Safety app specialists StaySafe have launched IncidentEye, an app that allows companies to quickly locate and monitor the safety of their staff in the event of a terror attack or other emergency.

IncidentEye, which is compatible with both Android and iOS devices, is a smartphone app and cloud-based hub which allows an employer to rapidly locate and protect employees during an emergency.

The solution has been developed in response to the growing number of incidents, both man-made and natural, that are affecting businesses around the world.

“Recent years have seen a rise in terror attacks and active shooter incidents, whilst climate change experts predict that warmer temperatures and high tides will continue to increase the number of natural disasters occurring” comments Don Cameron, CEO, StaySafe.

“These events are unpredictable and can cause considerable panic and disruption, both to staff and business operations. IncidentEye provides organisations with an effective way to instantly respond in the event of an emergency and monitor the wellbeing of their staff. The app provides real-time information to instantly ascertain where employees are located, ringfence those in the area and communicates with them until everyone is accounted for, with minimal disruption to the rest of the workforce”.

The app, which lies dormant on staff phones until an incident is triggered by their employer, uses location data to establish if any employees the in the danger zone and prompt them to check in safely. The app can then be used to communicate with affected staff, sharing up to date safety information and warning any near-by employees to avoid the area until the incident is resolved. Status information and communications are also tracked throughout and are saved as a report and audit trail.

Owen Loeffellechner, Chief Safety & Security Officer at Bank of New Zealand is one of the first clients to go live with the new app.

“The safety and well-being of our people is paramount and so we are continuously looking at ways we can exercise our duty of care better.” states Loeffellechner.

“As a business, we have a large national footprint consisting of many locations, including an active mobile workforce. The combination of these elements, industry related risks and a country that can be subjected to earthquakes means emergency communication is essential.

We are therefore very pleased to have adopted IncidentEye as our emergency communication service. We believe in times of an emergency this will contribute significantly to our capability to confirm the welfare status of our people and provide a timely response, or to proactively communicate about serious threats”

Colin Hay, Vice President Sales UK at Puzzel, discusses why contact centre employers should not forget about their employees as the deployment of tech becomes more widespread.

In the late 1980s, contact centres became welcome sources of employment as soft skills in the growing service industry replaced traditional manual skills in the manufacturing sector. Today, around 6,200 customer-service centres in the UK employ nearly 1.3 million people (i) but that workforce is facing challenges itself as consumers embrace digital technologies. The latest predictions from ContactBabel estimate that 45,700 jobs will disappear from the sector between now and 2021 (ii).

Anne-Marie Stagg, chief executive of the Call Centre Management Association, believes machine-learning, which is inspiring a whole new world of Artificial Intelligence (AI), is the culprit or “current bogeyman” behind such predictions and goes on to explain that this is nothing unusual.  She recently said:

“Every couple of years there’s a bogeyman that’s going to take jobs, but we are not seeing it. Call volumes are declining but those that come through are more complex and take longer to resolve.”

Anne-Marie’s enlightening statement reflects Puzzel’s own conclusion that technology is vital to the evolution of the contact centre but people are pivotal to its survival. Therefore, is it time to stop the scaremongering?
I believe that there are 3 top contact centre roles that make humans invaluable:

1.Understanding the customer

Clever technology such as speech analytics and silent monitoring are great ways to capture the mood of the customer, and web analytics provide useful data on website visits and user experiences to assess what is working and what is not.

However, it’s no use having all this technology and information at your fingertips if you don’t use it properly. A good customer service strategy starts with good people and a carefully thought-out approach that involves close collaboration and communication within the whole organisation for example:

Use your agents – they deal directly with customers and will know why they are contacting you in the first place, if they are happy, what the pain-points are and which channels they prefer to use. Effective managers will devise mechanisms that allow agents to pool and share this important knowledge.

Managers take note – contact centre leaders should then act on customer feedback to improve call scripts and agent training and then enhance business processes that proactively manage predictable’ situations and resolve problems quickly.

Introduce technology that matters – when agents and managers understand their customers, they are better placed to introduce the technologies that support their customers’ needs rather than deploy technology for technology’s sake. For example, if you know that 80% of your customers are aged 65 years and over and prefer to use the telephone then invest in voice, rather than risk alienating valuable customers by too much emphasis on Web Chat or virtual assistants.

2. Handling today’s complex conversations

It might appear counter-intuitive but digitalisation has actually elevated the role of the contact centre agent. Agents today are expected to have knowledge of all products, services and manage multiple web chats, social media posts and emails, as well as answering calls, in equal measure. What is more, the voice calls that agents now handle often take longer, are more complex and require moral judgment and empathy. This is good news for those working in contact centres today. Businesses are paying a premium to attract and keep this new breed of super-agent because they, not technology, are driving positive interactions with customers that really make their organisations stand out from the crowd.

Of course, emerging technologies such as AI in all its forms – robots, digital assistants, virtual agents is radically transforming customer interactions but there is no substitute to the human touch when it comes to closing sales calls or delivering exceptional customer service.

3. Creating the right framework

Even legislation such as the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS) and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) must first be managed by people tasked with putting in place the right processes to handle a constantly changing regulatory environment. It’s up to people to ask the right questions and establish effective ways of working with technology providers and partners. This is where face-to-face human discussions come into their own. They encourage best-practice processes that can then be built into the automated technology and workflows to support them.

According to the scaremongers humans have been under threat in contact centres since the first dotcom bubble at the end of the 1990s. It is true that omnichannel communication has changed the way in which customer service is now delivered, however, human communication will remain at the heart of contact centres and an exceptional customer experience.
You are invited to share your own experiences and learn from fellow contact centre professionals about the role of people in contact centres at Puzzel’s ‘Get Connected Conference’ on 27th June at the China Exchange in London. To register and find out more visit the Puzzel website

In the meantime, if you missed the first blog in the series “Delivering an exceptional customer experience through people, process and technology – a three point plan”, visit Puzzel

Generation Z, those born from the mid-1990s onwards, will be the last generation to remember a product-based economy, according to a new global research report “The Rise of Asset and Service Data Gravity”, conducted by Vanson Bourne on behalf of ServiceMax from GE Digital.

As the trend to servitization (bundling services with products) and the appetite for outcome-based contracts and business models continues, seventy seven percent of those surveyed believe Gen Z will be the last generation to experience an economy dominated by products alone without any embedded services or outcomes.

All-encompassing service models are nothing new, with telephone systems, broadband and IT providers and even TV services like Sky already bundling together equipment and service into one monthly fee – but the model is moving to other areas.

National Managed IT Support provider, ITCS, says servitisation is a sensible model for business clients to adopt:

“Our customers are often not technology experts, so they don’t know which hardware goes with what and have not got the time to juggle multiple devices, multiple guarantees, multiple providers and separate service contracts.   If something breaks, do you call your PC supplier, your IT support guy or your broadband supplier?

“At ITCS, we offer a fully managed service which includes everything in one fixed monthly fee – broadband, phones, networks, IT equipment, software, everything if required!  If something then goes wrong, it’s easy for the business user – they call us and we fix the problem, and we replace the equipment when needed.  I’m not surprised servitization is spreading to home users, it makes sense.”

The research, which surveyed 600 IT decision makers and field service management leaders across the USA, UK, France, Germany, Turkey, UAE and Saudi Arabia, also revealed that 84 percent say they want the same outcome-based efficiencies in their consumer lives that organisations are currently experiencing in a business context.

“Servitization is reshaping business models, and demand for servitized convenience and efficiency means it’s just a matter of time before it reaches a tipping point in a consumer context,” says Mark Homer, Vice President Global Customer Transformation for ServiceMax.

“Outcome-based contracts and business models have put asset data in a critical new light, along with the service data associated with it. We’re seeing products, new revenue streams and operational interdependencies all gravitating towards the data because of the untapped value and insights it holds. The advent of connected equipment assets, industrial platforms and servitization has made service data more valuable and strategic than ever before, yet it remains under monetized for most companies.”

Respondents say vast improvements are needed in the management of real time access to their service data, as well as the ability to both aggregate and analyze it with the rest of the business. Eighty seven percent say the successful collection and use of asset service data will have an impact on their organization’s ability to remain competitive.

The research found that ninety five percent of companies that don’t currently operate a fully servitized business model say they are already working towards it or are planning to in the future, and eighty nine percent believe servitization will enhance the way their industry operates.

For more details about the research and the changing role of asset and service data, click here.

Neyber, the financial wellbeing company, has recruited James Malia, a highly experienced employee benefits expert, as part of its leadership team. As Head of Account Management​,​ James will lead his team to help employers manage complex workforce dynamics and then design bespoke financial wellbeing strategies to increase employee financial resilience.

James has worked in the employee benefits sector for 10 years, running a team of 70 at Sodexo as Director of Employee Benefits and previously as Managing Director at P&MM Employee Benefits. 

At Neyber, James will strengthen and lead the Client Relationship team, managing some of the largest and most sophisticated employers in the country, including Royal Mail, Co-op, Asda, Anglian Water, Harrods, UK Power Networks and London City Airport. In its 3 years, Neyber has grown exponentially, now reaching over 1 million employees in over 200 organisations, with workplace financial educational programmes and five borrowing products. James’ remit is to ensure that Neyber’s products and services are fully embedded, supporting each organisation’s workforce.

James said:

“To me, Neyber is all about offering genuine, helpful assistance to individual employees and, therefore, their employers. We all have important lives outside of work, so helping someone improve their financial outcome, either by paying less for a loan, saving more or helping them understand their finances better, means they can have the comfort of better financial security. Really, it’s still about the fundamentals, putting money aside, ensuring outgoings are less than income, all in a sustainable plan.”

“I’ve been watching Neyber since it’s beginning and have seen the positive impact it has on employers and their people. Having started my career helping individuals manage their monthly income and outgoings efficiently, joining Neyber is like coming full circle. I’ll be helping large numbers of people, through their employers, to better manage their finances.”

Monica Kalia, Co-founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Neyber, said:

“James’ appointment comes with real excitement here as his background and credentials are a perfect fit for our culture. He will help drive the Neyber team forward to ensure our clients have all the support they need for employees to be more financially resilient.”

To find out more about Neyber, please visit www.neyber.co.uk.

Aon Employee Benefits, the UK health and benefits business of Aon plc (NYSE:AON), says that its Benefits and Trends Survey 2018 showed marked sector differences in the number of UK employers reporting employee stress and mental health-related illnesses.

Of the five markets analysed, the Legal and Professional Services sector showed the highest incidence of employers (82%) that reported an increase in mental health-related illness in their workforces. Also high was the Technology sector, where more than three quarters (78%) of businesses noticed an increase. Sixty-two percent of Finance sector firms reported an increase, while, at the comparatively lower end, 50% of Manufacturing and 40% of Pharmaceutical companies reported increases. These compare to an overall UK figure of employers reporting an increase from 55% last year to 68% in 2018.

The survey also noted the percentage of companies that have a dedicated budget for health and wellbeing programmes. Legal and Professional Services have comparatively the lowest proportion (11%) of firms with a dedicated budget, in contrast to having the highest incidence of employers reporting an increase in mental health-related issues. A third of participants in the Finance sector and 24% of the Technology sector have a dedicated budget, while 13% of Manufacturing firms and 60% of Pharmaceutical firms have such a budget.

In the Thriving at Work report, the independent review requested by Prime Minister Theresa May into how employers can better support mental health of people in employment, it was found that mental health costs, on average, £1,119 – £1,481 per employee per year. This rises to £2,017- £2,564 in the finance, real estate and insurance sectors, compared to £1,473 to £1,998 in professional services, or £841 to £1,421 in information and communication sectors.

Mark Witte, head of healthcare and risk consulting at Aon, said:

 

“There are interesting contrasts between sectors. For instance, 60% of Pharmaceutical employers have a health and wellbeing budget, the highest of the sectors, while only 40% have reported an increase in mental health-related illness, the lowest of the sectors studied. I would caution however, that although it is possible that there is a correlation between targeted funding and a lower trend of mental health-related illness, there are many other possible factors at play.

 

“Organisations need to analyse and define their own data to create considered action and, in time, measure impacts. This is the optimal approach, bearing in mind the diverse nature of every organisation. Increasingly employers are using data to help drive strategy and measure ongoing success (25% according to Aon’s 2017 Health Survey, with 40% intending to), but overall there is a long way for many organisations to go before they can characterise their wellbeing strategy as data-driven.”

Mark Witte continued:

“We also know from a recent CIPD report, that after common illnesses such as coughs and colds, stress and mental ill health is the second highest cause of short-term absence, and the most common cause of long-term absence. But again, understanding organisational data means employers can engage in relevant and meaningful activity.”

Across all sectors, Aon’s Benefits and Trends Survey showed a 25% increase in the proportion of organisations with designated funding for their health and wellbeing programmes, with over half of respondents having a specific budget in place or intending to have one within the next three years. Generally, employer investment in proactive initiatives to tackle mental health and stress specifically have increased to 42% from 36% in the previous year. Proactive initiatives include mental health first aid training, which teaches managers and staff how to spot the signs and symptoms of common mental health issues, providing support and guiding a person to seek professional help and gain resilience coaching.

Eighty-four percent of employers overall said that they consider themselves responsible for influencing their employees’ health behaviours.

Download a copy of the Benefits and Trends Survey 2018

New research from job search app, https://jobmagnet.com, reveals that unemployed, single job seekers take job rejection hard and therefore HR Managers need to be sensitive in the way they approach the candidates involved.

The job board undertook a survey of 1,200 unemployed Britons in order to understand more about the habits of those searching for employment. All respondents taking part in the poll had been unemployed for at least three months, were currently single and at least 18 years old. There was an even male/female divide.

Results were surprising.

All respondents were first asked, “What’s most upsetting, rejection from a potential employer or a love interest?” to which a third (34%) stated that they find it hardest to handle rejection from employers. They were then asked, “What would you most like to find, the perfect job or the perfect partner?” to which 59% would prefer to land their dream job than their dream man or woman.

Of those that found employer rejection worst, 54% were female; and it was men who were more keen to find their dream woman rather than their dream job, making up 65% of the respondents who chose the perfect partner over the perfect job.

How job rejection affected the respondents

All respondents were then asked to identify any behaviours as a result of a job rejection, to which 61% had ‘cried’, 57% had ‘drunk alcohol’ and 51% had ‘eaten unhealthy food’. 14% confessed that they had ‘rebounded to an old employer’.

A spokesperson at https://jobmagnet.com commented on the research:

“Finding the right job is a little bit like finding the right partner; it can take a while, you might have to kiss a few frogs along the way and you just have to keep trying.  In all seriousness, it will surprise some people that women make up the majority of those who are most upset by an employer’s rejection, and are more keen to find the perfect job than the perfect partner. Getting rejected always carries a sting, but it’s important not to let it get you down. What’s meant to be will be and you won’t find your happy ending if you give up!”

Of course, this does show one thing – that HR Managers need to be sensitive when letting candidates down.

How HR can let candidates down gently

HR Expert Susan Healthfield believes that recruiters should be thoughtful when approaching candidate rejection, not least because the influence of social media means that these days,  a disgruntled candidate’s rant is potentially seen by up to 1,374 people.  She says:

“The first consideration when you reject a job candidate is that you are not rejecting the candidate as an individual human. So, you want to term the rejection in a more positive light. Don’t use the word rejected. Say instead, “The selection team has decided that they will not pursue your candidacy further. We will retain your application and consider it when additional openings come up.” (If this is true, otherwise skip the second sentence.)

Susan also believes that after a candidate has come for an interview, an email rejection is not appropriate.  She says:

“After an interview, you must call the applicant. Never reject the candidate by email, text message, voicemail, or IM. You owe the candidate the courtesy of a call even if you follow up the call with a rejection letter.

Ultimately, organisations should treat candidates with the same level of respect they would extend to customers – you never know where they will ultimately end up, and kindness costs nothing.

Employees share less information with minority group colleagues, according to a study by the Rotterdam School of Management, Erasmus University.

The larger the cultural differences between a majority and minority nationality, the less likely it is that employees will share information with them.

The research examined problem-solving in 60 mixed groups of three nationalities: German, Dutch and Chinese. In all cases, the Chinese participants were given less information by their team members, leaving them unable to complete the task.

Burcu Subaşi, the lead researcher, says:

“In the workplace, people tend to categorise colleagues based on nationality and attribute a particular status to it. Being part of a country’s majority nationality typically leads to higher status and being seen as more competent by others. And, because people are more likely to share information with those of a higher status, people with the dominant nationality tend to receive more information.

“Until now, most research has assumed that having a minority nationality left an employee at a disadvantage, but not all minorities are stereotyped and categorised equally. When the cultural differences are small, the status of the minority group is not necessarily much lower.” 

The study showed that bias disappeared when the groups were being observed.

Subaşi says:

“An observer, which in practice could be a colleague or a manager, makes people feel more accountable for their actions. The social pressure of being watched forces them to look beyond the stereotypes and start looking for individual merits in their team members.

“In order to prevent performance deficits of ‘low-status’ minorities, companies could encourage knowledge transfer between colleagues, increase the diversity of work teams, emphasise task-relevant abilities of employees or even introduce open plan offices where employees can be easily observed by managers or other colleagues. It is important for organisations to tackle both conscious and unconscious biases in order to prevent underperformance in their employees.”

According to Neyber, the Financial Conduct Authority’s announcement that it will crack down on high-cost credit can’t come soon enough. The FCA reports that high cost credit is used by three million people in the UK.

Monica Kalia, Co-Founder of Neyber and Trustee of StepChange Debt Charity, said:

“Unsecured debt per household is reaching a record high of £13,900 in 2017 according to the Trades Union Congress (TUC).  Indeed, the Money Advice Service reports that six in ten working age people are currently struggling to get on top of their monthly budgeting and financial commitments, and StepChange have cited 3 million people in the UK behind on household bills. There’s a risk that a lack of access to affordable credit could push more vulnerable households into problem debt.”

Neyber says that two actions are essential:

• Employers and the Government need to work together to create a more financially inclusive environment. People should have access to a range of financial capability tools and be able to arrange fairer lending products as standard.
• Children should be taught in schools how to manage budgets and the importance of credit scores, at a minimum.

Kalia summarised:

“There is no doubt this is a step in the right direction, we have long argued for the suppression of high cost credit. In our work with UK businesses, we regularly see cases where employees have used forms of short-term borrowing at high interest rates to meet essential day-to-day needs. This leads to debt spiraling out of control and life can seem to be unmanageable. The Government needs to look creatively at working with businesses to provide low- and no-interest loans and education as to how to use credit safely.”

To find out more about Neyber, please visit www.neyber.co.uk.

Whilst it might be easy to envy the ultra-rich, they contribute more to the UK economy than might be perceived. Greycoat Lumleys, a London-based international recruitment agency
specialising in staffing for private households and estates, has reported a huge upsurge in the number of jobs being offered within private households.

The Sunday Times’ Rich List recently celebrated its 30th anniversary. Interestingly, the backgrounds of individuals now peaking the charts has changed dramatically. Robert Watts, the name behind the survey, states, ‘In 1989, our inaugural guide to wealth was dominated by the landed gentry. Three decades on and it’s the self-made at the top of the tree’*.

A high-net worth family will typically employ four to five members of staff (including a housekeeper, one or two nannies, depending on the number of children), whilst an ultra-high-net worth Individual’s household could employ up to 30 members of staff.

Of course, every household and family is unique and these are general statistics based on a very broad spectrum. What is clear however, is the high level of employment which these households offer. Although based in the family home rather than an office block, the professional principles and work ethos are similar, with the added dimension that confidentiality and discretion are qualities that remain supreme.

Debbie Salter, Managing Director of Greycoat Lumleys states,

“Within the past two years, we’ve seen our nanny and housekeeping staff section grow from two employees to ten. This is purely to keep up with the demand we are seeing from clients.”

Whilst wage growth within Britain in 2017 was 2.6%, rising to 3.1% in 2018*, Greycoat Lumleys’ 2018 salary survey highlights a significantly higher percentage increase within the private household staffing sector in London. Live-in butlers’ salaries increased by 8.2% within two years, starting at £38,000 per annum whilst live-out butlers almost doubled that by 14.2%, at a rate of between £40,000 to £50,000. The increasingly popular housekeeper-nanny role has proven its high demand by the salary increase: a live-out role increased in two years by 15.3% to between £30,000 to £41,000 whilst the live-in roles soared to 36.36%* at £30,000 to £33,500.

Debbie Salter adds,

“It’s undeniable that the affluent families make a contribution to the economy that is too often ignored. These families offer stable employment where career paths are varied, and employees have the ability to blossom and progress. Furthermore, they allow individuals to adapt and hone their skills and expertise within an industry which celebrates diversity. We’ve seen a growth in demand for male nannies and female close protection officers, for example. What’s heartening is that we’re seeing an increasing number of candidates who are looking at private household positions as a long-term career choice, with career development and suitably rewarding salaries of up to £50,000 per annum for PAs and £45,000 per year for estate managers.”

Image courtesy of Greycoat Lumleys