converge feb 2012


2/19

interesngTheres a well-known saying, May you live in

interesng mes. Its oen, but wrongly, aributed

to Confucius. Far from being an ancient Chinese curse

however, it seems that its origins lie in the West in the

early decades of the 20th century. What is known for

sure is that Robert Kennedy included it in a speech

he made in 1966 and its been widely recognised and

quoted ever since.

Theres no doubt that the 1960s were interesng

mes. And theres also no doubt that the expectaon

of a GFC Mark II in 2012 along with those zany

predicons that the world will end on December 21,

2012 mean that were living in interesng

mes ourselves.

When the GFC struck in 2008, NSC elded a signicant

increase in enquiries for Managed Services. Managed

Services make especially good business sense

when mes are tough: they enable organisaons toaddress both nancial and operaonal challenges

while accessing the benets of state-of-the-art

communicaons technology. Since those early days

of the GFC, weve taken the concept even further

and now include Breeze among our opons. Its

a Managed Service that enables organisaons

to avoid capital expenditure and instead pay for

communicaons on a month by month, per-user

subscripon basis.

If youre in the throes of reconsidering your

communicaons systems, a Managed Service may well

02/ converge 02/2012

IT / communicaons trends for 2012

I was asked several weeks ago to comment on

what I expected 2012 to bring in the world of IT

and communicaons. The pace of change and the

uncertain economic mes probably made such a task

even more challenging than usual. Nevertheless,

I thought you might be interested in NSCs

expectaons for the year ahead.

1. MobiliTy business can now connect connuously with

customers wherever they are. But in 2012,

customers are going to become more demanding:they will raise their expectaons of the quality,quanty and relevance of informaon they canaccess from a business and the speed with whichtheir enquiries are responded to

2. DEaTh of roaMing new apps for smart phones will make them anextension of a desk phone; businesses will savemillions by eliminang internaonal roaming costs

3. SoCial MEDia more organisaons will acknowledge the need to

develop a strategy for ulising social media and,as a result, will be beer posioned to use socialmedia eecvely to achieve their goals

business will develop beer ways of monitoringand measuring their social media acvity

4. TElECollaboraTion

there will be increasing investment in toolsand apps that enable collaboraon betweencolleagues, with customers and with suppliers

5. Growth in it as a service (cloud) more organisaons will purchase technology

infrastructure, licensing, service management,support, storage and upgrades on an opex,pay-as-you-go, subscripon basis

6. rESUrgEnCE of VoiCE therell be more widespread use of interacve

voice recognion and Siri style services, andfewer typed-text conversaons

speech biometrics will gain wider acceptance asan eecve idencaon and security measure,especially in the nance and banking sector

7. iT / bUSinESS alignMEnT there will be a renewed push to make IT more

about informaon and less about technology forits own sake

IT departments will need to accept responsibilityfor more funconal areas and technologies,such as contact centres, collaboraon, CRM ande-commerce

8. PCi CoMPlianT its not sexy, but being PCI compliant will becomeessenal this year for many Australian organisaons


3/19

mes indeedbe an excellent t for your needs, especially in these

interesng mes. Guy Simons arcle on

page 6 connues his review of the merits of Managed

Services. (You can nd his inial arcle in our previous

issue ofConverge:click here.) The overview of the

decision made by Starlight Childrens Foundaon

Australia to implement Breeze on

page 4 may also be of relevance. NSC is very pleased

to be assisng Starlight to achieve their objecves:

their new communicaons systems will increase the

funconality available to sta and volunteers, enhance

the management of their systems and enable the

organisaon to support sick children and their families

even more eecvely.

Challenging and uncertain mes can also be a catalyst

for reviewing organisaonal fundamentals. The focus

might be on idenfying opportunies to achieve more

with less, nding ways of extending the life of exisng

systems or creang innovave responses to meet new

and emerging customer needs. Assistance from outside

the organisaon can be helpful in such reviews: an

outsider can oer a fresh perspecve on the issues,

objecve and unbiased experse and new frameworks

and methods for addressing problems.

Through our Consulng unit, NSC is able to oer this

kind of support. Our consultants combine extensive

business, operaonal and technology experience,

which enables them to help organisaons with strategy

development, business-process analysis, end-to-end

soluon architecture and technology governance.

02/2012 converge /03

We have parcular experse in the elds of customer

service opmisaon and enterprise collaboraon.

The recent Consulng assignment that NSC undertook

with Victoria Teachers Credit Union (see page 8) is a

good case in point. Victoria Teachers have been widely

acknowledged as a leader in their eld, but they are

not resng on their laurels. Having undertaken a

review of their contact centre in concert with NSC,they are now implemenng a range of iniaves that

will result in even beer services for their members.

At NSC, we provide customers with praccal,

innovave and expert support that achieves genuine

business benets. Contact us to nd out how we can

help you succeed in these interesng mes.

reds,

C ne

Managing Director,

NSC Group
http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/converge-23/http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/converge-23/


4/19

CommunicaonsWhen not-for-prot

organisaon, Starlight

Childrens Foundaon

Australia, needed to

consider opons for

replacing its ageing

telephone system,cost was a key issue.

Starlight runs programmes designed to support thewellbeing and resilience of seriously ill children and

their families. Its proud of its track record of keeping

administraon and operang costs in check at

around 10% of revenue.

We are acutely aware that every dollar spent

has been donated, so we are always looking for

opportunies to minimise our non-programme

costs, said Louise Baxter, Starlights Chief Execuve.

Every dollar spent on administraon is a dollar not

spent on the children and families that we support.However, our telephone system was more than a

decade old; it was becoming unreliable and couldnt

oer all the funconality that we now need, so we

didnt have any choice about replacing it. We set

ourselves the goal of installing a new system and

reducing our total costs.

Starlight has nearly 200 sta spread across six oce

locaons and the major paediatric hospitals across

Australia. They required a cost-eecve and scalable

communicaons system and were looking for anIP-telephony based plaorm with access to all unied

communicaons features and funconality.

The soluon needed to cater for call-centre and

general oce sta in ve locaons, as well as the

expected future requirement of IP handsets in the

Darwin oce and a number of childrens hospitals.

Aer a thorough review of available opons, Starlight

determined that a relavely new communicaons-as-

a-service oering from NSC Group, called Breeze,

was the best t for its current and future needs.

There were several things about the Breeze model

that made an enormous dierence to us, Ms Baxter

connued. Not only did it provide the technology

we needed to address our communicaons

requirements, it also allowed us to avoid any

capital expenditure. Breeze is a subscripon style of

arrangement: we dont have to buy any equipment,

just pay the service subscripon on a month-by-

month basis.

Whats more, we have outsourced to NSC the

responsibility for monitoring, maintaining and

keeping the system up-to-date, which will free up our

Since being formed as an Australian childrens

charity in 1988, the Starlight Childrens

Foundaon has brightened the lives of seriously

ill and hospitalised children, and their families,

throughout Australia. Starlight provides

programmes integral to the total care of seriously

ill children while health professionals focus on

treang the illness, Starlight is there to li the

spirits of the child, giving them the opportunity to

laugh, play and be a child again.

Starlight is probably best known for its Wish

programme. A Starlight Wish provides meaningful

experiences, has life impacng benets and is

an opportunity to share in a dream come true. A

Starlight Wish gives the whole family

a break from the stress of their childs

illness. Fullled wishes provide lasng

memories for the child, and it s rare

that a day goes by without the family

menoning their special experience.

To nd out more, visit Starlightswebsite at www.starlight.org.au

About Starlight ChildrensFoundaon Australia

http://www.starlight.org.au/http://www.starlight.org.au/


5/19

upgrade is a breezeown people to focus on other projects. We only havea small head oce team, so this arrangement will

work well for us.

The subscripon model will allow Starlight to readily

add new users, and even new sites, during busy

periods and scale back down in quieter months,

Ms Baxter connued.

Starlight will also

be introducing

quanable servicelevels for their

communicaon

systems for the rst

me as part of the

Breeze service. We

aim to deliver an

exceponal Starlight

experience to all

our children,

families, volunteers and supporters and communicaon isa crical component of this, Ms Baxter commented. So

to be readily able to review the quality of the support that

were providing to our sta and our callers is an important

step forward for us. Well know exactly whats happening

and what steps are in train to address any issues and

implement improvements.

NSC will install 165 ShoreTel

handsets, Agent Workgroups,

Operator services, Unied

Communicaon Desktopclients, and the ShoreTel System

Management Applicaon. thirty

employees will have so phone

capabilies, allowing them to have

all the funconality of an oce

phone on their laptop computers.

This will be a boon to sta

members who frequently need to

work away from Starlights oces.

The major components ofthe network will be located in

Starlights head oce in the

Sydney suburb of Naremburn, with

interconnecons via the WAN to

the organisaons interstate oces

in Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide

and Perth. With standards-based

products built to operate at

ve nines reliability, Starlight is

condent that the operaon willtrouble-free.

And the cost? We have been able

to achieve our objecve,

Ms Baxter said. The Breeze

model isnt ed to any parcular

carrier, so we took the opportunity

to review our arrangements.

The money that weve been able

to save by switching carriers is

going to be more than sucientto cover the cost of the new phone system, which is a

terric outcome for Starlight and seriously ill children

across Australia.


Starlight CEO Louise Baxter


6/19


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Capex versus Opex by Guy Simons

Building on the review of Managed Services

that I began in the last issue (click here to read

that column), I am going to revisit each of the

principal business-case drivers that may result in an

organisaons decision to move to a Managed Services

model, starng with Capex vs Opex.

According to Gartner, the global IT spend for last year

was $3.6 trillion, of which more than one third was in

telecommunicaons. With IT systems being integral

in every industry, this spend is expected to increase

by 3.7 per cent during 2012. Capital expenditure has

always been a xture in IT budgets for large projects

that incorporate hardware, soware and licensing.

Companies have been happy to write o these assets

through depreciaon, being cognisant of the lifecycle

of upgrades and refreshes. (It is a point of interest

that upgrade/refresh melines have more than

halved since the days of the mainframe, much to theconsternaon of many nance ocers.)

Following on from the GFC two years ago, the world

is now potenally caught in the grip of another

global recession and for many countries, let alone

companies, the ability to raise capital has been

seriously impinged. Capital budgets are being slashed

and all expenditure scrunised, with increased

diligence a necessity for survival. Companies must

ensure that the business cases that support proposed

capital expenditure deliver the ancipated CSF (CricalSuccess Factors) and drive the expected ROI.

This has resulted in a proliferaon of IT as a

Service models whereby companies obtain services

that incorporate a combinaon of some or all of

the following: infrastructure, licensing, service

management, support and future upgrades, that were

tradionally delivered under capital expenditure, as

a monthly operaonal charge. NSCs Breeze and

On-Demand soluons are examples of these pay-as-

you-go-oerings. This move to a subscripon modelhas enabled companies to free up valuable capital to

spend on their core business.

Rather than being a current trend as a result of the

global nancial crisis that will revert back to type when

the crisis is over, I believe that the IT as a Service

model in all its dierent guises will become the

predominant line items in future IT budgets.

The actual IT spend over a three to ve year meline

may not dier greatly: it will be the way that this

spend is treated from a budgeng perspecve that

will change. The peaks and troughs of capital

expenditure will be replaced by the consistency of

operaonal expenditure.

As the old adage says, Necessity is the mother of

invenon, and although not a tangible invenon, the

IT as a Service model will be one that stands the test

of me.

Guy Simons is the Managed Services Execuve at NSC

Group. With a background in nance and IT, he combines

skills as a strategic visionary with a capacity to achieve

tangible and pragmac results.
http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/serviceshttp://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/converge-23/http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/converge-23/http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/services


7/19

Safe & sound


If your organisaon takes credit-card payments online,

over the phone or in person its me to get serious

about PCI DSS compliance.

PCI DSS stands for Payment Card Industry Data

Security Standards. They are a global set of

requirements designed to prevent fraud and the of

credit-card informaon. The standards were set in

2004, but the focus was on the large North American

and European markets at rst. Now theres increasing

aenon on Australia.

There are a number of reasons why your organisaon

should become PCI compliant:

it demonstrates to your banks, customers and

credit-card companies that you have taken

informaon security seriously

an increasingly large number of organisaons will

only do business with PCI-compliant suppliers

it protects you from sizeable nancial penales:

banks and credit-card companies impose nes forsecurity breaches, and the costs of invesgang

breaches and recovering from them can be signicant

Becoming PCI compliant can be complex, me

consuming and expensive but it doesnt have

to be so. NSC Group and our trusted partners can

assist by:

reviewing and documenng your organisaons

processes for capturing, processing, storing and

transming customer-payment informaon

clarifying the requirements for compliance

based on the volume of credit-card transacons

processed by your organisaon

idenfying the appropriate opons for

achieving compliance

By ulising NSCs PCI experse, you can

accelerate progress towards compliance and

reduce disrupon to your core business and

in-house IT iniaves.

To read more about PCI compliance, click here for

the white paper wrien by our in-house experts.

For more informaon about how NSC can help your

organisaon achieve and maintain PCI compliance,

contact your NSC Account Manager.

The rollout of Australias next-generaon broadband

communicaon infrastructure to residenal

consumers has begun in various towns and ciesaround the country a signicant undertaking.

NBN Co is now turning its focus to the business

market, releasing their consultaon paper, Proposed

Business and Enterprise Fibre Access Service, just

before Christmas.

This paper provides a good insight into the services

that will reshape how Australian businesses will

communicate naonally and internaonally in the

near future. Broadband bre access services will

signicantly change the way organisaons access

service providers that oer both the private and

public networks that form the

backbone for informaon-

demanding economies.

NSC Group is acvelyinvolved in providingnetwork soluons that will:

enable the ecient use

of the NBN Co business

and enterprise bre-based access services

smooth the transion from exisng data and voice

networks that currently underpin organisaonal

and inter-company communicaons.

To nd out more, click here to read the NBN Cosconsultaon paper.

NBN for business
http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/download_file/view/378/199http://www.nbnco.com.au/assets/documents/nbn-co-consultation-paper-proposed-business-and-enterprise-fibre-access-services-dec-2011.pdfhttp://www.nbnco.com.au/assets/documents/nbn-co-consultation-paper-proposed-business-and-enterprise-fibre-access-services-dec-2011.pdfhttp://www.nbnco.com.au/assets/documents/nbn-co-consultation-paper-proposed-business-and-enterprise-fibre-access-services-dec-2011.pdfhttp://www.nbnco.com.au/assets/documents/nbn-co-consultation-paper-proposed-business-and-enterprise-fibre-access-services-dec-2011.pdfhttp://www.nbnco.com.au/assets/documents/nbn-co-consultation-paper-proposed-business-and-enterprise-fibre-access-services-dec-2011.pdfhttp://www.nbnco.com.au/assets/documents/nbn-co-consultation-paper-proposed-business-and-enterprise-fibre-access-services-dec-2011.pdfhttp://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/download_file/view/377/1http://www.nbnco.com.au/assets/documents/nbn-co-consultation-paper-proposed-business-and-enterprise-fibre-access-services-dec-2011.pdfhttp://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/download_file/view/377/1http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/download_file/view/378/199


8/19

Victoria Teachers Credit Union has 85,000 members

and more than $1.5 billion in assets, and is the only

nancial instuon in Victoria focusing solely on

people who work in educaon. In 2011, it was the

Financial Review Smart InvestorCredit Union of the

Year, Moneymagazines Credit Union of the Year andwinner of Mozos Peoples Choice Award for Australias

best credit union.

Celebrang the 40th anniversary of its foundaon

this year, Victoria Teachers recently undertook an

evaluaon of the current technology and processes

within its contact centre to improve service and meet

future challenges.

Execuve Manager Sales & Service, Rosemary

Boissezon, said that the organisaons contact centre

was a parcular focus because of its importance for

member interacon. We eld almost 18,000 phone

calls per month in our contact centre. In addion,

70,000 calls are handled by the self-service funcons

of our interacve voice-response system. We expect

members will increasingly choose email and text to

communicate with us in the future, so we need to

ensure that we are eecvely managing an array of

communicaon channels.

Every aspect of the credit unions contact centrewas reviewed, from recruitment, training and

remuneraon of sta, workforce opmisaon,

quality management and organisaon structure

The credit union voted Australias

best in 2011 has just completed a

major review of its contact centreso that it can serve members

even more eecvely.


The best takes

Victoria Teachers Credit Union was

established in 1972 by a group of 48

educators, who each contributed $10.

The founding members of Victoria

Teachers Credit Union wanted to create

a beer economic life for people working

in educaon, as well as their families.

Their goals were to provide outstanding

customer service, a fair deal, and a

strong, secure organisaon that puts its

members rst.

Since then, the organisaon has grown

organically and now has over 85,000

members and in excess of $1.5billion in

assets. The values, however, remain

the same.

Victoria Teachers is one of Australias

most awarded nancial instuons,

having won numerous Credit Union

of the Year Awards in recent mes.It provides a range of banking

services tailored to people who

work in educaon.

www.victeach.com.au

About VictoriaTeachers Credit Union


9/19


t m b nsc g

nsc p y g y

ctct cete, ctct bed oDwe,

h f cg [email protected] (02) 9856 4380.

through to how technology is used to implement the

organisaons service strategy.

We undertook a series of workshops conducted by

NSC Group to evaluate our people, processes and

technology, Mrs Boissezon said. From there, we

worked with NSC consultants to idenfy opportunies

for improvement, and then priorised them in short-,

medium- and long-term acon plans.

Mrs Boissezon said the credit union would be

implemenng a range of iniaves as a result of the

project. They include restructuring the contact centre,

introducing a new performance-management system

and making more eecve use of interacve voice-

response systems.

We are also proposing to conduct sasfacon

surveys within 24 hours of members interacng with

the contact centre. This will provide us with quality

feedback that will allow us to connually drive

change, she said.

In the longer term, technology will be a focus. More

sophiscated use of data repositories will enhance

knowledge management and aid the implementaon

of e-learning for sta. Upgrading current infrastructure

will allow more roune enquiries to be handled by

the voice-response system, freeing up the me of

contact-centre sta to spend with members on more

complex tasks.

The credit union was founded in 1972 and aims to

provide people who work in educaon with a fair

deal and outstanding customer service across a range

of channels. The work that weve done with NSC

signicantly accelerated the process of reviewing ourcontact centre, eecvely saving us a year or more.

Were now well posioned to make changes that

will enable us to serve our members even beer

than before.

Rosemary Boissezon

another step forward


10/19


Avayas web.alive applicaon delivers all of this.

Intuive and user-friendly, web.alive removes the

barriers to eecve interacon among groups of

people in dierent locaons. No maer where in

the world you are, all you need to meet face to

face is an internet connecon.

Find out more and experience web.alive yourself atNSCs TecTkthis month. It will take place on:

Thursday, February 23 from 2pm (AEST)

from the comfort and convenience of your own

locaon!

Come alive

Imagine an easy-to-use, web-based applicaon that

facilitates training, group discussions, seminars and

business meengs.

Imagine the benets:

g pp training

can be provided to employees and customers

anyme, anywhere, without the costs of venue

hire, travel, catering or accommodaon. Roll out

new programmes and products, induct new sta,

meet OH&S obligaons or provide mentoring and

coaching at a dramacally lower cost.

b achieve higher

levels of collaboraon with colleagues, customers

and suppliers even when theyre in distant and/or

mulple locaons

educed csts, as meengs can be conducted

eecvely online no travel required and no need

to invest in videoconferencing resources

b pp mk

the tyranny of distance is no longer

set up virtual retail stores, in-store point-of-

sale displays or customer-service locaons for

demonstraons of products and services and

delivery of support

conduct online trade shows and product

launches

TechTalk

Watch an introducon to web.alive

HOLDTHED

ATE! PCI-DSS Compliance DemysedBusinesses that take credit-card payments are grappling with PCI-DSS

(Payment Card Industry Data Security Standards) compliance regulaons.

Our next NSC User Group in Melbourne will demysfy PCI-DSS compliance.

We will focus on the regulaons, what they mean for business, the

challenges, the process of complying and touch on some of the technical

soluons that can assist businesses adhere to the regulaons.

Friday, March 23 from 12 noon

RACV Club, 501 Bourke Street, Melbourne
http://youtu.be/pP_ZVLQflpAhttp://www.myrego.com/nsc/sr.cfm?v=e156e1&dx=dx&lg=0http://youtu.be/pP_ZVLQflpAhttp://avayalive.com/WaStore/Video.aspx?v=intro


11/19

I want to share with you a realisaon that I

recently had ... it was at the hands of Dr Billy, the

crack quack (as I now call him).

Now, I know that all medical praconers study

for many years and have an impressive amount

of knowledge and experse. But you, like me,

have no doubt experienced good ones and

bad ones. At my appointment with Dr Billy, I

believe I worked out the dierence ... and itinvolves listening.

Dr Billy is a chiropractor a discipline where,

no maer what your ailment, the treatment

invariably ends up with a spinal manipulaon,

All ears by Belinda ODwyer

an audibly horric (though not physically

unpleasant) experience.

Having been through a consultaon where I

described some of my symptoms (dont worry,

Im in good nick just a sore shoulder and an old

netball injury to my knee), Dr Billy recommended

an intensive course of spinal manipulaon for a

month followed by another assessment.

I was quite disappointed when I le the

consultaon, as I knew that I hadnt really been

listened to. (And for some reason, the expression

If your only tool is a hammer, everything begins to

look like a nail sprang to mind!)

I can recall so many

mes throughout

my career when Ive

been approached by

companies only too happyto convince me that their

soluon is exactly what

I need before even asking

me what I want or trying

to understand my issues

and requirements.

If an engagement be it business or medical

is going to achieve results in the right areas,

it has to begin with listening. Im sure youre

interested in what the NSC Consulng teamcan deliver, but the truth is that were much

more interested in who you are and what

you want.

To nd out more about how NSC Consulng

can support your business strategy, contact

me at [email protected]

Belinda is Head of Consulng at NSC Group. She

has 15 years of experience in contact centres

around the world and has consulted on producvity

improvements, process re-engineering, and

enhancing customer experiences.

mailto:[email protected]:[email protected]


12/19


When many companies dived into social media in

recent years, it seems that the standards that they

apply to customer service in tradional channels were

thrown out the window. Simple things that we take

for granted in contact centres were ignored and as a

result, brands and customers suered.

In my experience, a lot of organisaons struggle with

how to handle social media on a large scale. Oen

the conversaon is about engaging customers from amarkeng perspecve, not considering the post-sales

service aspects.

The reality is that social media cannot be owned

by one group in a company. A strong social-media

strategy must take into account all areas of the

company that deliver to customers and ensure that

customer support has the right contacts within each

department to adequately handle customer queries.

Ive idened nine crically important factors to

consider from a customer-service perspecve

when developing a social-media strategy, whetheryoure handling the process internally or engaging

NSC to assist.

Customer service using social media:9 crucial factors for success by Adrian Morgan


13/19


Consider what success lookslike for your company.

Is it a nancial saving through the use of a lower cost

channel? Is it the numbers of requests, menons or

posive referrals you get? Surprisingly, I have found

that this queson is oen overlooked by organisaons,

despite being arguably the most important.

Choose your channels.

Facebook and Twier are currently the most

prominent. But how about LinkedIn, MySpace, Four

Square, or Urban Spoon? Which channels are the right

ones for your brand? What is the image you wish to

present to your customers? Each channel has a target

market and a dierent engagement strategy.

Sta appropriately.

Not every contact-centre agent who performs well

on the phone will make the jump to wring tweets

and solving problems in 140 characters. Choose

agents based on their wring skills. Wring 140

characters may seem simple, but short, concise

wring is challenging.

Choose your mes.

Publish the mes that you are available on social

media. You tell customers who want to phone you

what your opening hours are, yet I see so many

Facebook pages that dont advise when customer

service will respond to an enquiry.

Understand that not every problemwill be solved using social media.

Train your sta to direct customers to a dierent

channel when appropriate. Social media is not the

place to have a conversaon that your customers mayperceive to be negave and uncomfortable such

as one about collecons, for example. In order to

redirect these types of conversaons, sta must be

trained in when, how, and where an enquiry should

be redirected. Many successful Twier campaigns,

for instance, use web forms and emails as well as

social media.

Dont remain stac.

The social-media landscape changes rapidly. Five yearsago My Space was on the decline and Twier was just

a small, early adopter start-up. Where will Google+ be

in a year? Review your social-media strategy every

six to 12 months. Is it working? Are you in the right

space? Are your customers sll there? What is on

the horizon? You need to commit to an on-going

investment of me and eort to keep track of

changes within social media.

Dont expect social media will xyour customer service.

It is simply another channel. However, if you are

performing poorly on any aspect of customer

service, your customers can, and will, use

your social media channel to broadcast their

dissasfacon. Review your current performance

and understand what will be dierent with an

addional channel.

Use the informaon gathered insocial media.

Share it with the markeng department. Use it to

update knowledge bases and FAQs. Use feedback

and quesons as input for product development.

You will have a rich source of informaon that can

support decision making in your organisaon.

Ignore trolls.

Some people want to engage in ame wars and

trolling on the internet. Train your sta how todeal with this. Whilst your company needs to

accept responsibility for decisions and acons, and

empathise where appropriate, trolls just want to

take up me and resources.

Social media can have a posive eect on your

customers and more customers are choosing

social media as a preferred method of contact.

Be on the front foot for contact centre customerservice and connue to build great relaonships

with your customers.

One nal p: when a customer calls your contact

centre, the agents always say their name. Make

sure you do the same on social media. The

company has an identy, as do the individuals in

your company who serve your customers.

Adrian Morgan is a member of NSCs consulng team,with a special interest in social media and its use in

contact centres.

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14/19

WAN opmisaon is about improving theperformance of business applicaons over WAN

connecons by matching the allocaon of WAN

resources to business needs and deploying the

opmisaon techniques that deliver measurable

business benets.

NSC Group has recently chosen to partner with

Silver Peak for WAN acceleraon and opmisaon.

NSC partner, Verint, has developed a soluon to

address these challenges and opportunies. Verints

Voice of the Customer Analycs drives operaonal

excellence by providing a capability for capturing

and analysing customer feedback, opmising the

workforce, enhancing the performance of customer-

service sta and increasing customer sasfacon.

Click here to nd out more.

Look whos talkingMost organisaons are being challenged to collect,

analyse and act on the wealth of informaon that is

available to them from their customers. These days,

customers want to interact with you using a wide

range of channels: phone, email, online, on Twier

and so on. Some of those interacons will be

iniated by you, but many of them will be iniated

by the customer themselves. Whats more, these

interacons are oen directed to dierent partsof your organisaon, making it dicult to get a

comprehensive sense of customer needs and views.


Silver Peaks capacity to accelerate networks atthe IP level and deal with VoIP/video as well as

address packet loss and jier makes it compelling

for business to invesgate, given the ever-present

need to get more out of the pipe.

Industry analysts, Gartner, recently reviewed the

WAN opmisaon market, and rated Silver Peak

as one of the industry leaders. This evaluaon

was based on completeness of vision and ability

to execute, with Silver Peak rated high on both.

Click here to read Gartners report

Follow the leader
http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/download_file/view/379/199/http://www.silver-peak.com/landing/Gartner-Magic-Quadranthttp://www.silver-peak.com/landing/Gartner-Magic-Quadranthttp://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/download_file/view/379/199/


15/19

NSC has moved into new premises in Perth,

consolidang all sta in one locaon.

Our new oce address is:

nSC gup

s 3, 190 sg s

Pet 6000

Phone: (08) 6330 5777

Consultant advisory group

NSC is keen to work closely with industry analysts and

consultants around Australia.

We are establishing an advisory group with the

objecve of maintaining thought leadership

and dialogue on the ever-changing shape of thecommunicaons sector. Proposed topics for our inial

session include PCI compliance, market trends in

Click here to registerand find out how to participate

New WA oceaccommodates growth

NSCs Regional Manager for Western Australia, Mark

McBride, said, The move to Srling Street means that

we will have our enre Perth-based team working from

the same locaon for the rst me.

Our business is growing signicantly here in the West.

And weve chosen our new premises so that they will be

large enough to accommodate our plans for connuing

growth in future years.

communicaons-as-a-service and the latest products

from some of the major vendors.

If you are interested in being invited to our next event,

please click here to register your interest.

http://www.myrego.com/nsc/link.cfm?link_id=9&dx=dx&lg=0http://www.myrego.com/nsc/link.cfm?link_id=9&dx=dx&lg=0http://www.myrego.com/nsc/link.cfm?link_id=9&dx=dx&lg=0


16/19

NSC Group is now able to oer customers Extreme

Networks remarkable product of last year: the

BlackDiamond X8.

This record-breaking data-centre Ethernet switch has

been independently tested and veried by leading

industry analysts The Lippis Report.

Cliuck here to read the full story.

The BlackDiamond X8 shaered all performance

records with superior bandwidth, lossless

performance and extremely low latency, making it the

best-in-class choice for high-performance networks,

said Nick Lippis, principal analyst for The Lippis Report.

I commend Extreme Networks for designing such a

remarkable product.

The X8 oers:

the highest 10GbE and 40GbE port density to

seamlessly support up to 768 we-speed 10gE

connected servers in e-td 42 rU rack or

2,304 k

the capacity to send the enre contents of the

Apple App Store in about two seconds (based

on 500,000 acve apps x 5.0 megabytes = 2.3

terabytes). The performance and density oered in

one-third of a data-centre rack is simply in a league

of its own

BlackDiamond X8 test highlights:

1. Ultra Low Latency, with lowest average latency of

2.3 microseconds for Layer 2 trac.

2. Up to half the power consumpon of competors:

8.1 was per 10GbE port at one-third loading;esmated to be 5 was per 10GbE port at

full loading.

3. 100% throughput with zero packet loss as a

percentage of line-rate across all 256-10GbE and

24-40GbE ports.

4. The X8 tested 310 mes faster than any core

Ethernet switch in its form factor, and had the

lowest latency and best power eciency per port.


Worlds fastest core now available in Australia from NSC Group

Breakthrough for cloud and mobile networks
http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/download_file/view/369http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/download_file/view/369/1/http://www.nsc.net.au/index.php/download_file/view/369


17/19

Ethernet switch

With demands on data-centre infrastructure

forecast to be stronger than ever before as a result

of the adopon of cloud services, osite-storage

requirements, disaster recovery and CaaS iniaves,

enterprises will be forced to more closely examine

the total cost of ownership than in the past. The

introducon of the carbon tax and the widely

ancipated increased cost of power generaon,

together with the inevitable demand for 10Gbps and

even 40Gbps in the data centre, will both serve to

impact the business case of any enterprise considering

large cloud-style compung.

With its extraordinarily small footprint, partnered with

port-density and power-reducon gures head and

shoulders above the compeon, Extremes X8 should

be at the forefront of enterprise consideraon for any

data-centre project.

Graph courtesy of Extreme Networks

F m fm b Bkdm X8 e , :

M sy, nsc nk s 0400 237 069.



18/19

Creang an environmentfor success by Jane Flemming

From elite sport and the eternal quest forulmate performance we can observe a number

of consistent aributes that foster, and improve

chances of, success.

In my view, the one that stands out above all

others is the willingness to seek, give and

receive construcve feedback: in sporng

lingo coaching.

Elite athletes have professional, full-me coaches

who provide feedback. As a result, athleteslearn from the full gamut of performances, good

and bad. It might be that a parcular element

requires improvement or recognising that it was

executed successfully and understanding why

that happened, with the aim of repeang it again

and again.

Feedback, or coaching, must be honest, given in

very objecve terms and language and be of a

constant nature to achieve the best results. There

are no egos involved and no preciousness; ajoint or team objecve of improved performance

drives these coaching behaviours.

In the world of elite sport, daily, if not hourly oreven minute-by-minute, feedback and coaching

are the norm and absolutely crical to the

aainment of success. A stark contrast to the

corporate environment!

In post race or match interviews with athletes and

coaches, we oen see and hear an instant analysis

of where a team went wrong, of where they

played well and where they played badly. It is not

personalised and no one takes oence. Even the

wider community perceives this as the norm.

If and when the corporate world adopts this

atude and it becomes ingrained in everyday

behaviours, an extraordinary performance will

result: individuals will start to truly full their

potenal, company morale will be boosted and

ulmately, the boom line will be on the rise.

Jane Flemming is one of Australias best known sporng

personalies. During her sporng career, the dual

Olympian won two Commonwealth Games Gold andtwo Silver medals, 13 naonal tles and broke literally

hundreds of records in elite compeon.

Photo:SebasanCostanzo



19/19

Converge is published by NSC Group Pty Ltd

Publisher: Craig Neil

Editor: Megan Fisher

[email protected]

Contributors: Nick Culpi, Alexandra Dawson,

Jane Flemming, Adrian Morgan,

Belinda ODwyer, Guy Simons

2012

No part of this magazine may be reproduced by any

process without wrien permission.

All reasonable measures have been taken to

ensure the quality, reliability, and accuracy of

the informaon in this magazine at the me ofpublicaon. Statements, opinions and views of

contributors may not necessarily reect those

of the NSC Group or its aliates.

ADELAIDE | AUCKLAND | BRISBANE | CANBERRA | MELBOURNE | PERTH | SYDNEY
mailto:[email protected]@nsc.net.aumailto:[email protected]@nsc.net.au

converge feb 2012

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