Scottish-based contact centre businessbeCogenthas appointed an IT director to oversee its team of 20 IT
professionals.
Adrian Smales, former project manager, business development
director, business analyst and IT consultant, said he would look at
using technology to help people transact business.
"The contact centre industry needs to look at moving beyond
telephone contacts to provide more individually tailored and
personalised services through channels such as instant messaging to
engage
generation Y, and therefore we need to have the right
technology in place to enable our clients meet the demands of their
customers," he said.
Smales said he wanted to attract good quality UK staff by
providing increased
working flexibility. "We need to deliver the platform to enable
staff to work from a wide variety of places such as home or
community centres," he said.
In the next year, Smales plans to trial technologies to see
which ones fit beCogent's business model and provide competitive
advantage.
"The biggest challenge facing IT directors, particularly in the
contact centre industry, is keeping pace with the extremely rapid
changes in technology, legislative requirements and consumer
demands to keep them interested and engaged," said Smales.
Smales said it was important for
IT to work in collaboration with the business. "Those
businesses that can adopt and assimilate IT will flourish, but
those that don't will die. IT directors need to listen to what the
business needs and translate that into real tangible benefit that
addresses that need."