Today is an interesting day for me. In the last few months the job search has been more difficult than I had anticipated. I have gone to workshops and programs and they have all told me one thing will be critical to find work in my field of expertise in upper level management.

Networking

Today, I will get to attend an event with the Westmorland CBDC in Shediac. I was invited by a local small business owner  to the event. My experience with the CBDC has been fantastic. I took a course with them on business development in late November, as research for what would happen if I didn’t find work traditionally.

The course opened me up to the possibility of starting my own business if the job search doesn’t pan out. It seems that there are ample opportunities in Call Centres locally to start at the ground floor, but most of the middle and upper level managers are hired either internally, or through local networking. I even met with people at my former company. They were willing to interview me for any position I was qualified for, but there was nothing availiable locally in my field. They recommended networking with other Call Centers.

Networking. That would be the key goal for me in order to find a traditional job.

The Business Development Seminar was fantastic. Well worth the fact that I now have to sort out paperwork with Service Canada because I missed one of the required forms.. but that’s another story.
One of the best things that the course taught me was something that I expect even they didn’t know they taught.

“What do I want to be when I grow up”

Funny, that was a question that I never had an answer for.. I “was” what I did every day. It was a job that I did in exchange for a paycheque, and a generous one at that.

When I was a kid, I always wanted to help people. I volunteered as a Medical First Responder with St. John Ambulance for years when I was in High School because I liked helping people. I went to University in Ottawa to study Criminology to become a Police Officer again because I liked helping people.  I went to work with my Father as a financial advisor straight out of University, because I could help people with their finances. That role didn’t fit because I never liked the sales component, and quite frankly I couldn’t help people fast enough for my liking. Sorting out years of financial issues for a client doesn’t happen overnight.

So I got my first “Real” job. I worked for a telecommunications company in Technical Support. Computers were something I had been interested since there was one in the house.. I started programming when I was very young on an Apple ][+ computer using Logo and basic. I built my first computer at 14. A shiny new 386 DX! (With a 387 later on for you technical people!). The reason the job interested me, was because I was helping people solve their problems. My love was helping people, and my passion was computers and technology.

Within a very short period of time I was up to the level of Team Manager.  I really enjoyed that Job.. the one thing that I enjoyed the most, was helping people. Helping people grow, showing people their potential and giving the tools to succeed. I grew my network of associates and peers by helping people.

One day I was declared, “Surplus” with 375 other peers and associates. Heck, I even read the press release about my demise about 5 minutes before I got the tap on the shoulder.  I was the most expensive, it was explained, to me.  Cuts needed to happen company wide, period. It was either me or 2 junior managers, and they couldn’t lose two managers and still maintain the targeted manager to staff ratio.. So being the most senior, and therefore most expensive, I was “Surplus”. If you have never gone through this.. Think of the floor beneath your feet falling, and you just drop, hitting the ground a few days or weeks later.

During my time at that company we were often asked in training “What do you want to be when you grow up”. Overtime that question felt more and more ridiculous in the many years I was a Manager.

Then, I took that seminar by the CBDC in late November, and someone explained that you can do something with your life with an opportunity to start your own business.. It clicked…

“What do I want to be when I grow up”

The answer was clear as it was when I was a kid.

“I want to help people”

That got me thinking about using my years of experience in Management and IT. My experience in project management, people management. My technical skills to take a large project plan and actually physically implement it with my own two hands.

I could help businesses that needed technical help. Businesses that realized that technology is important, but don’t have the skills or knowledge to implement technology on their own.
I spoke about it with others in my class, and found a potential market. I could leverage my skills to feed my love of helping people, and my passion with cutting edge technology!

But on most levels, I am not ready to take the plunge just yet.

The plan still is to find someone that will pay me a whole whack of money to run their Technical Call Center. I have the skills and experience to run technical operations for a large scale enterprise. I am comfortable managing large teams and managers of large teams. I am still willing to trade the long hours, the stress, the toll on my family, even my rapidly receeding hairline, for a large salary; because that is what we do in this society to provide for our family. Or is it?

That plan is still plan A.

However, what If Plan B, starting a business in summer next year if the job search doesn’t turn out, becomes a viable concept.  Something that will allow me to help business people, with my skills and abilities but be unrestricted in the help I can offer..  Right now that seems like a faraway dream.  Perhaps by next summer it won’t be.

Tonight, I will be surrounded by entrepreneurs and those that have gone through the process of starting a Business here in New Brunswick. In my drive to Network with business leaders, perhaps I will find that I have the skills and abilities to not only be the second in command, but the person at the top.

Its going to be an interesting night.

And its all thanks to the CBDC Westmorland in Shediac and the Business Development Seminar for showing me that sometimes that there is a world of possibilities when you step back and look.

It’s been a while since I have posted here. Back in late February of this year, my family and I took a look at what we wanted in life. My wife, who has family out in New Brunswick, proposed that we relocate out to that area of Canada. This is an area of the country that she has always loved and had an affinity for and quite frankly it “ticks many of the boxes” for me in terms of location.

The planner in me kicked into high gear. A number of things would have to “click” for us to be able to make the move financially viable for us. Chief among them was that my wife would be able to transfer to a local division of her company which happened to have an office in Moncton, New Brunswick.

Thankfully that was easily accomplished; the second major obstacle was that we needed to wait for my son to graduate high school, and out daughter to finish out the school year.

We would also need to sell our house and pack up all our belongings.

Fast forward to now, it’s almost August, and we have been in Moncton now for just over two weeks.
The difference in environment is beyond comprehension. Gone is the now concrete jungle of the place that I grew up in. Instead it’s an area that is filled with open spaces and green space. On the weekend we checked out a local park, Centennial Park. It was a fantastic place and one that I expect my family and I will be frequenting on a more regular basis.

My goal now is to find employment in the area where I can be a positive contribution to a company again. It’s amazing how motivating people and actively driving performance in a company becomes part of who you are as a person when you have done it daily for two decades. It’s amazing to me how much I miss leading teams, and working towards solving problems that on their face, seem insurmountable. I miss the daily challenge of coming across a roadblock in a project, and collaborating with peers, direct reports, and others to overcome the challenge.

My more immediate challenge is the job application process. Finding the right balance of customizing ones resume and cover letter to a job, vs. keeping the resume short enough that someone actually reads it is, quite frankly one of the skills that I will need to brush up on.

The biggest opportunity for me is the fact that I can look at sectors here that I wouldn’t have considered applying a number of years ago. Instead of looking for jobs in strictly telecommunications, I am branching out to jobs that not only fit my skill sets, but also are in areas that I enjoy.

I love helping people out, teaching and developing people, always have. It started early in my life and has been re-enforced through both my career and personal life. I enjoy not only solving problems, but teaching others how to solve problems.

Now the type of problem has never really mattered to me. It can be anything from complex multifaceted problems like take a framework for an existing job, and adapt that to a remote model that is non-site specific like I did with Rogers creating their Remote Agent program, or working through a customer problem where the customer is upset and frustrated and simply wants a person to take responsibility and fix their issue.

There have also been many situations where peers have come to me with complex inter employee conflict issues and are looking for examples of how to solve them.

For me it’s never been the problem itself that has held my interest and enjoyment, it’s more the solution. It’s the process of taking something that has stumped someone, and either directly, or indirectly through support, breaking down that problem into component parts and solving it.

That’s something that I really miss, and hopefully will be able to get back into the swing of it again soon.

Now if only I can get past the automated and computerized candidate selection algorithms and have an actual person read my resume and cover letter, so I can start getting back to what I love to do most, and that’s work and make a difference. I am going with the model of customizing my resume and cover letter for each individual position, we shall see if the extra effort pays any dividends.

The plan is also to continue to write and blog about management topics and other points that interest me. If you happen to be reading this and want me to touch on a subject or answer a question, please feel free to send me an email, I welcome the challenge to solve any problem, big or small!

Plus, if you are looking for someone with a wide spectrum of people / process / technical / and operations Management experience in the Moncton area; I would really like to hear from you!

One of the great things about vehicles is they tell you when something is wrong. It’s easy to identify, a light pops up on your dashboard. You simply have the code looked up and you know exactly what is wrong.

With people, it’s not that easy. As a manager you can often see the signs of a problem; poor work performance, a change in attitude, disengagement or other signs.  As a people manager, it’s important to learn about your employees. Once you do, you will find out that they do have their own version of a check engine light. It can manifest itself in behaviors, actions, and/or words that let you know that something is wrong.

There are two schools of thought when it comes to management style consistency. As a manager you can use one style, for every person that reports to you. Or, in my preferred method, you can use many styles, and pick one for an individual.

I had many peers that argued for a single style across all of their direct reports. They felt that this gave them consistency of approach, they could then perfect their personal style and they would have their employees adapt to their style. The interesting thing is that the managers felt it worked best for them as it was easier and any employee that didn’t respond was a “bad fit”.  Those managers often wondered why they scored poorly on employee engagement surveys and exit interviews.

I was never a proponent of that style. My background in psychology and sociology taught me very early on that everyone is different, vastly different.  Every individual has their own sets of likes and dislikes. They have their own sets of motivations and reasons for everything that they do. As a manager, it is key to find out what they are. Many will state, this is too difficult, too time consuming. To those people, I will state, at its core, that’s what a manager SHOULD be doing.

When addressing a performance problem, it is critical to find out what the cause of the problem is. For instance, you can have a substantially tenured employee that has difficulty with one facet of their job. The assumption typically is that the person is just being difficult. As a tenured employee, they have to know what they are doing!  I have learned, that just asking the simple question, “What do you think the problem is?” instead of assuming something is far more effective.   You may find that the person never was properly trained on that part of their job, and as time progressed was too embarrassed to ask how to do it properly. Taking the time to properly show the employee how to complete the task can solve the problem. 

Taking the time to find the real reason for an issue saves more time in the end because you get to the root of the problem faster. This allows you, as a manager, to solve the problem faster.

There are times where work performance can be strongly affected by factors outside the workplace. Often times you will have employees that either gradually or suddenly have performance and attitude issues. Making a blanket assumption that an employee is disengaged because they no longer enjoy their job is something that often managers zero in on. When speaking to an employee, you may find that they have family issues, financial issues, or other serious issues that are affecting work place performance.

If you have an employee assistance plan at your work place, this is the perfect time to offer it. Plan or not, there are often things that you can do for the employee that can make the problem, at minimum, easier to handle. For instance, if the issues are family related, see if you can assist the person with arranging their schedule, or providing time they can take as vacation. There is more to be gained by balancing the needs of the employee with the needs of the business than by taking a hard line in many circumstances. (This also can touch on the legal requirement of reasonable accommodation)

Employees, like customers, remember when someone went out of their way to help them. Taking the time to help others will always pay dividends, not always immediately, but it always has worked out for me.

The most important thing that I can stress is that as a Manager you actually have to care about the development and improvement of your direct reports. You don’t have to be their best friend as you always have to maintain a professional relationship, but if you focus on a win-win solution for both the business and the employee, you will find that you have more productive and highly engaged employees. 

Call centers often have a number of metrics or key performance indicators. Chief among them is normally one regarding handle time. At times this becomes not only the primary metric, but one that dominates the others.

In my experience, focus on that metric in absence of others is a grave mistake. The most important metric should be “getting it right the first time”.  Often called “First Time Right” (FTR), or "Single Call Resolution" (SCR), solving the customer’s issue the first time they call, whenever possible, should be of primary concern.

When a customer calls in for customer service, or technical support, they are typically inconvenienced by simply calling in. The vast majority of customers simply want their product or service to meet their expectations with no outside intervention. Calling into a call center or seeking assistance through other channels is an inconvenience to a customer. One that if not handled properly affects the customer’s opinion of the company and its products.

Every contact prior to resolution of the issue or conflict only multiplies the customer’s level of dissatisfaction.  When a customer contacts your company to solve a problem that they have, as a company, you are already at a disadvantage with regards to the customers opinion of your product or service.

The old adage rings true, “you only have one shot, to make a first impression”.  Some would argue, “they are already a customer, why is it a first impression?” The key lies with the fact that this IS the first impression the customer will have of you addressing an issue that is fundamental to how they will feel about your brand going forward.

The first contact a customer makes should be considered the best opportunity you have to reinforce the value of the customer to you.  It’s critical that the customers issue be heard completely, that there is a firm understanding of the expectations of the customer, and providing those expectations are realistic, that the customer be given a proper timeline on resolution.

If an issue can’t be solved in the first contact, then the onus on follow-up should be with the company. Once a customer has to contact the company again for follow-up or resolution the opportunity to improve the relationship with the customer is harmed.

This is where the handle time issue comes in to play. Often companies are focused on “optimizing” call center costs. This can easily be done by taking the number of inbound contacts, multiplying that by the time spent on the call, and factoring in down time for employees equals your cost per contact. (That oversimplifies the math, but it’s the basic formula).

When looking for efficiency, it’s easier to say something along the lines of “Just cut the handle time by 10%”. Although that may look like a solution on the face of it, if customers have to call back, not only is the savings out the window, now you have a customer service problem that has become systemic.

Customer service is a holistic approach; it’s about making your customers “Feel” appreciated. If you try to boil it down to a science too much, you will lose the essence that makes a customer feel content about doing business with you.