CCNG is working through our network of colleagues and resources to help share information, insights, and ideas on maintaining strong customer care, employee support, and business continuity during this challenging period. These articles and resources offer specific starting points we hope you’ll find helpful. We will continue to update this contact-center-centric resource as new information becomes available. We encourage you to check back often.
COVID-19 for Contact Centers
Member Response to COVID-19. CCNG hosted an interactive open forum for all members to address issues related to the COVID-19 spread and how our members’ contact centers are dealing with people, planning, and procedures. The recording will be available shortly and we’ll update this post with the link. This event was driven by members and lead by their questions and insights. Discussion topics included: 1) Pandemic Plan, 2) Site Exposure Plan, if someone diagnosed, 3) Pay Plans, if site closed or sent home, 4) Current Cleaning Action Plan, 5) Work from home option.
COVID-19 Is Here. What You Need To Know Now. TTEC. In this on-demand webcast, you’ll hear up-to-the-minute details on what our clients are saying, the strategies we are deploying on their behalf, and which business continuity solutions and services you should leverage to keep your contact center online, accessible, and connected during this stressful time.
Contact centers during a crisis: An action plan from experts. A conversation with Rosetta Carrington Lue. March 20, 2020. Because Coronavirus, the pandemic also known as COVID-19, has thrust organizations of all sizes into crisis operations mode, CX leaders everywhere are now completely in the thick of that crisis — contact center leaders, especially. What are the guideposts contact center pros should follow in leading their organizations through times of intense difficulty? Here are five big takeaways from our conversation to start thinking about today.
How Have You Adapted? Starting March 17, Contact Center World is publishing a series of comments from members around the world related to coronavirus and contact centers, and how they have reacted / adapted in their centers.
From Leader to Leader: The Coronavirus & Your Workplace, by Kelly Keefe. March 23. No matter the industry and state of business, this is an unprecedented and a necessary time for strong leadership. Now, because of government mandates, thinking differently is the only way to survive. The workplace is different. Your leadership skills need to be different, too. Here are a few things that you should be doing differently.
Preparation and Planning
COVID-19 Strategies and Policies of the World’s Largest Companies, by Larry Edmond and Ellyn Maesse, Gallup. March 15, 2020. Gallup Managing Director Larry Emond gathered the strategies and policies of 100 members of the CHRO Roundtable, an organization that includes the CHROs of more than 650 of the world’s largest companies, for their responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. The companies in this sampling average $27 billion in revenue with 80,000 employees and most are global organizations. This is what Emond found.
How to manage COVID19 in the contact centre, by Justin Tippett. March 18, 2020. Whilst having a robust Business Continuity Plan could help to minimise/negate many of the current challenges contact centre managers are facing right now, I don’t think many of us could have foreseen something of this magnitude coming as quickly as it did. So I’ve done my best to provide some real, practical advice on how you can manage the Coronavirus/COVID19 in your contact centre.
Tips for Mitigating the Impact of Pandemics on Contact Centers, by Donna Fluss. February 12, 2020. Contact centers and other service organizations should draft a DR/BC plan that documents a number of potential health-scare scenarios. It’s also necessary for employees to know what is expected of them and how to communicate with your organization if they are not able (or willing) to participate in the plan. The plan should include the following high-level practices.
Managing Contact Centers Through the COVID-19 Pandemic, Donna Fluss. March 18, 2020. The article addresses key practices that can keep your employees safe and reassured, and help your organization be responsive to customers during the pandemic, if you do not yet have a BC plan in place. Clearly, using a CCaaS solution and having a WAH program are necessary, but all is not lost if you don’t. Here are a few suggestions for handling this situation. Also: a webinar on this topic is scheduled for April 14:
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Managing Contact Centers Through the Pandemic. Webinar: Tuesday, April 14, 2020, 12:00 p.m. ET. Join noted contact center expert Donna Fluss and CX leader Steve Chirokas as they discuss best practices to handle this pandemic. They will cover the actions you should take if you don’t have a business continuity plan for your contact center, and what technologies and applications are best suited to help you. They will also discuss best practices for managing contact center employees during this pandemic, and how to reassure customers that you are there for them.
Coronavirus and Your Call Center: Don’t Panic – Plan and Prepare. By Bruce Belfiore. February 29, 2020. COVID-19, more commonly referred to as the Coronavirus, is spreading rapidly as I write this in February, 2020. As a result, there are contact center managers worldwide who are wondering what to expect and how best to prepare. I am not a public health expert, but I will do my best to interpret what I know for our community of professionals.
Designate Essential Personnel for Your Contact Center, by Andrew Gilliam. March 12, 2020. Once you’ve outlined how service will be delivered during a disaster, you can begin to answer the question of who and how many people need to be involved. While it’s easy to designate an entire department as essential, it’s often not necessary or realistic. Be deliberate about selecting only positions that are utterly vital to your mission.
Remote and at Home
Rapidly Moving to a Work-from-Home Model in Your Contact Center. Calbrio on-demand webcast. Recorded March 20, 2020. Moving your contact center operations to a remote setup can be a challenge—especially when it must be done fast. We’ve brought together a team of experts to share real-world actionable advice on how to quickly (and successfully) implement a work-from-home migration.
With Coronavirus in Mind, Is Your Organization Ready for Remote Work? Gartner. March 3, 2020 Contributor: Jackie Wiles. Ready or not, many coronavirus contingency plans require remote work. Seize the opportunity to bolster your policies — and prepare for future workplace and employee needs. Few organizations feel prepared for large-scale remote work, but you can take steps to make the experience productive for both employees and your organization.
How Can Work@Home Work for You?: Answers from an HGS Expert. May 29, 2019. Working from home is increasingly a trend that delivers real benefits to businesses. At our May 23 webinar, HGS Go-to-Market Lead Marco Colaiacovo shared insight about their Work@Home solutions and a unique set of employee lifecycle challenges that you need to acknowledge and overcome. He explained how HGS has embraced the uniqueness of Work@Home and created a distinct ecosystem. Note: This post included a very useful Q&A portion of the on-demand webcast.
Resources For Working and Training Virtually, from TrainingIndustry.com. In light of the coronavirus pandemic, many organizations worldwide are seeking to protect their employees, customers and communities by sending employees home and moving business operations online. To help the training community adapt, we’ve gathered some of our best resources on remote work and virtual training. We wish you and your people the best in this difficult time.
Business Continuity
Business Continuity Management: Pandemic Planning Briefing, Gartner. March 6, 2020. On-demand webcast. Duration: 60 minutes. Business continuity management is well under way at most organizations. Whether COVID-19 coronavirus officially becomes a pandemic or not, more planning is needed. This complimentary webinar covers 10 steps for pandemic preparedness, crisis management solutions, the power of data and analytics and how technology plays a critical role for business success in this new environment.
Business Continuity, CX Central. Last updated: March 20, 2020. There are a number of options when looking for BCP solutions for your call centre with some being a lot easier to implement than others. These are the four most common Business Continuity options available.
Coronavirus and Organizational Resilience: What you need to do right now to make sure you are prepared for a new normal, from BCI. March 19, 2020. Ultimately this phase of response to the current outbreak will end and if we are to avoid a severe and long-term economic recession, organisations need to make sure that they can not only survive the current situation but are well positioned for the environment that emerges. So – what is this new normal likely to look like and what can businesses do to prepare for it?
How to Create & Implement Your Company’s Business Continuity Plan, by Yaniv Masjedi. March 5, 2020. Having a company-wide plan in case of an emergency is essential. If you rely on cloud-based communications, you might still have vulnerabilities. If you centralize your operations in one location, that can also become a risk. Luckily, there are ample resources available to create a business continuity plan. Here, we’ll cover key aspects of a business continuity plan including: 1) What is a Business Continuity Plan?, 2) Top Threats to Business Continuity, 3) The Anatomy of a Business Continuity Plan, and 4) Helpful Tools and Strategies.
Business Continuity Planning Today, Cisco. Every business is struggling with how to keep their businesses running while keeping their employees and customers safe. Companies are putting in drastic measures such as canceling events, eliminating business travel and in-person meetings, and having employees work from home. Cisco is actively dealing with these topics, and I wanted to share some of the practices we are putting into place to address business continuity in the short and long term. It’s our hope that by sharing some of our own experiences, best practices and free resources, we can work through this uncertain time together.
General Updates on The Coronavirus Outbreak
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Coronavirus: Official Updates, The latest updates from official sources of information curated by LinkedIn Editors
