TSW Day 3: Awards and Top Attended Sessions

Our Technology Services World Conference ended yesterday, and we are so thrilled at the turnout (550+!!!), the excellent content, and the spirit of collaboration among the members of our three associations (SSPA, TPSA, AFSMI).  I was booked solid with member 1:1 meetings and heard some new challenges (like how to introduce a culture of selling) as well as many companies struggling with some age-old problems that never go away (like how to increase KB effectiveness).

The conference ended with an awards luncheon, recognizing SSPA Star Award winners, TPSA Industry Leadership Awards, and the inaugural winners of the new Services Innovation Awards (presented to collaborations between education and industry).

SRII CEO JB Wood presents the Services Innovation Award cash prize to Israel's Technion

Here were some of the top attended sessions yesterday:

• “Using Remote Diagnostics Tools and Chat to Revolutionize Support;” Kenny Bunnell, Director, Services Operations, Novell. Kenny is a long time SSPA member, but I first met him when I was at Forrester doing research on customer communities. Novell was way ahead of that trend with a vibrant community driven by customer experts a decade before anyone had even heard of Web 2.0. Kenny was back at the conference this year to talk about moving beyond phone and manual processes to radically change resolution times and customer satisfaction.
• “Customer Satisfaction Best Practices Leading to J.D. Power and Associates Certification;” Brian Hayward, Senior Director of Customer Satisfaction, Avaya. Many companies work toward J.D. Power Certification, but few achieve the designation, many stumbling on the intense scrutiny given to customer satisfaction. Certified companies have a competitive advantage in the marketplace, and in this well attended session Brian talked about the process and lessons learned along the road to certification.
• “Understanding the Role of the Chief Service Officer (CSO) in a Small/Midsize (SMB) Company;” Bill Rose, Founder and Vice President of Services Research, SSPA. Bill always draws a crowd, and over the last year he has spent a lot of time digging into the unique challenges of our SMB members. Hopefully we will now see more CSO roles in smaller companies–a great way to boost visibility and credibility for the service organization.

I’d like to thank all the members and partners who attended TSW and those who contributed content and gave presentations. This was my 7th SSPA conference and the smoothest yet. Screw the recession, we proved that conferences that have clear impacts to the bottom line can still succeed! See you all in October for TSW Las Vegas!

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