and keyboard – make sure equipment works.  If not, replace it FAST.  We’ve come to depend on the mouse, and when it doesn’t work – it puts people into a state of disarray.  I “grew up” in the DOS days and when I had to switch to a mouse, it was terrible!  I hated it.  But like everything else, I got used to it and now can’t imagine how I’d manouver applications like Microsoft Office, or the browser any other way!

Mice and keyboards are cheap.  Keep a few on hand, and everyone is happy should one cease to function.

You may even want to consider wireless mice and keyboard for key individuals on your team.

Quick Fix #4

The minor details – foot stools, good chairs and as ergonomic workarea as you can reasonably accomodate.

Some of these items may seem odd - like a foot stool; after all your staff is there to work – not sit and relax.  But simple additions like these to those individuals that needs them results in increased productivity from those individuals.  Something simple like a $20 – $40 foot stool may save a $200+ purchase in an ergonimic chair for someone.

Do you have any productivity failures in your work area?  What are they?  Share them with us, along with your solution!

Increase Your Productivity In 2010

Who doesn’t want to get more done all the time?  And for those of us who are workaholics, who tend to put in 10-15 hour days we might just be doing more harm than good.

Over the last few years, there has been research done into multitasking – alot of which led to the conclusion that we are not adept at multitasking and by doing so, we actually slow ourselves down rather than get multiple things done.

I think mom had it right, when she told us to do one thing at a time.

So how can you get more done?  How can you increase your productivity?  All it takes is a few simple steps…

First and foremost minimize distractions.  You know what they are, the cell phone/BlackBerry or other smart phone.  That is a BIG distraction.  Learn to manage your distractions.  If you manage people, you can’t keep your door closed and have an open door policy.  When your staff come to you, it’s because they’re need guidance and you can’t turn them away.  But you can learn to manage your distractions.  Lets take meetings – schedule them early in the morning, or late in the afternoon – but not in the middle of the day.  They will eat up valuable time – by scheduling them earlier or later your focus will remain on the meeting not on the number of e-mail messages waiting, or phone calls pending.  Try and do the same with e-mail – check e-mail on a set schedule; checking every 5-minutes is only a distraction that takes away from other important work.

Organize your workspace.  Is your desk cluttered with paper and important pending items?  Well if you’ve not gotten to those important pending items for several weeks then they probably were not that important.  File them away, and if you use Outlook or another “all-in-one” type application – set reminders for yourself to get specific tasks done.  You eliminate the clutter on your desk and still have reminders to get things done.  All that paper – get rid of it.  Use file folders to organize what’s on your desk.  Keep only the “tools of the trade” close and accessible.  Yes, the coffee mug can stay.

Take a break – work less – work smarter, not harder.  These all go together.  If you’re well rested, you’re better prepared to take on the challenges you have for the day/week/month/year – if you contstantly work 15 hour days, take no time off to rest, no vacation you harm yourself.  In the short-term you may get a lot of work done – but in the long-term you jepordize how well you get that work done.  You may force yourself, but in the end your body will give up and you’ll be in the red instead.  Taking breaks is also a must.  You should get up from your desk every 30-60 minutes and get the blood flowing!  Take a short walk and grab a tea/coffee/water – or just take a short walk, say “Hi” to your team.  As a manager, you’re faced with pressure everyday.  You are expected to perform well above what others in your department are doing, and the only way you will be able to sustain that performance is by taking breaks.  Remember to take your vacation – it’s provided for a reason.  Yes, there is never a good time to go – but you know what, it will never be a good time.  That’s why you need to groom your team and senior members of the team to take on tasks that you perhaps perform that can be handed off, that pose a low risk to the company.

Stressed out?  Don’t be!  In order to be effective, you need to reduce your stress.  Stress will not allow you to think clearly, it may cloud your judgement and it will prohibit you from doing good work.  It can be difficult to overcome stress, but one of the best ways: exercise.  There is an exellent story on ABC News about stress “Reduce Stress, Extend Your Life“.

If you’re looking to become more productive in 2010 – a few simple changes will ensure you can.

PrePaid Cards – Gift Cards / Debit Cards / Visa & MasterCards

I recently came across an excellent site called Payments News (http://www.paymentsnews.com) that discusses of all things – prepaid cards.  I find this very interesting since that is the industry that I’m currently working in and am really enjoying.

There were a few great articles listed that are well worth the read:

First up is this article – http://www.paymentsnews.com/2009/10/2009-gift-card-trend-report-from-archstone-consulting.html - that goes into the 2009 Gift Card Trend and surprisingly the concensus seems to be a flat to modest 5% growth this year in the gift card market.  Well worth the read.

Next was an article that was quoted on the site but appeared in The New York Times, Your Money – http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/06/your-money/06prepay.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all.  This article goes into several aspects of the pre-paid industry but is geared specifically towards reloadable cards.  Will reloadable cards go away simply because of fees? No – here is a quote from the article:

In 2008, for instance, customers loaded about $8.7 billion onto prepaid cards, a 125 percent increase over the previous year, according to the Mercator Advisory Group. The industry is expected to balloon to $119 billion by 2012, Mercator predicts.

If anything the industry is expected to boom in the coming years but with several regulations in the US on the table (CARD Act comes to mind) there will be greater oversight over what card issuers can and cannot do.

What Is The Unified Desktop

Within the contact center world, there is a lot of talk/discussion and numerous white papers on the unified desktop.

But what exactly is the unified desktop?  Is it just a grouping of programs that can be easily accessed?  Is there more to the unified desktop?

Lets start by providing an example of what unified desktop is by making an analogy to something we use everyday – the (lowly) cell phone.

In the old days, you had a cell phone.  It kept basic information, but you also had your desktop PC or notebook that held your contact list and other information that would be pretty useful if you were someone that was always on the road and travelling.

Maybe you had a PDA (personal digital assistant).  They were the rage, weren’t they?

You needed something – you started up your laptop and retrieved the information.

What a pain.

In comes the first of the smartphones – the BlackBerry.  Now you could get your corporate e-mail routed to your BB, you could even carry your documents with you.  Unified communications.

Out comes the Apple iPhone and now not only can you get your e-mail, but you could VPN into the corporate network and work as-if you’re in front of your PC.  Unified communications.

The unified desktop is very similar.  The unified desktop takes all your applications and converges – or integrates – them into one “super application”.  Think about it like this, depending on the industry you are in your customer service agents may need access to 5 or 10 application in order to fulfill certain requirements.  You could have the following:

• Accounting applications (billing and accounts receivable)
• Order placement
• CRM (Client Relationship Management) tools
• Inventory
• E-mail
• IM
• Softphone
• Knowlegebase

Though this presents a high-level overview, it is entirely possible that each item above is composed of one or more applications.

Trying to train and then have your agents navigate through dozens of applications is not an easy task.  You will build process upon process to handle simple enquiries – your agents may spend more time learning the process than mastering the tasks that are required to fulfill the job requirements.

The unified desktop integrates everything into one application, so that a look-up or change in one automatically makes updates in related applications.  It simplifies logins as well, the user doesn’t need to remember a dozen passwords but only one.  If they forget one, IT can reset one password.  If they forget 3 passwords, IT is working with multiple applications and resetting passwords.  Mulitply that by the number of customer service agents you have in your group.

There is a very good article on Contact Professionals’ website – http://www.contactprofessional.com/issues/article.asp?ID=375 that will give you more information about the unified desktop as it relates to the contact center.

So why would anyone want to spend the money on a unified desktop for their contact center?  Simple…

• Improves first call resolution
• Improved customer experience – they are not constantly on hold, or transferred from one department to another
• Improved agent satisfaction – agents don’t need to struggle to learn multiple applications or memorize dozens of logins
• Reduce call handling times – everything is in one place, you don’t need to keep 20 windows open on your desktop
• Reduced training costs – focus on building product knowledge, not application knowledge; spend less on building detailed and intricate processes to handle every issue the arises
• Reduce agent churn – a happy agent will stay with your organization; this will reduce costs overall with hiring and training new staff

The key in any contact center is to reduce costs.  It’s not always efficient to reduce staff as there will always be a need to retain staff to a certain level – so you need to look for operational efficiencies by looking at those items that are within your control that you can make changes to.

I would love to hear your take on the unified desktop, whether you use it in your organization and what types of results you’ve had with a unified desktop.

Everyone Has Accomplishments

From time-to-time I help friends and friends-of-friends with their resumes, or job search efforts.  When I initially take a look at their resumes, they are very boring.  There is nothing there to excite me about them.

So I start asking the individual questions about their current job, what their dream job looks like and about their accomplishments.

That’s the trigger word: accomplishments.

When I ask this, most just look at me.  Then they say “well, I didn’t accomplish anything.  I’m just a programmer” or whatever their job is.

But this is where you are wrong.  You probably HAVE accomplished something.  Perhaps you coded some new procedures/functions/scripts that enhanced an application?  Maybe you helped design part of an application?  Maybe you even streamlined code that allowed the application to work faster/better/with less errors.

These are ALL accomplishments even if they were part of the job.

For example – as Director of Customer Support and Operations it’s my job to ensure that we meet service level agreements – the fact that I meet them is an accomplishment eventhough it is part of what I have to do.

It’s called “tooting your own horn” and friends, when you’re looking for a new job or the first job you do toot as much as you can BUT remember that you need to toot in such a way that you also show the value you will add to the prospective employer.

Now there are individuals out there that may not get the opportunity to make changes in their workplace, in some companies processes are so tight that you cannot make changes for various reasons – legal, regulatory etc., but there are always ways to streamline what you do — that is an accomplishment.

Let me give you another example.  One of my CS Agents prints out any memo that I send out and puts them into a binder.  He then builds his own “process” to handle those specific events.  He’s developed his own processes to handle those issues – that is an accomplishment.  He can bank that on his resume.

He can safely put on a resume “developed my own processes to deal with customer service issues” and in an interview expand upon that.

Regardless of the position you are in, you have the opportunity to enhance your work by looking at what you do and seeing if there are ways to improve upon it.  If you have spare time after having completed a project, look at it again and see if there is any way to optimize it.  Maybe there isn’t a way — but isn’t it better than just sitting around?

Be proactive in your career and you will find hidden gems that have the potential to propel you forward.

Checklist For Developing A Training Program

Whether you are considering a continuous program or a one-shot course, the questions should stimulate your thinking. Many of them involve alternatives that you need to resolve in setting up the program.

Use this checklist as a guide. The experience of other companies in training can provide additional guides. However, in thinking about a training program for your company, consider each question and answer with a “yes” or “no” in light of the training needs of your particular situation.

This is Part 1 of a multi-part series of posts on Developing a Training Program.

What Is the Goal of Training?

The questions in this section are designed to help the owner-manager define the objective or goal to be achieved by a training program. Whether the objective is to conduct initial training, to provide for upgrading employees, or to retrain for changing job assignments, the goal should be spelled out before developing the plan for the training program.

• Do you want to improve the performance of your employees?
• Will you improve your employees by training them to perform their present tasks better?
• Do you need to prepare employees for newly developed or modified jobs?
• Is training needed to prepare employees for promotion?
• Is the goal to reduce accidents and increase safety practices?
• Should the goal be to improve employee attitudes especially about waste and spoilage practices?
• Do you need to improve the handling of materials in order to break production bottlenecks?
• Is the goal to orient new employees to their jobs?
• Will you need to teach new employees about overall operations?
• Do you need to train employees so they can help teach new workers in an expansion program?

What Does the Employee Need to Learn?

Once the objective or goal of the program is set, you will need to determine the subject matter. The following questions are designed to help you decide what the employee needs in terms of duties, responsibilities, and attitudes.

• Can the job be broken down into steps for training purposes?
• Are there standards of quality which trainees can be taught?
• Are there certain skills and techniques which trainees must learn?
• Are there hazards and safety practices which must be taught?
• Have you established the methods that employees must use to avoid or minimize waste and spoilage?
• Are there material handling techniques that must be taught?
• Have you determined the best way for the trainees to operate the equipment?
• Are there performance standards that employees must meet?
• Are there attitudes that need improvement or modifications?
• Will information on your products help employees to do a better job?
• Should the training include information about the location and use of tool cribs and so on?
• Will the employee need instruction about departments other than his or her own?

Additional topics which will be covered in subsequent posts will be:

What Type of Training?

What Method of Instruction?

What Audio Visual Aids Will You Use?

What Physical Facilities Will You Need?

What About Timing?

Who Will Be Selected as Instructor?

Who Should Be Selected?

What Will the Program Cost?

What Checks or Controls Will You Use?

How Should the Program Be Publicized?

In addition to providing a simple checklist that you can follow, we will drill into each of the topics to provide more valuable information.

Over time, each of these topics will be linked and we will feature the primary post on the right sidebar menu for easy access to this valuable information.

You are welcome to share your experiences on this topic by leaving a comment or if you wish, we would happily accept you as a guest poster to the blog – either way, just leave us a comment and we will be in touch!

Increase Your Personal Productivity With A NetBook

It’s no secret to friends and co-workers that I’m a gadget freak.  I find that technology helps me stay organized and keeps me  in-touch with what’s happening around me.  You can use technology to work more effectively.

A couple of gadgets that I feel are well worth the money are the iPod Touch (or the iPhone) and the netbook.

First the netbook.

Typical netbooks will have a screen around 10″ in size and are very portable – in fact, it makes the traditional laptop look and feel like a desktop!  I purchased a couple of netbooks over the last two years and use both to the max.

I most recently purchased two different HP netbooks:

Both are great netbooks, the differences between the two:

The 110-1030C comes with Windows XP, has 1gb memory whereas the 2140 comes with Windows Vista Operating System and has 2gb memory.  You could upgrade the 1030C for about $50.00 and add an additional 1gb memory.  Running Windows XP 1gb should be enough, but it’s always nice to have more.

Other than that and some technical specs, they are almost identical.  The displays are very clean, and bright and I’ve been able to get anywhere from 6-8 hours of use out of the battery depending on how I use it. 

The one drawback with netbooks in general is that they do not come with a CD/DVD drive.  So you need an external one, here is the one that I purchased:

I am really happy with the Sony DVD – it is slim and can fit into the same sleeve that I purchased for the netbooks.

I opted for a slightly more expensive, slim drive – why would you want to lug around a HUGE CD/DVD?  The slim drive is also USB powered so feeds off of the netbook (this is where you may draw more power if running on battery alone).

Although netbooks are only intended for surfing the web and light applications, I’ve really maxed both netbooks out and run full versions of Microsoft Office Professional on them in addition to several other CPU intensive software packages in addition to an older version of JASC Paint Shop Pro (now owned by Corel and re-packaged as a Corel product).

Running graphics intensive applications does suck power and pushes the netbook to its maximum potential but to now I’ve not run into any significant issues.

The 160gb drive is ample, but I have also purchased a new external hard drive plus I have an older external hard drive from an old laptop that I took apart to make a digital picture frame (here is part 2 of the same post – digital picture frame).

Whatever you decide to purchase, ultimately you want something that helps you become more productive.  I truly find that I can get caught up on personal work with my netbook – I can take it anywhere and combined with internet access I am truly mobile.

Designing A Training Program

Designing a well thought out training program either for supervisors in your team (such as team leads or coordinators) or for your team members can be a challenging task.

Training programs come in all shapes and sizes, there are companies out there that do sell pre-developed “white label” training programs that allow you to take from a base of solid content and customize it to your organizations needs.

As well many large organizations may already have well developed training departments that can help alleviate the challenges associated with the manager in developing their own content.

Regardless of the method you choose, putting together something that will teach and entertain is not easy.

When I develop any type of training for my team, I opt for lots of pictures and explanations so that my agents fully understand the product any limitations (such as support related inquries) along with all the benefits of the product.  I will ensure that they know which of our merchants sell the product, and the denominations it is available in plus any special terms and conditions associated with the product.

Most training that I’ve put together is only a few sheets and is generally sent via e-mail to the team and stored in a central repository or knowledge base that everyone has access to.  Depending on the type of training, we may also include it in our customer service manual.

When you are going to develop your own training material, you need to ask yourself some very basic questions:

• What is the goal of the training?
• At what level does the training need to be delivered?
• Will the training be delivered in a classroom setting, or through an informal e-mail to the team?
• Are images and detailed explanations required?
• What type of formatting?
• What should be included in the content?

These are only a few questions to consider – they all will play a role in the final product.

Regardless of the type of training you are going to provide, you need to ensure that it will fulfill an existing need – in most cases the needs come as you find issues with current processes.  Another method to identify training needs is by using a GAP ANALYSIS.

What is a Gap Analysis?

Just as it sounds – what the gaps in your existing processes?  For example, lets look at a Human Resource documentation GAP ANALYSIS.

You’ve been told that in order for your Human Resources employee files to be considered complete, each employee file requires certain information:

• Social Insurance Number
• Emergency contact information
• Hire letter
• Employee evaluations and review copies
• Company documentation such as confidentiality agreements

Of course there could be much more.

You’ve now got a baseline of what must be in the files.  Working with your HR department you review a certain number of files and find that you are deficient in certain items.  You’ve now identified the GAP and have just gone through a gap analysis.

The next step is to close that gap.  How will you do it?  If you know that you don’t have a hire letter for everyone, or evaluations then you need to methodically go through and ensure that the missing information is completed and put into that employees file.

I am over simplyfying the process – but essentially that is what it is.

You take the same view when developing training materials for your organization or department.

What does the process currently say you have to do.  For each of the steps in that process, do you need training?  If so, do you have some form of training — remember it doesn’t need to be fancy, even a single paragraph or sheet of paper could be the extent of the training needed.  If you don’t have the training, determine what is required and then from there you would begin the development of your training program.

I realize that this post just touches on the topic of developing a training program.  Over the next while I will go into more detail into this topic.

Moving

We are in the process of moving to a new host, that offers some better options for us and the network of sites that we run.

Interested in a great host (we’ve use them in the past) that has some fantastic plans?  Simply visit my Online Internet Business | Internet Marketing related blog and look at the SPONSORS and click on the HostGator advertisement button.

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A few facts about HostGator:

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