Telework & Persons with Disabilities

President’s Corner

The Telework Coalition (TelCoa), America’s leading nonprofit telework education and advocacy organization, based in Washington DC, was established in 2002 by a group of professionals with experience in addressing the benefits, adoption, and implementation of telework and telecommuting programs. This was in response to a growing need for a single, reliable source of reference material about technology’s impact on our economy, environment, energy usage, and our society in general. TelCoa focuses on how this technology is changing our lifestyles, organizational structures and workplace management, along with the policies, processes and procedures that support them.

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Guest Columnist

Telecommuting Catches On at the Council of Better Business Bureaus

Matthew Scandale

The Council of Better Business Bureaus (CBBB) is a national nonprofit headquartered in the Washington, DC area. They generate $20 million a year with 114 employees, leading a network of 115 independent BBB's generating $165 million in revenue with 2,300 employees. So they probably land in the middle of mid-sized organizations. We work hard to make the world a better place, helping consumers to avoid getting ripped off. We were a random collection of about 100 white-collar workers bustling about the halls and cubicles of a random high-rise in DC. Or at least that's the way it was until this year.

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Outbound Customer Contact – tougher to recruit and retain – Does it have to be that way?

Outbound Call Center Featured Article, TMCnet.com

By TMCnet Special Guest, Jack Heacock, Senior Vice President of The Telework Coalition

We all know the importance of recruiting and retaining the very best people throughout the contact center industry. Not only are they key contributors for providing high-quality service, first contact resolution, customer satisfaction, and an ongoing positive relationship with customers, but they are also especially difficult to retain for outbound work.

Outbound contact center work requires talent that is courteous, yet tenacious; flexible, but firm; detailed and factually oriented; while at the same time maintaining a professional decorum and a results-driven acumen beyond the skill levels of inexperienced representatives.

Programs of limited duration such as product recalls, political or customer preference polling, and direct sales campaigns add to the challenge of finding, training, and managing effective talent. During periods of economic downturns, reminder calls on account obligations to financial institutions are especially difficult areas for representatives to address and resolve successfully.

In fact, outbound has on occasion been categorized as …not for the ‘faint of heart’, requiring specialized training and resolute skills by those who take on the responsibilities. That makes outbound contact center work one of an HR department’s most difficult assignments to fill.

Does it have to be that way?

Click here to read the entire article.

NBC’s Today Show had a segment discussing why telephone agents are a company’s first line of defense in tackling calls and that employing disabled people to work from home is a growing trend. Companies and workers are recognizing the benefits of providing opportunities for certain employees to skip the commute to the office and work from home.

Today Show financial editor Jean Chatzky reports.

For a show summary and interviews with workers, click here.