Issue link: http://www.insightdigital.biz/i/112770
Calling ��� Moscow? An antique switchboard phone (circa 1950s) owned by a friend of Ber�����s who received it as a souvenir when he worked as a lawyer in Budapest, Hungary in the 1990s, shows how far the communications industry has come. (Rob Knuepfer of Chicago says when he was given the phone by a high-level Communist government official he was told it had a direct line to the Kremlin.) Today, Alta Resources invests millions in technology and e-commerce is its fastest-growing division. According to Baird Research, 20 years ago large companies outsourced just 10 percent to 20 percent of their customer care business; in 2010 that figure rose to 35 percent and by 2015 it will increase to 40 percent. ���You sort of have a megatrend of business shifting from doing it themselves to outsourcing,��� says Ber��. ���They���re saying, ���Is this really our expertise? Do I really want to buy a $2 million telephony system, or build another building for something that isn���t my primary business, when capital is tight and I���d rather innovate in my own products?��� As an industry, we can fill that gap. We can bring best practices to that. We can bring technology and metrics. We���re participating in that big shift.��� The industry is still quite fragmented in terms of market share, Ber�� explains. The top nine companies that do global customer care together enjoy a total market share of 22 percent. Opportunities have opened up for smaller companies, like Alta, to focus on a niche and exploit it. Changes in the health insurance industry, for example, offer tremendous opportunities to companies that specialize in outsourcing, Ber�� says. The Affordable Care Act will result in 9 million individuals shopping for insurance through newly created insurance exchanges. People will have questions. Trained individuals will need to be on the other end of the phone or keyboard when they call or email. ���Our hope is that we would get some business in that area,��� Ber�� says, confident that Alta will, given its concentration of expertise in the health insurance industry. Attention to efficiencies and metrics C ontinuous improvement processes help prove to its customers that outsourcing work with Alta makes sense. The company incorporated Six Sigma principles in 2006 and now has 43 green w w w. i n s i g h t o n b u s i n e s s . c o m belts and one black belt in the program. Since then, Alta has saved about $45 million ��� and passed $40 million of that on to its customers, according to Mark Strassburg, Alta���s Six Sigma black belt and director of quality. Sunrun���s Asher, for example, is pleased that since it contracted with Alta last fall his company has been consistently achieving targeted metrics ��� already saving 10 percent to 15 percent on its customer service budget. Strassburg says there���s a perception that Six Sigma is for manufacturing, but it can be applied to any business process that has quantifiable and defined goals. ���We define the problem, measure the baseline of the problem, analyze for root cause, implement improvements and then put controls in place,��� he says. ���We are able to apply it to our contract center work, customer care, sales, IT, human resources or other functions as well. We apply the methodology and it really strengthens relationships with our customers. In many cases, it���s triggered additional business.��� Continuous improvement initiatives in Alta���s [continued] �� M a r c h 2 013 ��� Insight | 27