IT and Telecommunications

Worked with the European Marketing Director of IBM on the development of their strategy for launching and selling Voice Enhanced Applications. The work included the development and running of workshops for the clients major account sales teams, their sales agents and application developers. Product configuration, pricing and marketing strategies were also developed with relevant executive managers in many European countries. Then worked with IBM UK to help set up the new Voice Solutions Centre (VSC) and manage its growth from 3 to over 20 staff. Responsibility for developing and implementing much of the marketing strategy including the selection of new software products sold by the VSC.

Responsible for bringing together the international consortium that bid for, won and then implemented, Europe's first pay-per-view system for BSkyB. This became one of the busiest commercial CTI enabled call centres anywhere in the world, regularly handling in excess of 100,000 calls per hour.

Advised and helped to train British Telecomm's call centre specialists in both the sales and marketing of BT Call Centre Solutions and, for their project managers, the many diverse issues involved in implementing integrated call centres.

Worked on the development of the detailed sales and marketing plans for launching BT Linkline which became the first "0800 - freephone" public telephone service in the UK.

Retained by a global call centre, telecomms and IT manufacturer to advise on the introduction and development of their multi-million pound European professional services business.

Advised Unisys, a multinational computer hardware and services company, on their entry into the integrated call centre marketplace.

Retained by several leading computer and PABX manufacturers to advise on their marketing and product development strategies in the CTI arena.

Worked with Norwich Union, one of the UK's leading Life and Pensions companies, on the strategic development of their new call centres for servicing IFA's and policy holders into the next century.

Advised a leading direct insurer on the introduction of outbound teleservices for improving customer sales, retention rates and overall service levels. Developed new business processes for these services and acted as project manager for the ITT preparation, supplier evaluation, selection and implementation.

Worked with a number of other direct insurance companies (including Legal&General, PruDirect, Commercial Union, Cornhill) to develop their call centre strategies in line with their overall business plans.

Advised two UK Clearing Banks (TSB and Bank of Scotland) on their strategy for Teleservicing financial products and services. Developed and helped to present the business cases for Board level approval. Assisted with the development of their functional specifications, preparation of ITT documents and evaluation of suppliers. Retained by both Banks to help ensure the successful implementation of the new services, the first of which went live in Autumn 1994.

Assisted Capital Bank (formerly North West Securities) to identify and clarify their business direction for the '90s in terms of Teleservice. This resulted in the need for a different telecomms. infrastructure from that previously envisaged. Retained to advise on the selection of the new equipment, CTI and other aspects of implementing this new direction.

Worked with Barclaycard on the design, development and implementation of their integrated credit authorisation system. This was the first major installation of a fully CTI enabled call centre in Europe and is capable of supporting over 10,000 calls per hour.

Led the team assisting a major store credit card company (Debenhams) to develop a new strategy in the collection of overdue payments based on new telephone-computer techniques. Advised Legal and Trade, one the UK's leading specialist debt collection companies, on the development of their telephone related activities. Prepared and presented the Board with a range of options together with a costed business plan for the recommended way forward.

Worked with National Savings to design and implement their new direct sales information call centre. This involved the successful introduction of a new ACD, CTI and advanced workstation applications to staff who had previously only worked with simple PABX telephony and product manuals.

Developed a methodology and the metrics for cost justifying integrated call centres, since refined into a business case model spreadsheet.

Other sectors

Assisted the IT Director of a leading mail order company to determine the optimum call centre infrastructure which allowed their investment in legacy mainframe technology (including "dumb" terminals) to be retained with the added benefits of CTI.

Acted as marketing director for a large American energy company introducing their services into Europe and the Middle East. Responsibility for developing their marketing strategy and winning their first contracts in Scandinavia.

Worked with the senior managers of a number of multi-national oil companies to develop their management information and project management requirements so that these could be developed into practical computer based systems.