Tuesday, May 6, 2008

The Finale: Final Keynote Address and Co-Hosted Evening Poolside Reception

Closing Keynote
Following the final conference breakouts, Thomas Lah of TPSA and Steve Smith of SSPA held the final keynote presentation of the conference on “Surviving Service Convergence,” presenting to services executives from both conference events.





Poolside Reception
The closing poolside reception provided the perfect California ambiance where attendees from both conferences came together to reconvene, compare notes, share experiences, and further ground connections made.



Thank You
As you can see from the blog below, this co-hosted services event was a really great learning and networking experience. On behalf of SSPA and TPSA staff, I thank you and wish you much success throughout the remainder of 2008. And of course, we look forward to seeing you in Vegas this October!

Tuesday Luncheon: Featuring SSPA's STAR Awards and Eric Chester from Generation Why

STAR Awards Luncheon

The prestigious peer-recognition STAR Awards honor companies that demonstrate ongoing high-level commitment to delivering world-class results in software and technical support. Winners were honored during today’s luncheon awards ceremony, where NetApp and Sun also were inducted into the SSPA Hall of Fame. This special recognition is awarded to a select group of companies that have won five SSPA STAR Awards since the program’s inception in 1989.

The 2008 SSPA STAR Award for Best Practices winners by category are:
  • Best Customer Commitment: Cisco - Linksys
  • Best Embedded Product Support – Hardware: Cisco Systems, Inc.
  • Best Embedded Product Support – Software: Oracle Corporation
  • Best Emerging Company Support: Approva Corporation
  • Best Knowledge Management Practices: NetApp
  • Best Online Support: Symantec
  • Best On-Site Support: Sun Microsystems, Inc.
  • Best Practices in Value-Added Support: Sun Microsystems, Inc.
  • Best Service Delivery Optimization: Sun Microsystems, Inc.
  • Best Support Staff Practices: EMC Corporation





We were honored to recognize these industry stars for their leadership and commitment to best-of-breed practices in technology service and support.

The Next Generation
Following the ceremony, Eric Chester, founder and president of Generation Why, took the stage to deliver “Insight, Perspectives, and Strategies for Understanding, Employing and Educating the Next Generation.” Eric’s logical, informed, and oftentimes humorous perspectives on managing the newest legion of the workforce provided great intelligence into the why’s of what makes this generation tick.



Following the afternoon breakouts, the Best-Practices Sharing Sessions offered yet another opportunity for folks to gather in comfortable and relaxed setting to discuss real business issues occurring on the front lines.

Day Three...Morning Learning

Microsoft Keynote
This morning’s keynote drew a packed house to hear Denise Rundle, general manager of global customer support for Microsoft. Denise shared her viewpoints on “Moving from Break/Fix to Breakthrough Customer Success.” Attendees were capturing her observations on laptops and by putting the good, old-fashioned pen to paper, truly absorbing Denise’s advice for gaining customer loyalty and achieving breakthrough organizational performance.




Morning Breakouts

The first round of breakouts offered up a wide range of topics for folks at all levels in the support organization…improving the customer sat survey (Cisco); SMB hiring practices (Advanced Solutions International); technology for the support center (two co-presented sessions—a) Trulia and Parature, and b) QLogic and KNOVA); KM (Cognos); management excellence—troubleshooting the madness (Akamai Technologies); attaining, retaining, and winning talent (Cisco Systems); key inflection points for value-added support (SSPA); systems mapping for BPO (Hewlett-Packard); and the ever-prevalent Web 2.0 (Microsoft).

In between sessions...

Monday, May 5, 2008

The Sessions

Our breakout sessions are where some of the best thinking in the customer service/support industry is shared. No matter what level you are positioned within the organization, today’s sessions delivered the exciting new developments in support from some of the leading technology solutions providers out there today.

Something for Everyone…
Topics were wide and varied in the afternoon sessions. A big topic, no doubt, was Web 2.0. Best practices in support, benchmarking and metrics, SMB practices, knowledge management, talent management, service and support technology, managing support staff in India, rewarding the service employee, multivendor support, and improving the customer experience are just a handful of the other areas covered by top execs from a lineup of companies that reads like a Who’s Who in the Technology Services Market: Intuit, Microsoft, Support Center University, Inovis, Autonomy etalk, Linksys, Cisco, KANA Software, Sprint, IBM, Hewlett-Packard, Symantec, Novell, Dell, Oracle, EMC, NetApp, Apple, GE Fanuc, Mentor Graphics, InQuira, Eclipsys, Citrix Online, and Hyundai.





Johh Ragsdale led another group of folks through the second Innovation Tour of the day, once again featuring the finalists and winners of SSPAs Recognized Innovator Awards.

Best-Practices Sharing Sessions provided the unique environment of moderator-free seminars where attendees could feel free to discuss their biggest issues, successes, and failures with peers with similar spectrums of interest. These were really popular gatherings where attendees got to share what worked and what hasn’t with one another in an intimate business environment setting. Sessions included:

  • Benchmarking and Metrics
  • Best Practices for Small and Medium Businesses
  • Consumer Support
  • Embracing Web 2.0
  • Kowledge Management
  • ManagementExcellence
  • Spport Operations
  • Talent Management

Reliable Application Support
The final keynote of the day, “End-to-End Solution Operations for Reliable Application Support,” presented by Andreas Graesser, vice president of active global support, SAP America, drew a packed house of attendees eager to learn solid processes and solutions for consistent, unwavering support that can be applied on the global basis.



Monday Night Reception in the Technology Services Expo
Sponsored by Salesforce.com, this reception was the place to be for good food, great conversation, building on past business relationships, developing new prospective agendas, and some great fun, including an appearance by Elvis Presley, himself. Keeping folks entertained with his humor and song, Elvis captured the attention of everyone. A great collection of very nice and generous prizes was given away on the show floor, and the prize wheel by the SSPA and TPSA booths never stopped spinning throughout the night. Attendees really enjoyed this opportunity to relax and make connections with friends and other like-minded industry execs.





Monday Morning Keynotes Take Center Stage

Monday morning was host to a strong lineup of keynote presentations, following a superb breakfast buffet in the Technology Services Expo. To a room filled to capacity, these presenters addressed the key trends driving the technology support industry today and into the future.

Attendees converged in Hall B for an enlightening opening keynote delivered by SSPA’s executive director Stephen Smith, who gave an in-depth update on the Association and what our initiatives and deliverables are, touching on the topics of how members are leveraging Web 2.0, the best-practice metrics and measures, and some of the results from the recent TPSA Global Service 50. Bill Rose, SSPA’s vice president of services research, to talk about there the Association’s research agenda is heading in the future.



Next Steve invited Mary Cay Kosten to the stage. Mary Cay is senior vice president of Global Customer Services for Sun Microsystems and gave a very interesting thought-producing presentation on “Achieving Service Excellence.”

Rounding out the morning keynotes, John Ragsdale, vice president of technology research for SSPA, discussed “2008 Support Technology Trends,” with results from SSPA’s 2008 Functional Heat Map and the 2008 Member Technology Survey.

Nearing the end of his keynote, John had the great honor of delivering the SSPA Spring 2008 Recognized Innovator Awards to the finalists and winners in the three critical business areas of usability, voice of the customer, and root cause analysis. Clarabridge, IBM, InQuira, NextNine, and Microsoft were all recognized for surpassing key stringent criteria and objectives as outlined by this year's panel of judges.

Following these morning keynotes, John Ragsdale led a large group of interested folks through the Technology Services Expo on the first Innovation Tour of the day, offering up the microphone to key execs in the services realm from the finalists and winners of the Innovator Awards.




Afterward, SSPA and TPSA members congregated on the show floor to make connections and refuel for the rest of the day with a fabulous luncheon spread.

Networking...