Finally! the fMRI studies provide evidence.
Judy Willis, a neurologist, provides an engaging and lucid evidence-based explanation of our conjecture on Edutopia's blog.
Enjoy!
Friday, April 15, 2011
Finally! A neurologist illustrates how video gaming can train the brain and enable learning
We have been claiming that repeated game play helps to learn.
Finally! the fMRI studies provide evidence.
Judy Willis, a neurologist, provides an engaging and lucid evidence-based explanation of our conjecture on Edutopia's blog.
Enjoy!
Finally! the fMRI studies provide evidence.
Judy Willis, a neurologist, provides an engaging and lucid evidence-based explanation of our conjecture on Edutopia's blog.
Enjoy!
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Conversations with Anneke Seley, a Sales 2.0 and social selling thought leader, surfer, questioner of the status quo
As the thought leader of the Sales 2.0 and social selling methodology, a surfer, twelfth employee of Oracle and CEO and founder of Phone Works, Anneke Seley questions the status quo, promotes sales 2.0 best practices and social selling. Her team at Phone Works, improves the operations of sales organizations ranging from global multinationals to start-up organizations.
This interview with Anneke is the twelfth in our series about learning, games, social media, crowd-sourcing, and work performance.
RD> First, on behalf of the PAKRA team, we would like to thank you for being completely instrumental in us selling in the Sales vertical and also being a mentor and adviser to us.
AS> PAKRA’s time is now. I’m glad to collaborate.
RD> So! Are you a gamer?
AS> I play scrabble through Facebook. I am definitely a crossword puzzle fan. I was introduced to Kinect by my cousin’s kid last Thanksgiving, particularly the Dance game. I can see myself playing this especially in the cold weather. I’m a Farmville wife. Once in a while, I look over Jack’s (my husband Jack Oswald) shoulder and he lets me play with some sheep and fertilizer.
RD> He does? Jack constantly plays Farmville, at least according to his Facebook posts. Working with bio ammonia in real life – well! He has to live his brand in a game. We all should live our brand in games.
RD> When I first met you in virtual space, I was very intrigued with the tagline of your personal brand on LinkedIn: "Questioner of the status quo" --- Why is it important to you to question status quo?
AS> It’s important to me because it is very easy to get comfortable with the way things are. If we don’t challenge ourselves, if we don’t change, if we don’t evolve, then we don’t improve. We don’t progress.
RD> So! Is the challenge and change that you are referring to only in your personal sphere, or are you also translating that in your work ethic and customers?
AS> It is not just about my personal life but also I use this mantra in the business world. More importantly, I am always looking for opportunities to improve organizational performance, improve a function, improve a group of people and their skills sets, improve business processes, implement new technologies. There is always room for improvement. Until and unless we question the status quo and the way things are, we cannot evolve nor progress.
RD> This brings us to Sales 2.0. Of course you are THE thought leader in both practice and theory. A quick question about that: Because there are many functional silos that customers have to navigate, what is the start and end step of a sales process in the Sales 2.0 world?
AS> Traditionally we think of things in very structured buckets. In today’s world, that does not work any more. There is so much interconnectedness and collaboration. There is across-the-board customer engagement. That is what sales is all about. The sales process can start differently for different people. It can start online; it can start with social media. It starts where the customer engages with your company. Hopefully, the process never ends. In fact it is more important after the sale as the customer is well qualified to continue to buy either different products and services or additional products and services. A lot of companies have different functions - new business reps and reps that focus on customer successes and nurture the existing customer base.
RD> Do you think that there is one story to be had? For instance, a Sales VP wants to get some part of the sales cycle done so they make a compromise to complete that part or should there be specialization in the Sales process?
AS> I think it is hard for one person to participate and play the entire Sales process role and play each part really well. It is very hard to manage an engagement through to the closing process, especially as one’s company grows, leading to the need to specialize. Also, people tend to be better at one part of the sales cycle than another part of the cycle. Some are better at engaging customers early on and some are better at closing. Specialization will happen.
RD> If you look at your own experience and the experience of your 300+ clients, what are the key factors to both deploy Sales 2.0 principles appropriately and to sustain it? In other words, what are the critical success factors for sustainable user adoption to Sales 2.0?
AS> I think many organizations try to change things very quickly involving too many people. I truly believe that if organizations start small, hand select and involve a small group of people who are very innovation-oriented and who are excited about trying something new and improve their productivity and in turn of course make more money, it is a better start. In my own career at Oracle, there was no way we could have come in and said, “we are going to implement an inside sales team globally and now you have to share your accounts.”
- The trust has to be built; the experiences have to be had. The field reps had to see that inside sales would not ruin their customer relationships and would only enhance the relationships. And once the field sees more revenue to be had, then the middle adopters come more easily.
- Also, you need the right executive sponsorship.
- Metrics and process are not intuitive and this makes it hard for people to rally around it.
- Also the implementation has to be consistent and requires lots of discipline.
RD> I also find that processes, metrics and a visible accountability system –are not liked by many folks in different levels of management (especially first-line managers, supervisors). That is one the biggest resistance we find in users adopting our PAKRA system.
AS> Gerhard Gschwandtner of Selling Power Magazine quotes Warren Buffet: "It's only when the tide goes out that you learn who's been swimming naked." That explains it. When I interviewed Stu Schmidt (formerly at Cisco WebEx) for my book he said that it took him a year to get the sales team to really embrace a new Sales 2.0-style sales process, based on their buyers’ buying cycles. That first year, the intensive focus was to get the first line manages on board. It takes practice.
Also, there is a perception that in some accounts, especially those located here in Silicon Valley, who fancy themselves as being innovative and creative, that if one implements process and metrics the creativity will somehow be hampered.
RD> You are now going down my memory lane of the entire Lean and Six Sigma Operations life that I led prior to PAKRA. There is some truth to that last belief because there are some people who like “check-marks” and who make it very bureaucratic. In fact, one of the things I always point out to my team, “over my dead body will you collect data on things that do not give us direction to improve and change.”
AS> You’re right. There has to be a structure that allows room for creativity to blossom. But with no structure at all then all the creativity in the world is not going to be productive in the business world.
RD> How do you define social selling?
AS> Essentially the same way that I define Sales 2.0. It is a more efficient and effective way of selling and buying for both the seller and the buyer, enabled by technology – in the case of social selling, using social technology.
RD> You are involved with Social Selling University. Tell me more about it.
AS> It is a program sponsored by InsideView. It includes in-person workshops, webinars and online content for sales professionals at all levels. It is being rolled out this month. I will be speaking on March 24. It is the first of its kind to help companies understand the opportunity of social selling and develop strategies and implement a social media process and metrics. My particular interest is in developing a track for executives. There are great examples of grassroots activities, but almost all are at the individual level. The opportunity is to capture the best practices such that we can enable and scale sales, marketing and customer success at organizations.
RD> Do you think the accountability of sales managers changes with social selling implementation? I perceive that the organizational structure to manage the process of acquiring and retaining a customer becomes flatter. Do you agree?
AS> I recently read an online post where this question was posed: “Why are we hiring social media managers? We don’t have email managers, or fax managers. This is just another channel.” This is just approaching a customer via different channels. Is that what you are asking?
RD> Well! Let me give you an example. Let’s say I work for a company that sells in different verticals. I sell to the Education market. I belong to a LinkedIn group, where a prospect wants something in the Healthcare vertical, which I know that my company also sells. Right now, I am not incentivized to promote that information and it ends up being a lost sale for my company. The chances of me encountering that request are much higher than before. I see an opportunity to create a new incentive and accountability structure that does not let this opportunity die. Who is held accountable for taking actions on these encounters?
AS> It takes a village or a corporation to communicate with customers. Lots of people are using social media channels and they have a higher chance to meet a buyer. Is everyone then a salesperson? I absolutely agree that the organization become flatter. Salesforce.com gives the example that in Chatter, someone who is an entry-level salesperson can now chat with Marc Benioff because some online engagement allows them to do so. It takes away the hierarchy. Social technology is the great equalizer.
RD> What kind of resistance are you seeing when you talk to your clients about effectively implementing social media?
AS> There are several objections:
- We see skepticism that social media is for kids and personal views and there is no place for it in business and waste of salesperson’s time
- We see the lack of strategic initiatives. There are more grass-root level initiatives that are not scalable and repeatable across the organization
- We have poor metrics management, as most don’t know what to measure to appropriately monitor success
- We see the need for a process that is integrated to the sales workflow and sales process
RD> How do you learn?
AS> I ask questions. I read and I write. I have conversations. I go to the theater. I put myself in sometimes challenging and uncomfortable situations. I practice and I repeat.
RD> Do you think the current training providers and practices are meeting the needs of today’s salespeople especially in the context of Sales 2.0?
AS> My perception is that: like in Sales 2.0, if the idea is to customize the message to the buyer in different parts of the sales cycle, then should we not develop learning content and deliver to the learner when they need it in the learning cycle and deliver the right information at the right time in the right medium - the way they want to engage in learning? There is a huge opportunity here. There is also an opportunity to introduce process and metrics in training content. I think giving people a fun and engaging way to learn the content is important. And I also think that this is how most learners, me included, want to learn and practice. All of this leads to a huge opportunity and that's where I think PAKRA is positioned well.
RD> You have a career where it seems that you do all kinds of fun and innovative things driven by this “we’ll figure it out” attitude. What is next for you? Give us an exclusive scoop.
AS> I’m learning to snowboard. My friend Sarah Cooper started this company called Adventurous in San Francisco that uses the Endless Slope and provides a really cool way to learn snowboarding. It’s a technology enabled training device. It is all about muscle memory and I am completely hooked on it.
RD> I am checking out this site as we speak… This looks awesome! You can avoid the cold, dry wind, and snow and still you can get this simulated experience. This is really cool.
RD> Games! Simulations! Practice! Learning! Grand finale to our chat. Thank you for your time Anneke. This was most lovely.
AS> You are welcome! Talk to you soon.
This interview with Anneke is the twelfth in our series about learning, games, social media, crowd-sourcing, and work performance.
RD> First, on behalf of the PAKRA team, we would like to thank you for being completely instrumental in us selling in the Sales vertical and also being a mentor and adviser to us.
AS> PAKRA’s time is now. I’m glad to collaborate.
RD> So! Are you a gamer?
AS> I play scrabble through Facebook. I am definitely a crossword puzzle fan. I was introduced to Kinect by my cousin’s kid last Thanksgiving, particularly the Dance game. I can see myself playing this especially in the cold weather. I’m a Farmville wife. Once in a while, I look over Jack’s (my husband Jack Oswald) shoulder and he lets me play with some sheep and fertilizer.
RD> He does? Jack constantly plays Farmville, at least according to his Facebook posts. Working with bio ammonia in real life – well! He has to live his brand in a game. We all should live our brand in games.
RD> When I first met you in virtual space, I was very intrigued with the tagline of your personal brand on LinkedIn: "Questioner of the status quo" --- Why is it important to you to question status quo?
AS> It’s important to me because it is very easy to get comfortable with the way things are. If we don’t challenge ourselves, if we don’t change, if we don’t evolve, then we don’t improve. We don’t progress.
RD> So! Is the challenge and change that you are referring to only in your personal sphere, or are you also translating that in your work ethic and customers?
AS> It is not just about my personal life but also I use this mantra in the business world. More importantly, I am always looking for opportunities to improve organizational performance, improve a function, improve a group of people and their skills sets, improve business processes, implement new technologies. There is always room for improvement. Until and unless we question the status quo and the way things are, we cannot evolve nor progress.
RD> This brings us to Sales 2.0. Of course you are THE thought leader in both practice and theory. A quick question about that: Because there are many functional silos that customers have to navigate, what is the start and end step of a sales process in the Sales 2.0 world?
AS> Traditionally we think of things in very structured buckets. In today’s world, that does not work any more. There is so much interconnectedness and collaboration. There is across-the-board customer engagement. That is what sales is all about. The sales process can start differently for different people. It can start online; it can start with social media. It starts where the customer engages with your company. Hopefully, the process never ends. In fact it is more important after the sale as the customer is well qualified to continue to buy either different products and services or additional products and services. A lot of companies have different functions - new business reps and reps that focus on customer successes and nurture the existing customer base.
RD> Do you think that there is one story to be had? For instance, a Sales VP wants to get some part of the sales cycle done so they make a compromise to complete that part or should there be specialization in the Sales process?
AS> I think it is hard for one person to participate and play the entire Sales process role and play each part really well. It is very hard to manage an engagement through to the closing process, especially as one’s company grows, leading to the need to specialize. Also, people tend to be better at one part of the sales cycle than another part of the cycle. Some are better at engaging customers early on and some are better at closing. Specialization will happen.
RD> If you look at your own experience and the experience of your 300+ clients, what are the key factors to both deploy Sales 2.0 principles appropriately and to sustain it? In other words, what are the critical success factors for sustainable user adoption to Sales 2.0?
AS> I think many organizations try to change things very quickly involving too many people. I truly believe that if organizations start small, hand select and involve a small group of people who are very innovation-oriented and who are excited about trying something new and improve their productivity and in turn of course make more money, it is a better start. In my own career at Oracle, there was no way we could have come in and said, “we are going to implement an inside sales team globally and now you have to share your accounts.”
- The trust has to be built; the experiences have to be had. The field reps had to see that inside sales would not ruin their customer relationships and would only enhance the relationships. And once the field sees more revenue to be had, then the middle adopters come more easily.
- Also, you need the right executive sponsorship.
- Metrics and process are not intuitive and this makes it hard for people to rally around it.
- Also the implementation has to be consistent and requires lots of discipline.
RD> I also find that processes, metrics and a visible accountability system –are not liked by many folks in different levels of management (especially first-line managers, supervisors). That is one the biggest resistance we find in users adopting our PAKRA system.
AS> Gerhard Gschwandtner of Selling Power Magazine quotes Warren Buffet: "It's only when the tide goes out that you learn who's been swimming naked." That explains it. When I interviewed Stu Schmidt (formerly at Cisco WebEx) for my book he said that it took him a year to get the sales team to really embrace a new Sales 2.0-style sales process, based on their buyers’ buying cycles. That first year, the intensive focus was to get the first line manages on board. It takes practice.
Also, there is a perception that in some accounts, especially those located here in Silicon Valley, who fancy themselves as being innovative and creative, that if one implements process and metrics the creativity will somehow be hampered.
RD> You are now going down my memory lane of the entire Lean and Six Sigma Operations life that I led prior to PAKRA. There is some truth to that last belief because there are some people who like “check-marks” and who make it very bureaucratic. In fact, one of the things I always point out to my team, “over my dead body will you collect data on things that do not give us direction to improve and change.”
AS> You’re right. There has to be a structure that allows room for creativity to blossom. But with no structure at all then all the creativity in the world is not going to be productive in the business world.
RD> How do you define social selling?
AS> Essentially the same way that I define Sales 2.0. It is a more efficient and effective way of selling and buying for both the seller and the buyer, enabled by technology – in the case of social selling, using social technology.
RD> You are involved with Social Selling University. Tell me more about it.
AS> It is a program sponsored by InsideView. It includes in-person workshops, webinars and online content for sales professionals at all levels. It is being rolled out this month. I will be speaking on March 24. It is the first of its kind to help companies understand the opportunity of social selling and develop strategies and implement a social media process and metrics. My particular interest is in developing a track for executives. There are great examples of grassroots activities, but almost all are at the individual level. The opportunity is to capture the best practices such that we can enable and scale sales, marketing and customer success at organizations.
RD> Do you think the accountability of sales managers changes with social selling implementation? I perceive that the organizational structure to manage the process of acquiring and retaining a customer becomes flatter. Do you agree?
AS> I recently read an online post where this question was posed: “Why are we hiring social media managers? We don’t have email managers, or fax managers. This is just another channel.” This is just approaching a customer via different channels. Is that what you are asking?
RD> Well! Let me give you an example. Let’s say I work for a company that sells in different verticals. I sell to the Education market. I belong to a LinkedIn group, where a prospect wants something in the Healthcare vertical, which I know that my company also sells. Right now, I am not incentivized to promote that information and it ends up being a lost sale for my company. The chances of me encountering that request are much higher than before. I see an opportunity to create a new incentive and accountability structure that does not let this opportunity die. Who is held accountable for taking actions on these encounters?
AS> It takes a village or a corporation to communicate with customers. Lots of people are using social media channels and they have a higher chance to meet a buyer. Is everyone then a salesperson? I absolutely agree that the organization become flatter. Salesforce.com gives the example that in Chatter, someone who is an entry-level salesperson can now chat with Marc Benioff because some online engagement allows them to do so. It takes away the hierarchy. Social technology is the great equalizer.
RD> What kind of resistance are you seeing when you talk to your clients about effectively implementing social media?
AS> There are several objections:
- We see skepticism that social media is for kids and personal views and there is no place for it in business and waste of salesperson’s time
- We see the lack of strategic initiatives. There are more grass-root level initiatives that are not scalable and repeatable across the organization
- We have poor metrics management, as most don’t know what to measure to appropriately monitor success
- We see the need for a process that is integrated to the sales workflow and sales process
RD> How do you learn?
AS> I ask questions. I read and I write. I have conversations. I go to the theater. I put myself in sometimes challenging and uncomfortable situations. I practice and I repeat.
RD> Do you think the current training providers and practices are meeting the needs of today’s salespeople especially in the context of Sales 2.0?
AS> My perception is that: like in Sales 2.0, if the idea is to customize the message to the buyer in different parts of the sales cycle, then should we not develop learning content and deliver to the learner when they need it in the learning cycle and deliver the right information at the right time in the right medium - the way they want to engage in learning? There is a huge opportunity here. There is also an opportunity to introduce process and metrics in training content. I think giving people a fun and engaging way to learn the content is important. And I also think that this is how most learners, me included, want to learn and practice. All of this leads to a huge opportunity and that's where I think PAKRA is positioned well.
RD> You have a career where it seems that you do all kinds of fun and innovative things driven by this “we’ll figure it out” attitude. What is next for you? Give us an exclusive scoop.
AS> I’m learning to snowboard. My friend Sarah Cooper started this company called Adventurous in San Francisco that uses the Endless Slope and provides a really cool way to learn snowboarding. It’s a technology enabled training device. It is all about muscle memory and I am completely hooked on it.
RD> I am checking out this site as we speak… This looks awesome! You can avoid the cold, dry wind, and snow and still you can get this simulated experience. This is really cool.
RD> Games! Simulations! Practice! Learning! Grand finale to our chat. Thank you for your time Anneke. This was most lovely.
AS> You are welcome! Talk to you soon.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
Conversations with Harlina Sodhi, SVP at Reliance Industries, a change catalyst and Learning visionary
As recently appointed Senior Vice President of Learning and Organization Development for Reliance Industries, an ultimate Change Catalyst, and a believer of the “Tao of Cricket”, Harlina Sodhi is leading the effort to bring progressive and process driven, workforce training and development to Reliance Industries that is in line with company’s Strategic and Business Transformation goals.
This interview with Harlina is the eleventh in our series about learning, games, social media, crowd-sourcing and work performance.
RD> First, on behalf of the PAKRA team, we would like to thank you for being completely instrumental in implementing PAKRA system at your past employer - Genpact. Next, sincere congratulations for seizing this vast opportunity at your new gig -- Reliance. This is awesome news.
HS> Thank you. This is a huge opportunity for me to lead and execute on Reliance vision of getting to be the world’s best company for learning and development of workforce. And as you know, the reason I passionately spearheaded the efforts in Genpact for PAKRA is because I believe in the value that it offers. Right product and platform in the right place at the right time is PAKRA !
RD> So! Are you a gamer?
HS> I play Chess. A strategy-based game intrigues me. Also I am an avid car rallyist …but I am also pleased to share, ever since I got my smartphone, I don’t literally have to risk my life but am able to simulate the experience by playing mobile games like www.carsvideogame.com and Angry Bird
RD> How do you learn?
HS> I learn by doing. Tell me - Show me initially, and then I have to do it and then I can teach one. Learning that involves different levels of achievement motivates me.
RD> You and I are more or less in the same age group (Well! I am older ha!) -- do you think the way we learned and ways we were taught is different from the younger generation that is getting into the workforce? If yes, how different?
HS> It is completely different. The younger generation, in particular when you consider that places like in India and other emerging markets where the median age of an employee is 35 years, learn differently and want to be taught differently. For example, their attention span is short, (140 characters Twitter revolution), they learn on-the-go and they want to pull information when they need it in small chewable chunks. They want technology-enabled learning with streaming media, threaded conversations, blogs, games, simulations and not just a teacher delivering lectures and batch-based learning events.
RD> What role do you see for immersive learning using Games and simulations in today's workplace?
HS> The DNA is changing and being reprogrammed. In a place like India, that leap-frogged it’s growth using technology (i.e. the dabbawallahs, the dhobi, the Tuk-Tuk driver and the person living on the street all have cell phones and are probably playing Angry Bird as they stand at traffic lights), user-driven content is how information is being managed and leveraged. Also, many more women are in the workforce today than 25 years ago and they are influencing their children. This is what economic growth brings. In such type of a growth environment, immersive learning is what all are demanding. It is user-driven need and the role is very strong.
RD> How do you anticipate Social Media and crowd-sourcing will be used in business applications and Learning?
HS> It is coming and vehemently needed as platform for peer-to-peer learning. By “it is coming” I mean that not too many businesses are into it, yet. Like, any adoption cycle where you have innovators, early adopters, initiators, and laggards, here too there are businesses who are innovators and early adopters. Ease of use will drive the utilization of these tools. As you know, this is the ultimate Web 2.0 architecture. It will drive the business applications and how work gets communicated and learned. Based on what I hear from my colleagues and networking groups, there is a demand for a platform that enables the adult-learning paradigm. Brick and Mortar learning and communication channels are more symbolic.
RD> From at multinational companies like Xerox, Zenta, GE, Genpact and now at Reliance, what do you see as trends for Learning and Talent Development offerings in business environment?
HS> It has substantially evolved since I started my job at Xerox when I was 21.
First, for content trends: I am hearing and seeing need for short content and immersive focused delivery that enhances Leadership attributes. Also, I am seeing more demand to provide on-demand domain expertise.
From delivery perspective, I am seeing the movement away from the traditional Level 1 to 3 evaluation based Kirkpatrick model to Level 4; is “Impact on Performance” and ROI and significantly towards Bloom’s taxonomy based learning delivery.
For technology, I am seeing more and more demand for platforms (such as PAKRA) that provides on-demand push and Web 2.0 technology for small and targeted content, games and simulations for immersive learning, peer-learning online community and coaching and mentoring accountability where all this links it to real work performance.
When I first moved to Learning and Talent Development functional area, they typically reported to Human Resources. Progressive businesses are making Learning and Talent Development professionals report to Business and Operations leaders. The reality is that the accountability and responsibility of managing and recruiting high-performing employees still lies in the hands of Business and Operations leaders with Human Resources being an key enabler. That reality will not change in my life-time. With such organizational restructuring, these businesses are able to actualize the value of the monetary investment they put in on-the-job training and talent development efforts.
RD> What is your recommendation for someone entering the world of Learning and Talent Development professionals?
HS> Stop focusing on how many courses the employee completed. Stop focusing on how satisfied the learner is with the trainer or coach. Do not use test scores as the only way to measure ability of an employee to do their job. Focus on real work performance of the employee and how well they can apply the skill you just trained and coached them, to their day-to-day work interactions and the work itself.
RD> Thank you for your time Harlina. If some one can implement change and manage the associated change in an organization, you are the one. Wish you all the best at Reliance.
HS> You are welcome! Talk to you soon.
This interview with Harlina is the eleventh in our series about learning, games, social media, crowd-sourcing and work performance.
RD> First, on behalf of the PAKRA team, we would like to thank you for being completely instrumental in implementing PAKRA system at your past employer - Genpact. Next, sincere congratulations for seizing this vast opportunity at your new gig -- Reliance. This is awesome news.
HS> Thank you. This is a huge opportunity for me to lead and execute on Reliance vision of getting to be the world’s best company for learning and development of workforce. And as you know, the reason I passionately spearheaded the efforts in Genpact for PAKRA is because I believe in the value that it offers. Right product and platform in the right place at the right time is PAKRA !
RD> So! Are you a gamer?
HS> I play Chess. A strategy-based game intrigues me. Also I am an avid car rallyist …but I am also pleased to share, ever since I got my smartphone, I don’t literally have to risk my life but am able to simulate the experience by playing mobile games like www.carsvideogame.com and Angry Bird
RD> How do you learn?
HS> I learn by doing. Tell me - Show me initially, and then I have to do it and then I can teach one. Learning that involves different levels of achievement motivates me.
RD> You and I are more or less in the same age group (Well! I am older ha!) -- do you think the way we learned and ways we were taught is different from the younger generation that is getting into the workforce? If yes, how different?
HS> It is completely different. The younger generation, in particular when you consider that places like in India and other emerging markets where the median age of an employee is 35 years, learn differently and want to be taught differently. For example, their attention span is short, (140 characters Twitter revolution), they learn on-the-go and they want to pull information when they need it in small chewable chunks. They want technology-enabled learning with streaming media, threaded conversations, blogs, games, simulations and not just a teacher delivering lectures and batch-based learning events.
RD> What role do you see for immersive learning using Games and simulations in today's workplace?
HS> The DNA is changing and being reprogrammed. In a place like India, that leap-frogged it’s growth using technology (i.e. the dabbawallahs, the dhobi, the Tuk-Tuk driver and the person living on the street all have cell phones and are probably playing Angry Bird as they stand at traffic lights), user-driven content is how information is being managed and leveraged. Also, many more women are in the workforce today than 25 years ago and they are influencing their children. This is what economic growth brings. In such type of a growth environment, immersive learning is what all are demanding. It is user-driven need and the role is very strong.
RD> How do you anticipate Social Media and crowd-sourcing will be used in business applications and Learning?
HS> It is coming and vehemently needed as platform for peer-to-peer learning. By “it is coming” I mean that not too many businesses are into it, yet. Like, any adoption cycle where you have innovators, early adopters, initiators, and laggards, here too there are businesses who are innovators and early adopters. Ease of use will drive the utilization of these tools. As you know, this is the ultimate Web 2.0 architecture. It will drive the business applications and how work gets communicated and learned. Based on what I hear from my colleagues and networking groups, there is a demand for a platform that enables the adult-learning paradigm. Brick and Mortar learning and communication channels are more symbolic.
RD> From at multinational companies like Xerox, Zenta, GE, Genpact and now at Reliance, what do you see as trends for Learning and Talent Development offerings in business environment?
HS> It has substantially evolved since I started my job at Xerox when I was 21.
First, for content trends: I am hearing and seeing need for short content and immersive focused delivery that enhances Leadership attributes. Also, I am seeing more demand to provide on-demand domain expertise.
From delivery perspective, I am seeing the movement away from the traditional Level 1 to 3 evaluation based Kirkpatrick model to Level 4; is “Impact on Performance” and ROI and significantly towards Bloom’s taxonomy based learning delivery.
For technology, I am seeing more and more demand for platforms (such as PAKRA) that provides on-demand push and Web 2.0 technology for small and targeted content, games and simulations for immersive learning, peer-learning online community and coaching and mentoring accountability where all this links it to real work performance.
When I first moved to Learning and Talent Development functional area, they typically reported to Human Resources. Progressive businesses are making Learning and Talent Development professionals report to Business and Operations leaders. The reality is that the accountability and responsibility of managing and recruiting high-performing employees still lies in the hands of Business and Operations leaders with Human Resources being an key enabler. That reality will not change in my life-time. With such organizational restructuring, these businesses are able to actualize the value of the monetary investment they put in on-the-job training and talent development efforts.
RD> What is your recommendation for someone entering the world of Learning and Talent Development professionals?
HS> Stop focusing on how many courses the employee completed. Stop focusing on how satisfied the learner is with the trainer or coach. Do not use test scores as the only way to measure ability of an employee to do their job. Focus on real work performance of the employee and how well they can apply the skill you just trained and coached them, to their day-to-day work interactions and the work itself.
RD> Thank you for your time Harlina. If some one can implement change and manage the associated change in an organization, you are the one. Wish you all the best at Reliance.
HS> You are welcome! Talk to you soon.
Friday, February 11, 2011
Conversations with Kevin McLaughlin, inside sales leader, and business technology advocate
As an Inside Sales Manager at NetApp, technology advocate, and sports enthusiast, Kevin is responsible for building and leading high performing sales teams. In this conversation, we discuss how Kevin enables and drives results in the B2B sales world through technology, motivation and social media.
This interview with Kevin is the tenth in our series about learning, games, social media, crowd sourcing, and work performance.
MS> Hi Kevin. My first question for you is, are you a gamer?
KM> Not at all. I’m probably going to be very much in the minority here - but board games, video games - I have very little interest in either. I’m always doing something else.
MS> Okay, tell me a little bit about this “something else”?
KM> Right now it’s my kids’ sports.
MS> Nice. What sports do they play?
KM> Basketball mainly with my youngest, who plays on his high school team. Volleyball and skiing from a recreational perspective, we participate together.
MS> Sounds like you enjoy games, just not video games.
KM> Yes, I like to play them live. I also enjoy traveling, working out, and business and sports motivation.
MS> Tell me a little about how you learn. What’s your learning style?
KM> That’s an interesting question. To me, the best way to learn is through a combination of audio and video. Just reading out of a book, is more of a struggle. I think that today’s way of learning is much better for me.
MS> What’s interesting to me is that younger generations, elementary through college aged, primarily learn through technology and a combination of media. It’s the only way of learning that they know. Other generations that didn’t grow up with as much technology, I don’t want to say that there is a resistance, but they don’t always adapt as easily to this way of learning.
KM> Understood, but if you are around them enough you can adopt that way and it’s a lot of fun.
MS> Tell me a little bit about how NetApp uses social media to sell and manage the customer experience?
KM> Our marketing team is very much on this path as it relates to using social media outlets like LinkedIn and Facebook. Like many technology companies, we’re using those mediums to personalize the experience. We’re also using these outlets to help increase our brand awareness. Not everyone knows about NetApp, although we feel like we have the best value prop in the industry, as it relates to data storage and data management. I think we're still in the earlier stages as far as cracking in to social media and other ways of branding and getting the word out.
MS> Do you see social media as the future of how your company is going to expand brand awareness for NetApp?
KM> Yes, along with our alliances with companies like Cisco and VMware. That’s a big part of the coaching that I do with my team, I teach them to leverage the credibility and collaboration with these great companies. There’s a reason why Cisco and VMware chose NetApp for data storage/management in the Data Center of the Future. They, from a technology standpoint, know what our capabilities are. So, I think that it’s not just the social media aspect but also the key alliances that you have with strategic partners.
MS> I agree. Clearly you have partnerships with some very credible companies and that does say a lot about your company.
KM> Exactly.
MS> Does your sales team use social media in the pre-sales process? Do they use social media in prospecting before they pick up the phone?
KM> The answer is yes. We’re doing more and more of this. I am teaching my team to do as much pre-call planning as possible. Most sales people simply “Google a company” for information, but that can be multiple steps. We utilize tools like Jigsaw, Harte-Hanks, LinkedIn and others and embed them in our CRM tool, which helps us in our pre-call planning. We are working more closely with marketing than ever before to have them do some of this “information gathering” for us – bundle it, couple it, put a little mini-campaign around it – including scripting and talking points. I would say that my team is thoroughly immersed in that.
MS> Do you see a resistance to using social media, the Internet, and newer tools in your industry? Is there a feeling of new school versus old school, or do you see the industry as a whole moving in this direction?
KM> My sense is that some of this may be generational. Some of the younger users, who maybe tweeting, blogging and on Facebook certainly invite it. For others email is the preferred way. Very few people take direct phone calls, so using technology and social media to connect with prospects and customers is key. We are learning that the best way to reach someone is to have a very well thought out email or e-marketing strategy in advance of the actual call…something that differentiates us from the competition and those calling them on a daily basis. That dramatically increases our connect rate.
MS> That goes to one of the other points that I wanted to raise. How are today’s sales associates trained and coached differently to meet the needs of the busy, tech savvy buyers?
KM> Today’s buyers can hide behind their phones. They screen their voicemails as they do email, but they are open to those who have a compelling reason for them to listen! So I train my team to “connect” with the prospect as quickly as possible and get them talking about their role and IT environment and making it about them. We have an excellent training curriculum at NetApp that teaches the technology and perhaps more importantly, the business drivers behind the technology.
MS> Social media aside, how do you think technology can help enable sales in an environment like yours?
KM> I think that my team is very willing and open to using all forms of technology. A lot of it is, quite frankly, that they’re young. They’re recent college graduates – they expect to use technology and products like PAKRA. We’re building the team to be aggressive “hunters” that use technology like PAKRA and others to their advantage, to reach as many prospects and customers as possible with the NetApp story. I also think that they expect that our Marketing team uses technology to find us new lists, contacts and creative ways of connecting with prospects!
MS> Do you see a heavy overlap between where marketing ends and sales begins?
KM> Absolutely, there is a heavy overlap. It’s hand in glove. To make a war analogy, marketing and Inside Sales is air cover and field sales are the ground troops. I want marketing to soften up the base, get their Inside Sales team in early and then rely on the field/ISR/Channel to close it.
MS> That makes sense. Marketing is often brand awareness and lead generation, with the end goal being sales enablement.
KM> That’s the way that it’s supposed to be in my mind. Marketing needs to open up the door to sales.
MS> What factors do you think drive the adoption of new technology at a company like yours? For example, you rolled out the PAKRA products within the Inside Sales area of NetApp and user reception was so positive and adoption was incredibly high. What were the drivers behind that?
KM> One thing is that I have a boss who is incredibly open to new technology, he’s very innovative. He’s constantly searching for ways to not only improve productivity but also improve effectiveness. It’s one thing to be productive, but it’s an other thing to actually deliver. The other aspect to this is that the technology needs to be fun. I think that it’s a blend of these things, and PAKRA delivers both.
MS> You mentioned that you have a workforce that is right out of college and I do think that technology plays to how they learn. It’s an expectation to this generation. That fun factor and immediacy factor is important.
KM> I agree.
MS> We’ve covered a lot of ground today! Thanks for your time, Kevin. It’s always great talking to you.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
From UX Magazine: Interview with Harley Manning Vice President at Forrester Research about customer and user experience
This interview was not done by us. But we think for our series Conversations, this interview by UX magazine is very relevant and important discussion. UX Magazine interviews Harley Manning Vice President, Customer Experience at Forrester Research at the Forrester Customer Experience Forum
Making User and Customer Experience a Business Competency
The only question we would ask Mr. Manning in addition to what UX magazine asked is "How to crowd source the user interface design?"
Enjoy!
Making User and Customer Experience a Business Competency
The only question we would ask Mr. Manning in addition to what UX magazine asked is "How to crowd source the user interface design?"
Enjoy!
Friday, December 3, 2010
Conversations with Marianne Curran, EVP of Go Daddy, discussing Social Media as a channel to provide Customer Care
As Executive Vice President of Media & Communications for The Go Daddy Group Inc. , a Hawkeye, and a yoga enthusiast, Marianne Curran is responsible for the strategic expansion of Go Daddy’s communication efforts. She oversees Public Relations, Go Daddy Productions and Social Media. She also leads Go Daddy's Culture Team, which ensures that Go Daddy preserves its unique qualities and internal brand.
This interview with Marianne is the ninth in our series about learning, games, social media, crowd-sourcing and work performance.
RD> Are you a gamer?
MC> I haven't been a 'gamer' since I was a teenager. Back in the day, I enjoyed playing Mario Brothers.
RD> How do you learn?
MC> I'm definitely a visual learner.
RD> At the recent Customer Response Summit, you discussed how your company uses social media to manage customer experience. What led you to take on such an initiative?
MC> It's really Go Daddy's customers who led us into the social media space. A number of years ago, we took notice of many customers discussing Go Daddy and asking questions out in this public space. From years of experience providing the industry's best customer service, with 24/7 telephone and e-mail support, we've learned to make ourselves available in just about any and all of the communication platforms our customers might seek engagement.
RD> What were the unique challenges that social media channels presented that you and your team had to overcome?
MC> There are definitely challenges when communicating through social media. Expectations of real-time responses can be demanding from a resource perspective. To meet this challenge, we expanded our social media team to a "24/7" staff. We also cross train members in other areas where appropriate.
RD> Is Go Daddy focused only in B2B customers or personal websites (which is more consumer)? What % of your outreach are Small-Medium Enterprises v. Large enterprises?
MC> Go Daddy is focused on ALL of our 8.6 million global customers. Each and every one is important to Go Daddy as we want to provide them the tools and support to succeed online, quickly and affordably. A slight majority of Go Daddy customers are Small-Medium enterprises - but we have millions of personal users and large business customers as well.
RD> Do you use social media as a channel for selling (i.e. new customer acquisition) too? What kind of resistance do you see among B2B companies like yours in utilizing social selling?
MC> As the world's largest domain name registrar and top Web hosting provider, Go Daddy uses social media to interact with our customers, fans and followers on many levels. We discuss public relations events, brand initiatives, recruiting information as well as straight marketing promotions such as product discounts. For the most part, our fans and followers have been quite receptive to these types of promotions, which are geared toward them and offer a benefit. Go Daddy closely manages the frequency in which we communicate these types of messages out to our community - we are cognizant of customers' time and do our best each and every day to communicate only what they want to hear.
RD> I think employees, especially younger know how to use the tools faster than others but still do not know how to use the content to their advantage -- that requires critical thinking skills. How do you teach critical thinking skills now? Do you envision using games/simulations to teach employees what to do in this space?
MC> Go Daddy has an experienced, dedicated social media team. They are out there every day communicating with Go Daddy customers and potential customers. Our social media team members were selected because they have a strong knowledge of our company, our products and because they have excellent "people skills." Many of Go Daddy's social media employees have customer service experience from working directly within our highest escalation department, the Office of the President. Our external hires in the social media realm have spent considerable time training with the Office of the President team to build that knowledge.
As far as training our employees, Go Daddy uses a number of methods and is always looking to try out new techniques.
RD> How successful have you been in crowd-sourcing solutions?
MC> Yes, Go Daddy has had success in crowd sourcing. Through our ongoing engagement on social media platforms, we've built relationships over time, which is how crowd sourcing transpires. Go Daddy has a loyal community, which understands and appreciates our best-in-class 24/7-customer support, low prices and top-notch quality products - they love speaking about Go Daddy and we love to hear it!
RD> In your experience what are the key factors that are driving company adoption?
MC> There are a number of factors that help drive company adoption.
First, it is to acknowledge and address any and all service issues that arise. Until you step up and help the customer solve their issue, they simply will not be open to engage with you on any other level.
Second, bi-directional communication is so important - folks do not just want to be talked TO - they like to share and express their opinions as much as they like to hear what's going on around them.
Third, but certainly not least, when Go Daddy communicates with our community, it's around all sorts of topics - a charitable contribution, a business tip from our CEO and Founder Bob Parsons to help an entrepreneur succeed, an order-level discount, news about one of our famous Go Daddy Girls, and so on. In other words, Go Daddy stays open and is actively sharing company information on all sorts of levels.
RD> Thank you for your time Marianne. Good Luck with your strategies.
MC> You are welcome!
This interview with Marianne is the ninth in our series about learning, games, social media, crowd-sourcing and work performance.
RD> Are you a gamer?
MC> I haven't been a 'gamer' since I was a teenager. Back in the day, I enjoyed playing Mario Brothers.
RD> How do you learn?
MC> I'm definitely a visual learner.
RD> At the recent Customer Response Summit, you discussed how your company uses social media to manage customer experience. What led you to take on such an initiative?
MC> It's really Go Daddy's customers who led us into the social media space. A number of years ago, we took notice of many customers discussing Go Daddy and asking questions out in this public space. From years of experience providing the industry's best customer service, with 24/7 telephone and e-mail support, we've learned to make ourselves available in just about any and all of the communication platforms our customers might seek engagement.
RD> What were the unique challenges that social media channels presented that you and your team had to overcome?
MC> There are definitely challenges when communicating through social media. Expectations of real-time responses can be demanding from a resource perspective. To meet this challenge, we expanded our social media team to a "24/7" staff. We also cross train members in other areas where appropriate.
RD> Is Go Daddy focused only in B2B customers or personal websites (which is more consumer)? What % of your outreach are Small-Medium Enterprises v. Large enterprises?
MC> Go Daddy is focused on ALL of our 8.6 million global customers. Each and every one is important to Go Daddy as we want to provide them the tools and support to succeed online, quickly and affordably. A slight majority of Go Daddy customers are Small-Medium enterprises - but we have millions of personal users and large business customers as well.
RD> Do you use social media as a channel for selling (i.e. new customer acquisition) too? What kind of resistance do you see among B2B companies like yours in utilizing social selling?
MC> As the world's largest domain name registrar and top Web hosting provider, Go Daddy uses social media to interact with our customers, fans and followers on many levels. We discuss public relations events, brand initiatives, recruiting information as well as straight marketing promotions such as product discounts. For the most part, our fans and followers have been quite receptive to these types of promotions, which are geared toward them and offer a benefit. Go Daddy closely manages the frequency in which we communicate these types of messages out to our community - we are cognizant of customers' time and do our best each and every day to communicate only what they want to hear.
RD> I think employees, especially younger know how to use the tools faster than others but still do not know how to use the content to their advantage -- that requires critical thinking skills. How do you teach critical thinking skills now? Do you envision using games/simulations to teach employees what to do in this space?
MC> Go Daddy has an experienced, dedicated social media team. They are out there every day communicating with Go Daddy customers and potential customers. Our social media team members were selected because they have a strong knowledge of our company, our products and because they have excellent "people skills." Many of Go Daddy's social media employees have customer service experience from working directly within our highest escalation department, the Office of the President. Our external hires in the social media realm have spent considerable time training with the Office of the President team to build that knowledge.
As far as training our employees, Go Daddy uses a number of methods and is always looking to try out new techniques.
RD> How successful have you been in crowd-sourcing solutions?
MC> Yes, Go Daddy has had success in crowd sourcing. Through our ongoing engagement on social media platforms, we've built relationships over time, which is how crowd sourcing transpires. Go Daddy has a loyal community, which understands and appreciates our best-in-class 24/7-customer support, low prices and top-notch quality products - they love speaking about Go Daddy and we love to hear it!
RD> In your experience what are the key factors that are driving company adoption?
MC> There are a number of factors that help drive company adoption.
First, it is to acknowledge and address any and all service issues that arise. Until you step up and help the customer solve their issue, they simply will not be open to engage with you on any other level.
Second, bi-directional communication is so important - folks do not just want to be talked TO - they like to share and express their opinions as much as they like to hear what's going on around them.
Third, but certainly not least, when Go Daddy communicates with our community, it's around all sorts of topics - a charitable contribution, a business tip from our CEO and Founder Bob Parsons to help an entrepreneur succeed, an order-level discount, news about one of our famous Go Daddy Girls, and so on. In other words, Go Daddy stays open and is actively sharing company information on all sorts of levels.
RD> Thank you for your time Marianne. Good Luck with your strategies.
MC> You are welcome!
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
In the "Instant" world of "Push" Technology how long is 4 minutes?
Question: In the "Instant" world of "Push" Technology to upgrade web solutions, how long is 4 minutes to a user?
The answer: Per minute delay in instant connect, increases the probability of losing a sale (a customer) or disengaging an employee by 5%.
First, a disclaimer, our company blog is not a bully pulpit to bring personal gripes. This is a case study that I share in order to help us and our readers learn about critical thinking skills, crowd-sourcing, social media and customer service.
We are a remarkable learning SaaS company. We consider ourselves small, but innovative and agile and have maturity to listen and address prospect/customer's needs. So! what will happen 5 years from now, when we have grown and introduced the complexity and structure? Will that not bring down the level of innovation and agility to meet our customer's needs?
When people ask me, "what keeps you awake at night?" I can safely say, this scenario of impending downside of growth keeps me awake at night.
Why does this scenario keep me awake at night?
Let me share an example of a Great Company where some of my good friends have worked and some continue to work. It is a company whose innovation, business model and spirit of agility were something I admired and emulated for PAKRA --- that Great Company also happens to be a key technology provider for us. Their once innovative technology helps our company reach out globally, conduct meetings both internal with our employees and partners and is the place where every potential buyer experiences our products for the first time. In other words, this service provider is as valuable as fuel, electricity and water for our existence. Using their products, we do 100% of our sales and almost all our staff and internal meetings.
This past Monday, they launched and delivered their new upgrade on client-user instance via push technology (browser and O/S agnostic). This upgrade was supposed to bring some delightful array of features (which frankly we did not ask for). By their own estimates (and verified separately by three unrelated individuals) "it can take on average 4 minutes on a reasonable connection for a participant to download this upgrade on their side before they can connect".
This push upgrade brought our lives to a standstill.
After 24 hours of my first tweet (I heard from a conference speaker about their great use of social media to drive customer care) and retweets of other users, I finally heard from them and then it took another hour and half for them to call me.
Then the situation of mitigation became more frustrating.
The customer service representative who finally called seemed to be in a hurry and with a non-empathetic voice wanted to determine the root cause. In summary: why our customers are concerned about on average 4-minute delay; if it was a user related error i.e. us.
This is why?
"All participants over 6 meetings with innumerable O/S and browsers and their versions, from different parts of the world(India, US, Canada, UK) had problems connecting from 3 minutes to 20 minutes. Let me explain, it takes me weeks to coordinate a prospect company to get their team to agree to a 20-30 minutes meeting and coordinate their calendars to find a date and time. Let's say there are 1 to 5 participants and the last person -- the Boss Man joins and starts the process 5 minutes past the scheduled meeting time. Now we are theoretically into a wait of 9 minutes of a potential 20-minutes sales call. We are not even going bring in the statistic of variation, where in one case, one person could not connect over 20 minutes. We just lost a sell. Now do you see the problem?"
When we operate in the world where instant meeting connect means "instant". That 9 minutes just decreased our chance to win our prospect by 45%. Most of our meetings got rescheduled which given the timing of the year, meant delayed the sales cycle by additional 60 days. That's how long 4 minutes is.
What do we learn at PAKRA from this experience – because this can happen to our customers, as we grow?
First lesson:
If at any time, our developers tell me to push a new upgrade to all our customers, and in testing it shows that it will take the user X minutes wait time before they can use the product, I say, "No Go forward".
Second lesson:
Teach our customer service agents, critical thinking skills when discussing with the customer (our brand after all).
For example, teach the necessary skills to the customer service agents, such that they never say things such as -- (These are paraphrased quotes.)
(i) "Oh I am so sorry your customers are not nice to you."
(ii) "Ma'am, your participants delayed in joining -- we cannot be responsible for their actions."
(ii) "Oh! we are giving such a better interface. This is only one-time interface download. Upgrades are free. so! this should be only a minor frustration."
(iii) "How is a few minutes delay an issue?"
Third Lesson:
Teach all employees to understand
-- the impact on the customer when our product and services fail to meet the "must-have" and "more-is-better" Kano features of our products.
-- how the customer uses our products and how they get value out of them.
-- the value our company provides to our customers.
Fourth lesson:
Have 24X7 coverage to listen-in, since social media is the most important channel for us to listen-in.
Fifth lesson:
We must provide influence-capital to the employees who engage in social-media channels with our customers. The agents servicing this channel of in/outbound listening are typically handling situations where "must-have" needs of customers are not being met. Those inquiries require special skilled people not your "let me see which browser you are using M'aam?" problem solvers.
OK! Now I feel relieved, we are just beginning to define a plan to prevent and mitigate issues as they emerge while our company grows.
As I still feel loyal to my friends at this Great Company and I have no guarantee that other providers would not have lost their vision, their strength like Great Company has, I will not cancel our subscription yet. Plus, they said it will take 48 hours while they petition their Bosses, whether our company's account can be locked to past version such that no one invited to participate in our meeting ever has a 4 minute delay, --- I am dying with curiosity and want to see how this plays out.
Meanwhile, we have a company-wide moratorium to use our key provider's products for 2 days -- because we are loyal but not stupid.
Few days from now, on our blog, you will read a fabulous case study of another company that has figured out how to use social media channels to implement a great customer-care and customer acquisition.
The answer: Per minute delay in instant connect, increases the probability of losing a sale (a customer) or disengaging an employee by 5%.
First, a disclaimer, our company blog is not a bully pulpit to bring personal gripes. This is a case study that I share in order to help us and our readers learn about critical thinking skills, crowd-sourcing, social media and customer service.
We are a remarkable learning SaaS company. We consider ourselves small, but innovative and agile and have maturity to listen and address prospect/customer's needs. So! what will happen 5 years from now, when we have grown and introduced the complexity and structure? Will that not bring down the level of innovation and agility to meet our customer's needs?
When people ask me, "what keeps you awake at night?" I can safely say, this scenario of impending downside of growth keeps me awake at night.
Why does this scenario keep me awake at night?
Let me share an example of a Great Company where some of my good friends have worked and some continue to work. It is a company whose innovation, business model and spirit of agility were something I admired and emulated for PAKRA --- that Great Company also happens to be a key technology provider for us. Their once innovative technology helps our company reach out globally, conduct meetings both internal with our employees and partners and is the place where every potential buyer experiences our products for the first time. In other words, this service provider is as valuable as fuel, electricity and water for our existence. Using their products, we do 100% of our sales and almost all our staff and internal meetings.
This past Monday, they launched and delivered their new upgrade on client-user instance via push technology (browser and O/S agnostic). This upgrade was supposed to bring some delightful array of features (which frankly we did not ask for). By their own estimates (and verified separately by three unrelated individuals) "it can take on average 4 minutes on a reasonable connection for a participant to download this upgrade on their side before they can connect".
This push upgrade brought our lives to a standstill.
After 24 hours of my first tweet (I heard from a conference speaker about their great use of social media to drive customer care) and retweets of other users, I finally heard from them and then it took another hour and half for them to call me.
Then the situation of mitigation became more frustrating.
The customer service representative who finally called seemed to be in a hurry and with a non-empathetic voice wanted to determine the root cause. In summary: why our customers are concerned about on average 4-minute delay; if it was a user related error i.e. us.
This is why?
"All participants over 6 meetings with innumerable O/S and browsers and their versions, from different parts of the world(India, US, Canada, UK) had problems connecting from 3 minutes to 20 minutes. Let me explain, it takes me weeks to coordinate a prospect company to get their team to agree to a 20-30 minutes meeting and coordinate their calendars to find a date and time. Let's say there are 1 to 5 participants and the last person -- the Boss Man joins and starts the process 5 minutes past the scheduled meeting time. Now we are theoretically into a wait of 9 minutes of a potential 20-minutes sales call. We are not even going bring in the statistic of variation, where in one case, one person could not connect over 20 minutes. We just lost a sell. Now do you see the problem?"
When we operate in the world where instant meeting connect means "instant". That 9 minutes just decreased our chance to win our prospect by 45%. Most of our meetings got rescheduled which given the timing of the year, meant delayed the sales cycle by additional 60 days. That's how long 4 minutes is.
What do we learn at PAKRA from this experience – because this can happen to our customers, as we grow?
First lesson:
If at any time, our developers tell me to push a new upgrade to all our customers, and in testing it shows that it will take the user X minutes wait time before they can use the product, I say, "No Go forward".
Second lesson:
Teach our customer service agents, critical thinking skills when discussing with the customer (our brand after all).
For example, teach the necessary skills to the customer service agents, such that they never say things such as -- (These are paraphrased quotes.)
(i) "Oh I am so sorry your customers are not nice to you."
(ii) "Ma'am, your participants delayed in joining -- we cannot be responsible for their actions."
(ii) "Oh! we are giving such a better interface. This is only one-time interface download. Upgrades are free. so! this should be only a minor frustration."
(iii) "How is a few minutes delay an issue?"
Third Lesson:
Teach all employees to understand
-- the impact on the customer when our product and services fail to meet the "must-have" and "more-is-better" Kano features of our products.
-- how the customer uses our products and how they get value out of them.
-- the value our company provides to our customers.
Fourth lesson:
Have 24X7 coverage to listen-in, since social media is the most important channel for us to listen-in.
Fifth lesson:
We must provide influence-capital to the employees who engage in social-media channels with our customers. The agents servicing this channel of in/outbound listening are typically handling situations where "must-have" needs of customers are not being met. Those inquiries require special skilled people not your "let me see which browser you are using M'aam?" problem solvers.
OK! Now I feel relieved, we are just beginning to define a plan to prevent and mitigate issues as they emerge while our company grows.
As I still feel loyal to my friends at this Great Company and I have no guarantee that other providers would not have lost their vision, their strength like Great Company has, I will not cancel our subscription yet. Plus, they said it will take 48 hours while they petition their Bosses, whether our company's account can be locked to past version such that no one invited to participate in our meeting ever has a 4 minute delay, --- I am dying with curiosity and want to see how this plays out.
Meanwhile, we have a company-wide moratorium to use our key provider's products for 2 days -- because we are loyal but not stupid.
Few days from now, on our blog, you will read a fabulous case study of another company that has figured out how to use social media channels to implement a great customer-care and customer acquisition.
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