I have just returned from Dillwynia womens' prison at Windsor on the outskirts of Sydney. We have been partnering with the Department of Corrective Services for the last 3 years in providing advice, mentoring and support to the call centre within the prison.

The Dillwynia call centre has about 30 women inmates who are trained to make outbound calls, mainly related to data base cleansing and outbound promotions.

I have an arrangement with the Department of Corrective Services where by when girls are up for release we will interview them and see if we can find them employment in the wider contact centre industry. I have had four women who have come from Dillwynia work for me in my business. Their crimes have ranged from fraud to murder. I am about to interview another newly released girl on Friday.

I spent today with the girls who are still in prison coaching them on the skills they need in order to obtain employment on the outside. For many of these girls who have experienced extreme abuse and dysfunction in their young lives just the thought that someone on the outside will give them a chance at employment is monumental to them.

Most of these women are young, between 18 and 30 and most of them have children on the outside. The children are typically looked after by the grandmothers. Of the women in prison the recidivism rate (% who end up back in prison) is 42%. The two factors that reduce the women's propensity for going back to gaol are 1)accommodation and 2) employment.

The experience I have had so far with employing 4 ex-inmates has been excellent. Not once have any of the women caused me any reason to question their honestly, loyalty or commitment. They work extremely hard and go out of their way to express their appreciation.

For those of you in the contact centre industry who would be willing to give some of these girls a chance at living a normal, constructive life, and contributing to society by working responsibly please get in touch with me at cwallace@fifthquadrant.com..au

Today I conducted an Asia Pacific Webinar on the topic of how to 'Design an Enterprise-wide Multi-Channel Service Strategy'. We had close to 400 attendees, which is exceptionally cool and indicative of the interest APAC organisations have in this topic.

Some interesting info and stats I used in the webinar include:

1. Australian contact centre industry about 214,300 seats
2. About 7.6% growth in seats since 2011
3. Expected to grow 4.1% by end 2012
4. Predicted 223,100 seats by end 2012
5. 56% multi-channel integration

And now for the Kiwis...

1. New Zealand is about 29,610 seats (1% decline)
2. The industry predicts stronger growth over the next 12 months with a projected seat size of 31,500 by end of 2012
3. 37% multi-channel integration

Main Channel Categories

1. Voice
2. Face to Face
3. Online
4. Correspondence (includes email)
5. Social Media
6. Mobile Apps

Multiple channels in contact centres include:

1. Voice : caller to live attendant
2. Voice : caller to IVR
3. Voice : caller to Speech
4. Voice : click to talk
5. Voice: caller using VOIP
6. Web-self service
7. Video: caller using video to CSR
8. Video streaming
9. Web Chat
10. Virtual Web Chat
11. Instant Messaging
12. Remote Assist
13. Co-browsing
14. SMS
15. Facsimile
16. Email
17. Letter
18. Social Media
19. Mobile Apps

Gold…;)

I am about to do a number of speaking gigs in North America and Central America over the next 12 months and I have been working on presenting the concept of the 'Intention Economy'. The term Intention Economy was coined by Doc Searls, a Harvard Professor and refers to the changing dynamic of the consumer-business landscape and power base. 

Before I get underway with some amazing stats related to social media and mobile apps as service channels, I need to say that my dream has come true and in addition to this blog, I have now a blog dedicated to talking about Women in Business with a massive focus on Fashion. Please provide the following link to all women you know who want to know how to dress and behave to be successful at work, but more importantly it will share outrageous stories of wardrobe malfunctions in the work place. I did originally call the blog, Camel Toe, however the women’s network it is associated thought that name inappropriate (I still can’t figure it) so it is now called Devil Wears Grey. Check it out

In March I will be heading to The 3rd Global ContactForum in Mexico to talk about social media and the rise of mobile devices as customer service channels. The Central and South American contact centre industries are extremely interested in the world of apps, much more than Australian, Kiwi or US consumers. Here are some of the key insights I will share:

There will be 16billion smart devices by 2013 (Gartner)

22% of total time consumers spend on the internet is social (Nielsen Wire)

There are at least 19 consumer channels that can be handled by the contact centre:

1. Voice : caller to live attendant
2. Voice : caller to IVR
3. Voice : caller to Speech
4. Voice : click to talk
5. Voice: caller using VOIP
6. Web-self service
7. Video: caller using video to CSR
8. Video streaming
9. Web Chat
10. Virtual Web Chat
11. Instant Messaging
12. Remote Assist
13. Co-browsing
14. SMS
15. Facsimile
16. Email
17. Letter
18. Social Media
19. Voice from mobile app

The greatest users of social media as a service channel: 8% of Gen Y

Countries most actively using social media as a service channel: Mexico 17% and Brazil 10% of consumers Channels that consumers are happiest using and think are lowest effort (which are the attributes that drive strong consumer engagement):

1. Web-self service
2. Phone
3. Social media

Crappest channels for happiness and low effort (ie not happy and take high effort):

1. Fax
2. IVR
3. voice and IVR

Email rates as low effort and low to moderate happiness.

Organisations with mature service strategies have higher levels of:

• Mobile Apps
• Social networks
• Remote Assist
• Online forums
• Web chat
• So interesting.

Welcome to Fifth Quadrant and callcentres.net's first news issue for 2012. We are pleased to be back and be bringing you our regular contact centre and service sector news reports, Analyst updates and blogs.

I will start the year by sharing new insights from our Australian and New Zealand contact centre industry market reports.

For Australia…

The Australian contact centre industry has grown 7.6% since late 2010 to be about 214,300 seats. The industry is expected to continue growing at 4.1% (predicted 223,100 seats by end 2012).

48% of contact centres are using hosted solutions and there is an increase from 7 to 13% of centres using cloud based technology.

The top challenges facing the contact centre industry in Australia over the next 12 months include:

1. Inadequate headcount to effectively meet business requirements
2. Need to upgrade existing technology
3. Change management
4. Training/ Agent development
5. Budgetary constraints/ Expectation to do more with less

Now to NZ…

The contact centre industry in New Zealand is about 29,610 seats which is a 1% decline from 2010. This is exactly the growth rate (albeit negative) that the industry predicted it would achieve when researched in 2010. The industry predicts stronger growth over the next 12 months with a projected seat size of 31,500 by end of 2012.

The agent turnover rate is 24% p.a. down from 27% in 2010.

About 4 in 10 centres currently use hosted solutions and about 1 in 3 are using or about to use some type of cloud based application in their centre.

The top challenges facing the contact centre industry in NZ over the next 12 months include:

1. Inadequate headcount to effectively meet business requirements
2. Change management
3. Improving productivity/efficiency
4. Training/ Agent development
5. Better utilisation of current technology

Wishing you a prosperous Water Dragon inspired 2012.