A major health insurance company serving nearly 50 million members with over 24,000 providers and annual revenues of over $2 billion. 400 CSRs in two locations linked as a virtual center. Company regularly ranks among best in class in customer service and employee satisfaction

Advice sought by management on right number and sizing of call centers. Need to increase scheduling efficiency without negatively affecting agent morale. Required independent assessment of overall call center performance.

• Two person project team led a six week assessment of the two call center locations
• Analyzed call center data and metrics
• Conducted interviews of key personnel from senior management to frontline employees to gain perspective on current operations
• Assessed technology, quality program, organizational structure, and processes for scheduling and performance assessment
• Observed agents handling voice and email contacts, and observed supervisors and managers in action

• Changing Organization Structure
• Revising Quality Program and Coordinating Quality Process between Supervisors and Monitors
• Redesigning and Replacing Call Center Technology to Better Support Call Routing and Improve Disaster Recovery Capabilities
• Redesigning Performance Measures and Integrating into Schedule Bid Process
• Redesigning Performance Reporting System to Reduce Technology Risk

One of the largest divisions of a major cable operator (serving over 540,000 subscribers). Division is a collection of geographically discontinuous systems distributed across a single state

14 autonomous call centers without shared processes or procedures. The current operation led to poor customer service as evidenced by the low sales rates, high error rates, poor service levels, and high abandonment rates.

• Two person project team led an eight week assessment of the division’s customer care operations
• Analyzed call center data across the division
• Conducted interviews of key personnel from senior management to frontline employees to gain perspective on current operations
• Performed ride-alongs with field technicians, participated in side by sides with call center agents, and observed supervisors and managers in action
• Reviewed and analyzed best practices across other divisions within the company

• Standardize Call Center and Field Operations
• Centralize Call Center Operations
• Build Customer Care support team
• Organizational Restructuring
• Technology Enhancements

A worldwide provider of industrial gases. The company supplies atmospheric, process and specialty gases, high-performance coatings, and related services and technologies to a wide diversity of customers.

• Call Center IVR underutilized and the customer needed a capabilities assessment of the new corporate IVR system to realize ROI on this capital investment
• Most process tasks were manual and the current Call Center system did not have automated event management capabilities
• Several non-integrated technologies and data sources were involved in the Call Center processes
• There were multiple and disparate channels of communications between the Call Center Agents, Customers, Drivers and Sales & Service account teams.

• Develop CRM Repository Requirements
• Conduct IVR Technology Stack Validation against Call Center “To Be” requirements
• Design 4 BPM “To Be” Call Flows utilizing BPM best practices
• • Develop repository Vendor Selection Criteria for CRM/Repository
• Design Technology Stack Diagram “To Be” aligned with corporate technology roadmap
• Identify gaps between “As Is” and “To Be” states
• Provide Findings/Recommendations/Industry Best Practices for future improvement phases

• Identified non-value add Call Center process tasks and recommended improvements
• Identified process tasks to be automated
• Provided CRM/Repository Vendor selection criteria
• Leveraged existing corporate systems and data for recommended improvements
• Identified technology and process changes to monitor for business events and initiate real-time corrective actions

A large not-for-profit organization operating globally to raise funds for services to support mothers and children in 30 countries. Organization has seen multi-year growth at rates over 20%/year and is now expecting this growth rate to accelerate.

• Support relationship management and account management needs for US organization supporting four major product groups and 8 major customer segments
• Meet needs for solutions in contact center, marketing automation ,campaign management, business intelligence and reporting
• Define conversion strategy from multiple current platforms
• Comply with strategic technology architecture standards and directions established by IT group

• Interview executive leadership at C-level, VPs, Directors – across Marketing, Product Management, Strategic Planning, and Information Technology
• Review and advise on IT initiatives for contact center technology selection, taxonomy development, and information architecture development
• Develop draft strategic plan and review with various stakeholders
• Revise, develop technology roadmap, timeline, business case, and initial project descriptions for action in next fiscal year

• Increase market penetration, customer lifetime value, while reducing TCO and organizational inefficiency
• Support continued long-term growth

A large cable MSO with five call centers with over 1200 agents with no CRM solution. Over 15 fragmented,out-of-date, and inadequate KBMS. No standard content management tools or processes

• Increase sales and First Call Resolution rates
• Reduce AHT, error rates, agent training time
• Develop common systems to be leveraged by call centers across divisions
• Develop process for managing business knowledge
• Go live in six months or less!

• Identified vision and key requirements, developed project budget and assisted in presenting business case to executives
• Worked with corporate IT to develop requirements and designs for CRM and KBMS
• Facilitated rapid business review of requirements ,designs, content management process
• Developed and led user test and agent training for pilot implementation
• Provided post-implementation support to business users.

• Avoided $2 million dollar re-licensing cost for one acquired KBMS
• Met goals for pilot implementation in six months – on time and on budget!
• Positioned business and IT to roll out systems to all centers and agents – completed within two months after pilot!
• Provided conversion strategy for prior KBMS

A major provider of financial services to students and education lenders. The company was operating 4 isolated call centers throughout the country. Growth through acquisition had created a customer service technology environment that was fragmented, outdated, and forced inefficient use of resources.

• All contact centers could work together as one
• Technology was scalable
• Technology could support not only the call center but non-call center employees and executives

• Working with client executives, the project team defined a vision for customer service and developed high-level technology requirements that support the vision
• The project team presented the business case to the Board and gained approval
• The team developed RFPs, facilitated vendor presentations, and negotiated contracts
• The team was also engaged to work with the vendor to implement and gain acceptance of the new solution

• In 5 months, the project went from initial discussion of vision to Board request for funding to receiving live calls in the first call center
• Second site was live and operational only 4 weeks after first site
• As result of having clearly defined vision and technology plan client was able to roll-out new solution to the remainder of the organization – over 2,000 employees, a total of 800 call center agents , adding WFM, predictive dialing, and QA monitoring- quickly, using internal staff, at significant savings (ROI to client from consultant services estimated at over 600%)
• Substantially increased customer satisfaction, improved calls/account ratio, and reduced cost of service/account by using improved management information capabilities

The 450 agent call center supported multiple markets for a cable operator. Call center performance was dropping rapidly. Agent and management morale was low and turnover was climbing rapidly. Customer complaints and call volumes were rising. Management was searching for a Vice President of Customer Care to fill this key leadership role following the departure of the previous Vice President.

• Address critical performance problems
• Rebuild agent and management trust and morale
• Provide day-to-day leadership while new Customer Care executive was hired.
• Support new executive in transition to leadership.

• Assumed role of interim VP of Customer Care
• Assessed recruiting, hiring, training processes
• Assessed management structure, staff skills and strengths
• Assisted with evaluation of new VP of Customer Care candidates and transition for new hire.

• Dramatically improved morale and agent attendance
• lmproved monthly average service levels from below 50% to above 70%
• Revived relationships with Marketing, Information Technology, Field Service
• Re-defined quality and performance management processes
• Transitioned role to new executive who continues to be successful