The ICMI Annual Call Center Exhibition and Knowledge Exchange Conference was held over a few days in Phoenix Arizona last week. I was fortunate enough to attend and witness some very informative sessions. The theme throughout the conference leaned towards work relationships, and kicked off with a Commando Breakfast by Keith Ferrazzi, CEO, Ferrazzi Greenlight Inc, announcing that ‘EVERYTHING you want in life will be achieved through your relationships’. Ferrazzi, author of ‘Never Eat Alone’, gave us some great tips on how to network, communicate and most importantly, determine what is was each of us wanted from the event and how to get it. 

Ferrazzi then followed the breakfast with a keynote presentation detailing the importance of relationships. Remember our best boss? What was it that made him/her stand out? Ferrazzi says that the best bosses genuinely care about your successes. He also pointed that that his research indicated that staff retention increases dramatically if they have genuine meaningful relationships at work.  

There were 48 sessions within the main conference, 16 of which were very well attended. The most notable was a personable speaker from Memphis, Bob Furniss, who delivered “Six Strategies That Will Make You a Better Frontline Leader”… his message, his delivery, and most of all his hands-on contact centre experience helped his presentation stand out above all. 

Bob was incredibly genuine; he spoke from the heart and connected with every person in the room. He explored the strategies for success: Lead first – manage second; know your passion – live your priorities; think like a consultant – manage like a CEO; know your technology – use it to your advantage; love your people – love your customers; measure movement – celebrate success. Bob is the President of Touchpoint Associates, and hopes to make his way to NZ next year to keynote at the TUANZ Contact Centre Conference. I can tell you he is definitely worth hearing.

The 16 most popular sessions in the Conference were as follows:

• Six Strategies That Will Make You a Better Frontline Leader
• What’s the Secret to Hiring Agents Who Stay
• Call Centre Operations 101: For new recruits, or seasoned pros needing a refresher
•  New Trends in Call Centre Automation
• Motivation and Rewards: What Works and What Dosen’t?
•  Making your Call Centre Green: The Power of Remote Agents
• First Things First: Focus on Strategic Levers
• Smart Strategies for Implementing People-Centric WFM
• Scanning the Horizon, What’s ahead for Call Centres?
• No Pizza parties: Leading the Motivating Home Agents
• The Dirty Dozen of Common Survey Mistakes
• Make the Contact Centre the Core of your Multi-Channel Customer Strategy
• When You Help Them Grow, Everyone Wins
• How to Build a Believable and Achievable Business Case, and how to convince your boss.
• What’s New in Agent Training
• Prepared for the Worst: Disaster Recovery

Teleworking in the US is wide spread. Interestingly, all reported that their staff retention rates improved and their sick days and overheads decreased, whilst their productivity increased quite substantially. (TUANZ will be running Teleworking 08 in Auckland on November 11/12 at Eden Park).

A topic that wasn’t represented but judging from the many Q & A’s at some of the sessions, may be worth including in our next conference was: How do you deal with difficult employees, and how do you support the staff around them?

Lisa Dunson from Airlines Reporting Corporation, who presented ‘When you Help them Grow, Everyone Wins’ was asked how to deal with a difficult employee and she advised them to forget all the HR diplomacy and honestly ask him straight up why he’s being a jerk. She also made a great comment that ‘weaknesses are undeveloped strengths’.

The conference was well worth attending as a fact finding mission, and did have many relevant topics – however I felt that many of the popular sessions were let down by the quality of the speaker.    

As an overview, the message was clear - relationships, relationships, relationships. The Americans were great company, funny, and incredibly polite. But do I think they run a better conference then us – no way!

I’d love some feedback on the session titles above, and whether you would like some or all of them represented at our Contact Centre Conference in June 09. Email bernice@tuanz.org.nz or leave a comment below.