August 27, 2021 – Interactive discussion initiated by Contact Center Associations of Asia Pacific (CC-APAC), Leaders Talk: A Leader’s Roadmap to Contact Center Success, which invited three professional speakers in the Asia Pacific contact center.
One of the speakers, who was invited to this discussion is Ts. Saravanan Belusami. He is CEO of VADS Indonesia. Saravanan explained that the contact center faces many transformations. It strengthens us to be more agile in accepting change. If we talk about working from home, there is always the question of whether this is possible or not. Then the pandemic happened and made us agree that this is possible, and we can’t deny it anymore.
To face this change, he is talking from the perspective of a leader. He always looks from two angles, such as internal factors and external factors. The internal factor here, he sees how the role of the leader manages the organization from a perspective that requires their involvement as a leader, not only looking at your well-being.
Then external factors, such as from clients. In the BPO industry, they are very important. We have to be able to merge them in a situation like this. Also, how you can convince them and make your company a trusted BPO for them.
Saravanan has a different perspective from other speakers. He said that the only important element that we cannot deny in dealing with this particular situation is communication. When referring to what is going on in technology that Raymond said before, technology can easily be bought and incorporated into organizational structures. But what matters now is communication, how we can translate something using the right delivery for our people during work from home.
Therefore, this is where the role of a leader is so important to bring them to have a substantial understanding and make it happen, not only from the internal stakeholder perspective but also from they are external.
According to the discussion about transformation and digitalization, Saravanan also shares some tips that we need in the contact center industry. First what we need to do and find out is we must get out of our comfort zone. As a leader, we have to know what is going on out there then, you can translate it into the internal organization. You should also encourage and ensure that they agree to and accept these changes. As a leader, you need to lead your teams by example or demonstrate, such as how you conduct meetings, how you allow them to advance, and many more.
The second tips are you need to know your people, such as their strengths and weaknesses. You need to ensure that you are preparing to anticipate what is happening out there will not happen to your team. You must get yourself to prepare and have a proper development plan for your team. The last, Saravanan said the last thing that the role of a leader is not to come up with all the great ideas but, “To create an environment in which great ideas can happen,” said Saravanan. (ANF)
August 27, 2021 – In this Leaders Talk, the Contact Center Associations of Asia Pacific (CC-APAC) discussed “A Leader’s Roadmap to Contact Center Success.” We invited three speakers who are professionals in the Asia Pacific contact center industry.
One of the speakers is Byron J. Fernandez, Former Chairman of CCAM Malaysia Group CIO, Country Director Teledirect Malaysia. Byron said that in the beginning, especially people from the BPO industry disagreed and said, “No” if do work from home. At first, they were worried about how can we know they were working or not, how the data was secure, and other issues. But when the pandemic hit, they had no choice. In Malaysia, because the technology is sufficient, they finally decided to transition more than 95% of organizations to work from home.
The next discussion is talking about technology in the contact center. Byron said that technology is not important in the past. But in this current situation, technology is important and very useful. Some of the advanced tools we use can monitor the screen of a particular agent. In addition, there are also very interesting technologies, such as using facial recognition. With this technology, we can see people’s facial features, whether they are smiling, whether they are happy or not based on what they are doing. Also, the company can make it possible for agents to work from home in the long term and with good results.
At the end of the discussion, Byron gives his opinion about how to create a roadmap in the next five years. He thinks five years is a very long timeline. We never know whether there will be another pandemic in the next five years or not. Therefore, it is better to plan work in 18 months. What is your 12 to 18-month plan? Then make a roadmap by seeing what problems you face today. Then, what has changed and what will develop in the next 12 months.
That is where you must start thinking about where you invest. Do we invest in change management ratios? Do we invest in online tools to monitor people’s well-being? Do we invest more in insight and big data analytics to see where people are spending their time and what they do? Or invest in HR to see employee engagement? Those are the questions that leaders must answer that they can give excellent employee experience.
Byron thinks that the roadmap for the next 12 to 18 months is to figure out how we bring normality to our workforce. Therefore, we can provide our workforce with an employee experience that will make them want to stay. (ANF)
August 27, 2021 – The third Leaders Talk organized by Contact Center Associations of Asia Pacific (CC-APAC) discussed “A Leader’s Roadmap to Contact Center Success” by inviting three professional speakers in the Asia Pacific contact center.
This discussion was presented by Andi Anugrah, as Chairman of ICCA Indonesia. First panellist is Byron J. Fernandez, Former Chairman of CCAM Malaysia Group CIO, Country Director Teledirect Malaysia. The second is Raymond Devadass, Chairman of CCAM Malaysia, Founder & CEO Day Three. Then the last one is Ts. Saravanan Belusami, CEO VADS Indonesia.
The first discussion is related to the leader’s roadmap in the contact center, especially during the pandemic. Byron said that in the beginning, especially people from the BPO industry disagreed and said, “No” if do work from home. At first, they were worried about how can we know they were working or not, how the data was secure, and other issues. But when the pandemic hit, they had no choice. In Malaysia, because the technology is sufficient, they finally decided to transition more than 95% of organizations to work from home.
But in reality, Byron said that working from home is going well because the people in the contact center have good competence, are responsible, and care about others. Therefore, in this situation he is 100% more focused on taking care of everyone who works for his company, making sure they are successful, and that they continue to do well in their home environment that they adapt to this change.
Raymond also explained these changes. He explained that today’s gameplay is play for a change. In the contact center industry, change is nothing new. They accept and experience many changes, just like the internet. We’re turning mobile because all millennials are now using their phones to reach out on social media and other things like that. Then the contact center industry has also gone through and followed this change very quickly and rapidly.
He also agrees with Byron that it is a dynamic process that moves very quickly and adapts. And he thinks the organization has a good roadmap to say, “Okay, we will embrace machine learning for two years or AI for three years.”
Raymond thinks as leaders that are the most important thing to keep abreast of what’s going on with the different technologies. How does it apply to your business? Not just to take a new technology and just imitate it. They should see that implement technology works for the contact center and make a better customer experience.
Saravanan also agrees with Byron and Raymond that the contact center faces many transformations. It strengthens us to be more agile in accepting change. If we talk about working from home, there is always the question of whether this is possible or not. Then the pandemic happened and made us agree that this is possible, and we can’t deny it anymore.
To face this change, he is talking from the perspective of a leader. He always looks from two angles, such as internal factors and external factors. The internal factor here, he sees how the role of the leader manages the organization from a perspective that requires their involvement as a leader, not only looking at your well-being.
Then external factors, such as from clients. In the BPO industry, they are very important. We have to be able to merge them in a situation like this. Also, how you can convince them and make your company a trusted BPO for them.
The next discussion is talking about technology in the contact center. Byron said that technology is not important in the past. But in this current situation, technology is important and very useful. Some of the advanced tools we use can monitor the screen of a particular agent. In addition, there are also very interesting technologies, such as using facial recognition. With this technology, we can see people’s facial features, whether they are smiling, whether they are happy or not based on what they are doing. Also, the company can make it possible for agents to work from home in the long term and with good results.
What about training? Byron also explained that we are in a pandemic and cannot hold training. Therefore, they take advantage of the learning platform with concepts that are important for developing their people and then launch this course using the electronic platform. With this technology, he thinks in the coming months, all this thing will be done to support human development and the ability to work in the current situation.
Then, another perspective from leaders about technology. Raymond said that leaders must adapt and build the culture of digital internally. It means, if you want to create a great digital experience for your customers, you have to start with the employees. Therefore, everything you do internally needs to be more efficient through digital processes.
He also shared that people in the contact center are very energetic and thrive the social interaction. Raymond said that it is different today that we are restricted to do physical interactions, it is the challenge. Now, we have a hybrid model. Some of the agents work from home, some from the office.
Saravanan has a different perspective to other speakers. He said that the only important element that we cannot deny in dealing with this particular situation is communication. When referring to what’s going on in technology that Raymond said before, technology can easily be bought and incorporated into organizational structures. But what matters now is communication, how we can translate something using the right delivery for our people during work from home.
Therefore, this is where the role of a leader is so important to bring them to have a substantial understanding and make it happen, not only from the internal stakeholder perspective but also from they are external.
At the end of the discussion, all panelists give their final opinion and tips about the roadmap for leaders to succeed in the contact center. Want to know more about their opinion? For details, stay tuned for another article on the CC-APAC website. (ANF)
Customer Experience, Operational Excellence, Digital Innovation, and Business Continuity are in focus. The lessons of the past 18 months have been valuable, but how would these “Now Norms” shape up the future of the contact centers?
Contact Center Association of Malaysia (CCAM) presents the 10th National Contact Centre Conference (NCCC) 2021, to be held from 6 – 10 September 2021.
I recently had the privilege of sharing the story of my quest for Digital Transformation glory to some senior level government personnel who had been identified as digital champions for various government agencies. This was in fact part of the federal government’s Digital Government Competency and Capability Readiness initiative.
It was clear as day to me that the need for a more agile and innovative government ecosystem is ever more important to deal with rapid changes in citizen expectation. In many ways, it is no different in the corporate world dealing with the evolving consumer behaviour and expectation. After all, we are primarily serving the millennials and generation Z, who account for almost 65% of the global population and demand for convenience, accessibility and smarter ways to transact.
Although I was tempted at first to share my views on the mega-trends and cutting-edge technologies shaping the industry, I eventually decided to share my experience in cultivating a digital culture in an organization.
In recent years many companies have started to embrace a digital culture in their workplace. We already know how important it is to develop the right corporate culture. This can define how efficiently your team works as a whole and what values your organization hold. Having an excellent culture is one of the defining features of a successful organization.
There are a few different types of corporate culture that you can implement in your organization. However, if you’re looking to bring about a digital transformation in your company culture, then this article is for you.
So, what exactly does digital culture mean?
Digital culture refers to an organization that transforms their corporate culture into one that incorporates technology into its aspects. Instead of merely adding a bit of technology into the workplace, this culture encourages staff to maximize their productivity by using digital means. When it is implemented well, a digital culture will help your company to become extremely efficient.
Why exactly is this culture important? Isn’t it enough to incorporate a few digital technologies into the workplace? A survey done by McKinsey Digital in 2017 demonstrates that one of the major barriers to digital technology in the workplace is culture. To ensure that your corporation maximizes its digital efficiency, you need to incorporate this into your organization.
How has Digital Culture evolved over the years?
Let’s take the customer experience industry as an example. The traditional contact centre, or what was perhaps commonly known as call centres, became popular in the 1990s. It was the ‘Landline Era’ where call centres mushroomed addressing only the basics. Although call centres aren’t exactly what you think of when you consider digital culture, this is where it started. Call centres then mainly provided a transaction-based service. There was not much variation in the customer service you could offer here; it was purely product or operations driven.
The Rise of the Internet Era between 2001 and 2009 saw the advent of ‘Internet Contact Centres’. The creation of the internet changed the face of digital culture completely. This enabled companies to offer Online Customer Service, which drastically improved customer satisfaction. It also opened up the possibility of multichannel customer service.
The Mobile Internet Era between 2010 and 2015 saw the rise of Omnichannel Service Centres. This type of customer service was a huge step-up from the multichannel systems of the previous era. It became possible to focus on optimizing the service to focus on creating positive customer relations. This was also the era when the e-commercialization of the corporate world started.
Today, in this Multimode Digitalization Era, we are beginning to see the rise of Intelligent Solutions Centres providing Best in Class Service Delivery. The advancements that technology has made in the past few decades have changed customer service drastically. Artificial intelligence is enabling chatbots to provide customers a personalized experience while also being effortless to implement. Process automation is making customer interactions much more seamless. These new cutting-edge technologies have opened the doors to many innovative opportunities. It allows companies to have a more proactive approach to customer experience.
The three stages of a Digital Journey.
It’s essential to realize all the steps that you will require to digitalize your culture. To simplify this process and make it easy to understand, I have broken it down into three steps. The three stages of a digital journey that you need to undergo to attain a digital culture are:
1. Digitization: Convert data into digital The first stage you need to complete is to move all your data onto a digital platform. This step is also the easiest to do, although it’s not possible to move forward if you don’t complete this stage. We recommend working in small portions so it’s not overwhelming.
2. Digitalization: Digitalize your business This is the stage where you start to integrate digital methods into your usual business processes. Use this step as a way to check how your team copes with the changes. For example, you can introduce a few different programs into one part of your company. Then ask your team for some feedback about these programs. Use this feedback to implement processes that work for your team.
3. Digital transformation: Change your model by incorporating digital Now that you’ve finally changed all your business processes it’s time to begin the process of digital transformation. This step is the hardest one to do because it includes changing your entire business model. To digitalize your culture, you’ll need to make drastic changes in your customer service and your corporate culture. Keep in mind that the ultimate goal of digital transformation is to facilitate an improved customer experience so remember to make changes in your corporate culture with this goal in mind.
How you can develop this digital culture in your organization?
If you want to bring about a digital transformation in your business, it’s imperative to take a step back and check if your company has the cultural and leadership readiness required for this change. To put it simply, you need to make sure that everyone on your team is ready for all the changes that will come.
A digital transformation will change how your organization works as a whole. If there are even a few people that aren’t on board to make this transformation a success, then it’s highly unlikely that your project will succeed.
How do you tell if your company has a team that’s ready for a change this drastic?
You will be able to figure this out by observing what your team considers most valuable. If your team has the following traits, then you know that they’re ready.
Firstly, your team has to be focused on ensuring that your clients get the best service. One of the main purposes of digital culture is to improve your customer’s experience. If your team doesn’t fully understand this, then you’re not going to have an easy time.
Secondly, you must look at the nature of your workplace environment. Your workplace needs to have an environment that promotes team building instead of competition. Digital transformation requires a good amount of teamwork. This won’t be possible in a competitive environment.
The last trait that you need to look for is if your staff has members that prefer taking action over planning. Employees that are ready to take the initiative will be a good fit in a digital culture. If you have a team with this trait, it will also be easier for you to transition into a digital culture.
Although it might seem like the primary goal of digital transformation is to make your business more technologically advanced, this is not the case. A digital culture values customer experience above all else. Technology is just a tool that can help to facilitate this. When you’re figuring out if your team is the right fit, it’s not vital to check how tech-savvy your team is. Instead, your main deciding criteria is to figure out how much your employees value customer experience.
Building Your Culture Around Digital Megatrends.
You’ve now adequately analysed and have made sure everyone in the organization is on board with this transformation. You’re ready to move to the next step, but where do you start? I recommend that you look at the digital megatrends in your industry and build your culture around them. My previous article for example, looked at the megatrends reshaping the customer experience industry.
Although you’ll need to research which of these megatrends works best for you and your industry, here are a few that would probably be a part of your research. Three of the most valuable digital megatrends that have emerged in recent years are social media, cloud computing, and analytics.
Social media platforms have millions of users, and as more time goes on, this influence will only grow larger. If you use it well, it can drive collaboration between employees by strengthening the employer brand.
Cloud computing is a great way to work with individuals that you might not be able to meet with. Emails and chat apps can help you to gain remote access to talent pools from different countries. This also allows for a lot of mobility in the workplace as it’s possible to transfer data across continents without much trouble.
Analytics will give you the feedback you need to better your customer service. This data will help you to gain deeper insights into employee performances and behaviours. You can use this to learn exactly which areas you need to improve in.
These megatrends are redefining the way corporations all around the world conduct business. You will want to utilize these tactics to make your business as successful as possible.
A Few Tips to Ensure That You Have a High Digital Success Factor.
To have the most successful outcome in this endeavour, you need to keep digital transformation at the core of your organization. From my personal experience, compared to culture-building, the technological aspect of going digital is the easy bit. You may want to focus on changing the different aspects of your organization. Here are some of the changes that we made during our company’s digital transformation that might be helpful to you.
Our company started by revamping all our workspaces to fit the digital change. We let our employees create their digital studios. This gave them the ability to tailor their workspace; however they wanted to. One of the main goals that we had when we began this change was to promote more employee centricity. This is one of the reasons why we started our digital journey with this step.
Next, we changed our entire process to make the customer experience more personal. We wanted to provide the best customer service that was possible. So, we analysed our entire process completely and after making a lot of alterations, we ended up with a system that far surpassed our previous system. Remember that there’s no format that you have to stick to. Use this to your advantage to create a better customer experience.
Finally, we altered our recruitment process completely. We needed to change this process to enable us to build a team with more like-minded individuals. Don’t just pick digital talent with the right skills. Make sure that all the candidates are the right cultural fit for your company.
To make it easier to implement this change, here’s an example of an idea you can use. When our company started with digital transformation, we created a separate digital unit to develop digital services, then re-integrated that unit into the core business.
To unlock the true potential of digital transformation, it is necessary to bring about a digital culture that is employee-centric and value-focused.
Make It a Point to Enable a Digital Culture by Driving Employee Centricity.
Creating a digital culture is a massive task that will require you to revamp your system. This is why you need to focus on the employees. To enable employee centricity, you’ll want to engage and inspire the entire workforce while empowering them to drive the cultural change together.
This empowerment can happen by re-skilling your staff on trending digital skills, leveraging collaboration tools to improve productivity, using metrics to enable measurable value through key performance indicators (KPI’s), and adopting a systematic approach to drive this change.
One of the defining features of digital culture is that it improves customer engagement. Adopting the practice of digitalization can make employees more involved in customer service. This can enable customer-centric engagements and in creating better solutions relevant to their business needs.
I recommend making use of a transformation framework to monitor how much progress your company has made. Build this framework in a way that makes the employees the agents of change. Make use of the framework to bring in a work culture that empowers employees to make informed, context-aware decisions, focus on continuous improvement, and take calculated risks.
What You Can Do to Guarantee the Success of Digital Culture in Your Organization?
It’s not an easy task to change your entire corporate culture. To guarantee your success in this field, you must put in a lot of time and effort. Because of how hard it is to implement a digital transformation; it should come as no surprise that it’s easy to slip up now and again.
You’re bound to run into a few pitfalls along the way. For example, your team will take the time to learn how to incorporate this culture into their work. If you don’t take this factor into account, it will lead to your team getting overwhelmed by all the changes. If you want to give your company the best chance at success, there are three main things that you need to keep in mind to avoid these pitfalls.
You need to start at the top first and make sure that the leader leads by example. Leaders must be at the forefront of this change. They should be able to set clear goals for the employees. The person-in- charge should also know how to pick out the essential characteristics of their preferred culture. They must encourage their team to stick to these characteristics. Leaders should also continuously assess the changes to identify any faults and fix them. If the person at the centre of the organization is not fully committed to the digitalization, then you can’t expect the transformation process to succeed.
Keep in mind that a new culture doesn’t mean that all old methods should be scrapped entirely. Don’t make the mistake of trying to replace every single aspect of your corporate culture with something new. Make use of all the best practices from the previous culture. You can start slowly by incorporating the new tactics with the old ones. The previous plan’s best culture practices can be blended with the current ones to create new employee behavioural patterns in a digital ecosystem.
Another thing that can lead to the downfall of this whole operation is if you try to rush the process. Before implementing this change, you must experiment to figure out what works for your company. Different teams will adapt differently to the changes. You will need to pay attention to how your team works and plan accordingly. Pilot programs are a great place to start when you’re enabling culture change. You can use these programs to elicit new behaviours from your team. You could start by focusing on one area first and see how the team deals with the new challenges. If the criteria are met, you can begin to implement this culture in other ways. Based on the success of the pilot, leaders can alter their transformation plan accordingly.
Hopefully, this guide has given you everything you need to know to implement a digital culture in your company. Keep in mind that this process is not going to be quick. Because of the nature of digital transformation, it will likely take your company a while to gradually incorporate these changes. In fact, in the initial stages, the results aren’t going to be very apparent. However, if you continue to stick to this path, then the long-term benefits are enormous.
Companies such as Microsoft, Google, Facebook, and IBM are well known for their innovation. They were able to disrupt the technology world through their widely acclaimed digitized cultures. One of the reasons they managed to become so successful is because they embraced digitalization. Your organization will need to make drastic changes to excel in this competitive digital age, so why not start now rather than later? (RD)
Munirah is an MBA graduate from UK, majoring in Human Resource Management. She is a member of International Who’s Who of Professionals and Life Member of International Business Leaders. She has a total of 25 years working experience.
An experienced personnel in the areas of Customer Relationship Management (CRM) and Customer Experience Management (CEM), Human Performance Management, Strategic Management, Business Process Redesign, Sales & Marketing and Project Management. Her exposure includes both local and foreign assignments with 15 years’ experience in the Banking Sector and has worked and consulted with include BPO, insurance, telecommunication, property development and leisure vacation & hospitality.
She is the Founder/President & CEO of Brandt International, which specializes in the areas of Business Transformation Consulting and Outsourcing with offices in Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Jakarta and Manila. She is an experienced Facilitator, Human Performance Strategist, Service Quality Management & Change Management practitioner for the past 25 years having conducted numerous training and consulting assignments in CRM, Customer Service Management, Customer Experience Management and Organization Development assignments, both locally and overseas. She is currently a sought-after Speaker and Advisor to various Contact Centre & BPO Associations/Industries in the region, namely Singapore, Philippines, Thailand and Indonesia.
Her contribution has been recognized by numerous awards organizations:
Master Entrepreneur Award 2021
APEA Asia Pacific Enterprise Award (Regional Edition)
10 Best Aspiring CEOs in 2020 by Industry Era •
Top 3 Nominee for the prestigious “EY Entrepreneur of the Year Award 2018 (Malaysia)”.
“Women Leadership Award” for Business Process Outsourcing Sector in 2018.
“Top 30 Women Achievers & Leaders-Malaysia” 2017.
The “Women Leadership Achievement Award” at the WWLCA-World Women Leadership Congress & Award 2015
Inaugural “Malaysian Women of Excellence Award 2014”
Immediate Past President of the Call Centre Association of Malaysia (CCAM) COPC Certified Implementation Leader CIAC Certified Strategic Leader Group CIO of TDCX, Executive Vice President for Malaysia and India
Byron has over 20 years of experience in the Contact Centre Industry leading and running renowned outsourcing providers in Malaysia, India, and the Philippines. Byron has had the distinction of being the President, Vice President and Secretary of the CCAM during his time with the association. He holds an MBA in Information Systems, as well as an Advanced Diploma in Computer Studies.
Today, Byron is the Group CIO of TDCX, a well-recognized and respected boutique CX provider, specializing in delivering superior Customer Experience to some of the worlds most recognized brand names. His expertise in verticals such as telecommunications, banking, insurance, FMCGs, technology and government contact centres make him ideally suited to the responsibility of leading over 3000 of TDCX Malaysia’s best people.
Prior to his career at TDCX, Byron led and managed the outsourcing contact centre business for a large Malaysia outsourcing provider with a footprint in Malaysia, India and Philippines. His experience covers strategic management, digital transformation, customer experience management, business development and people development honed over his 20 years of work in outsourcing.
Byron is committed to the development of the contact centre industry and presently serves in the capacities of:
Founding Member of Contact Center Associations of Asia Pacific (CC-APAC) since 2019
Advisor to and immediate past president of the Call Centre Association of Malaysia (CCAM)
Recipient of the Career Achievement Award from CCAM
Panel Judge of Contact Centre Awards in Asia for over ten years (China, Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia)
Byron speaks at various events for Contact Centre development and in the development of young individuals through some of the local universities in Malaysia. He has spoken online via COPC and to aspiring young minds from INTI University, Taylor’s College and Multimedia University of Malaysia
Byron has represented Malaysia, speaking at Contact Centre events all around Asia, Europe and has even participated in government level identification of business delivery as far away as Honduras in Central America
When not working, Byron rides motorcycles with a charitable motorcycle club (Helang Motorcycle Club of Malaysia) where he serves to plan out and execute community work mainly with orphans and the elderly in Malaysia and Thailand.
Raymond is the Founder & CEO of Daythree Business Services. He specializes in providing strategic management direction, particularly in the field of digital transformation strategy and management.
He has guided several technology companies from ‘start-up’ to becoming leading technology players in the industry. Amongst his many key achievements, Raymond managed one of the largest healthcare informatics implementations in Malaysia and played key role in realizing the IT Outsourcing agenda of a major state government in Malaysia.
Having originated from a corporate finance background, Raymond has strong working and practical knowledge in finance, accounting and banking. He holds a Master of Business Administration majoring in Strategy & Planning. He is a Chartered Accountant, registered with CPA Australia and Malaysian Institute of Accountants.
Raymond is the author of several articles and research papers. He was twice selected by peers in the industry as ‘Best Thought Leader’ in 2017 and once again in 2019 – an award reserved for recognizing leadership aimed at external positioning of the individual’s competencies in delivering value.
Raymond is a member of MDEC’s Talent Expert Network Panel – appointed for his knowledge and expertise in digital technology. He serves as Councillor at PIKOM, the National Tech Association of Malaysia, and is also a member of the Malaysian Institute of Chartered Secretaries and Administrators’(MAICSA) Training Professional Development Committee.
Additionally, he is the President for Contact Centre Association of Malaysia. He also serves as Treasurer of Outsourcing Malaysia and chairs her annual flagship conference committee, GBS Summit.
Above all, he is a sports enthusiast and has a deep passion for music.
In July 2019, I was asked to deliver an opening address at our annual National Contact Centre Conference. This was when I began penning down my thoughts on the mega-trends reshaping the contact centre industry. There were so many thoughts in my mind, so many opinions to share, and perhaps so many heartfelt emotions to put into words. And when you have so much to say, sometimes it all gets mixed up in your head. The opening address was eventually delivered in some structured manner, but soon after that I began writing this article to share my thoughts. In many ways, it serves more as a reminder to myself of what to focus on.
The Contact Centre industry has evolved over the last 20 years and companies have started to realize the importance of adopting advanced technologies so they could better target the customers and consumers with more efficient engagement with the stakeholders. Customer interaction via contact centres has proven to be beneficial for the businesses as it adds value to the business.
Technology has always played an important role in the development and growth of the contact centre industry where the mobile boom, social media, data analytics, and big data centres are making a huge impact in today’s world. Contact centres were not even a recognized industry until the latter half of the 20th century but today, it is considered as the key part of many of the small and big revenue generating businesses.
According to statistics, in 2012, there were more than three million positions approximately, in the contact centre industry of United States accounting for almost five million jobs. Also, the annual growth of the contact centre industry in terms of jobs is 0.5 percent and it accounts for eight to ten million jobs worldwide according to estimation. Closer to home, the contact centre industry in Malaysia comprises of 230 MSC companies, employing 53,544 people, and generates a total revenue USD2.5billion per annum. With the addition of organisations in the BFSI and Telecommunications space, this industry employs all together more than 150,000 people – accounting for 1% of the total working population in Malaysia.
The rise of the call centres in the 1980s and 90s was the shift of terminology from telemarketing to call centres and it became a distinct function for the businesses and organizations in the last two decades of the 20th century.
By the end of the 20th century, the industry started to take off and call centres were being established by organizations of all sizes to address and cater the customer service requests, inquiries about the organization and its services, marketing and other similar areas. Not every company established their own contact service centres as some of the organizations also outsourced it to the already established contact centres whereas some established and ran the centres internally or did a little bit of both for better performance.
In today’s world where the competition is tough and economies are volatile in most part of the world, maintaining and establishing a profitable business is important. That is where contact centres play their role as it delivers and provides a quality customer experience (CX) to the individual customers as per their preferences, needs, and satisfaction. However, the technological advancements in the past have focused only on providing better and better customer service and improving the efficiency of the organizations.
Fast forward 20 years, the pace of change is accelerating, fuelled by technology and changes in customer expectations. The global CX industry is undergoing a major revolution as a result of automation, artificial intelligence and machine learning. With the new cutting-edge technologies, the scope of the contact centres is increased exponentially, and it is more important for the success of the businesses as it was ever before. Contact centres are considered as one of the most technically sophisticated operations, having a wide range of responsibilities and applications, within an organization. These new disruptive technologies are forcing us to re-think the way CX activities operate.
Companies, on one hand, are striving to improve the quality and efficiency of the customer experience by understanding the needs of the customers and, on the other hand, to cut down the costs associated with it. The technological advancements and new trends in the contact centre are revolutionizing the industry with self-service tools, simplifying operational requirements and environment, better online security and protection, the use of Artificial intelligence and deep machine learning, mobility, and big data analytics. These technological advancements have made it possible for the contact centres to provide more value-added services to the businesses and in turn create high-value jobs in the industry. (RD)
