Customer Care

Last week’s Enterprise Connect event was an eye-opening experience from many perspectives. A tour of the exhibit area seemed like a real-time stroll through the history of contact center technology. Several traditional contact-center providers were present, but some former industry powerhouses were…

“Choosing a Unified Communications and Collaboration vendor is a complex decision,” Marty Parker, Principal at UniComm Consulting, recently told me. “Any organization looking to refresh their architecture or rework their entire communications and collaboration strategy should be looking at a broad s…

Who likes Tomorrowland? Some people go to the futuristic part of Disney’s theme parks for the rides. The rides are certainly fun, but I go because it makes me think of the future. Perhaps that’s why people post so many predictions blogs every December: We like to dream about possibilitie…

Like most “overnight” sensations, Jimi Hendrix was not an immediate success. He burst onto the American music scene at the Monterey Pop Festival in June 1967, after a fascinating series of events first turned him into a superstar in the U.K. So much of what happened to Hendrix parallels the global r…

As consumers, we have many options in how we browse, research, and purchase products today.  We expect more freedom and flexibility in how we work with retail companies. Forward-looking companies strive to improve their customers’ experiences and provide flexibility without compromising qualit…

It has been more than a year since I started using Cisco Spark. And it has been a year of learning and changing how I work with my team…and I’m still learning. My focus and passion at Cisco is customer-care technology. I’m always thinking about how to apply new collaboration technologies to customer…

Have you ever imaged what your company would look like if you only employed the best and the brightest employees? Midsize business leaders, just like enterprise companies, need to recruit and retain the most capable employees. They recognize that because today’s talent is on the move, the best emplo…

“Let’s eat grandma!” “Let’s eat, grandma!” Punctuation makes a difference, doesn’t it? So does context. If you’re a basketball fan with March Madness on your mind, “Drive the lane!” might make you think of something a coach yells to his pla…

“Hello, Mr. Famous, and thanks for calling 1-800-WeCanHelp! I see you bought three items from us last week, and you IM’d with our agent Chet yesterday when you had some questions about set-up. Are you calling about that same issue, or can I help you with something else?” Calling customer service is…