Industry Perspectives and Resources
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.
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.
Special CallTalk: Coronavirus & Contact Center Management. Guest Dr. Charles Fenzi and our host, Bruce Belfiore, focus on how to show true management leadership in the face of this crisis. This special episode of CallTalk™ is dedicated to providing you information and advice that will make you better able to display, and develop, your management skills in a time of Coronavirus. Learn ways to protect your most precious assets - - your colleagues - - while serving your callers and keeping the corporate mission in mind.
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.
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.
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 @Home
Rapidly Moving to a Work-from-Home Model in Your Contact Center. 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. This webinar will be held Friday at 9 AM Central / 2 PM GMT.
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. Watch Webinar
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.
Assistance From Industry Solution Providers**
COVID-19 (Coronavirus) Business Continuity Resources, NICE inContact. NICE inContact is now providing CXone@home, a free work-from-home offer for 45-days to support business continuity, and the following best practice resources. This page will be updated with new information and resources as available.
No Cost COVID-19 Care Response Solution for Healthcare Systems. On Wednesday, March 11 Salesforce Chair and CEO Marc Benioff shared that to support the global response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, Salesforce is providing a COVID-19 Response Package that provides free access to technology for emergency response teams, call centers, and care management teams for health systems affected by Coronavirus.
Available immediately (March 13), Avaya clients can request a 90-day complimentary access license to convert their existing office-based contact center agents to remote workers. In addition, at the end of the 90-day complimentary period, users have the option to convert those licenses to a monthly subscription, to offer more agility and improve availability of services for customers.
Cisco Webex Available Free in These Countries (COVID-19 Response)
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Related:
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Working smarter anywhere – Working remotely, by Heidi Rhodes. February 29, 2020.
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Work From Home Best Practices, by Aruna Ravichandran. March 10, 2020.
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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
**Please contact each Industry Solution Provider for specific eligibility and requirements.
