Announcing the Spring 2012 Recognized Innovator Awards

TSIA is pleased to announce that we are now accepting applications for the Spring 2012 Recognized Innovator Awards, which honor TSIA partners for outstanding innovation in products and services. Awards are judged by a panel of TSIA members and industry experts, with awards presented during the closing ceremonies of Technology Services World (TS W) in Santa Clara on May 7th, 2012.

The theme for TSW Spring is Best Practices, and we are putting together an amazing agenda of content, including presentations by past STAR Award winners, TSIA members with impressive stories to tell, case studies of innovative technology deployments, and data, trends, and hot topics from TSIA Research.

The Recognized Innovator Awards showcase the role TSIA partners play in enabling the success of today’s global service organizations. With 47% of TSIA members indicating they plan to bring in consultants for assistance with some area of their operation in the next 2 years, clearly companies are looking for innovative consulting and managed services, in addition to enterprise hardware and software. To better reflect this reality, and the wide array of products and services offered by TSIA members, the Recognized Innovator Award categories are very inclusive:

• Innovation in Products. Services operations, including education services, professional services, support services and field service, are all looking for a competitive edge: something that allows them to make a unique claim in the market. Often, companies look to innovative technology to provide that competitive edge. The Recognized Innovator in the Products category will provide documented case studies showing how their innovative products enable service operations to better compete through means such as increased productivity, cost reductions, increased revenues, improved customer satisfaction, or improvements to other key performance or financial metrics.
• Innovation in Services. The economic downturn has forced companies to come to terms with core verses context: what specific processes should we continue to own because we add measurable value, and which processes could be outsourced to a service provider who can accomplish the processes more efficiently for less cost? The Recognized Innovator in the Services category will provide documented case studies showing how their innovative services are helping customers meet and exceed business goals for service operation by allowing partners to manage specific areas of the business.
• Innovation in Consulting. As documented in JB Wood’s Complexity Avalanche, complexity isn’t rising just for our customers, but for service operations as well. New technology must be identified and implemented. Employees must be trained on new standards and practices, from ISO and ITIL to KCS and loyalty programs.  Service lines must overhaul packaged service offerings and pricing to respond to the revolving needs of customers. And across all service divisions, companies need assistance in auditing operations and creating an action plan to improve. The Recognized Innovator in the Consulting category will provide documented case studies showing how their innovative consulting services have helped technology firms meet and exceed business goals.

If you are interested in being a judge for the awards, let me know.  The application packets will be sent to judges the end of February, and you will have 2 weeks to complete your judging. Judges will be recognized at the awards ceremony and in the written research that recaps the winners. If you would like to be a judge, please send an email to me atjohn.ragsdale@tsia.com.

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2012 Services Technology Survey: NOW OPEN!

TSIA’s 7^th annual Services Technology Survey is the only available source of actual industry data for adoption, planned spending and satisfaction across 24 categories of technology used by service organizations, including:

• Support Services: All the tools used to support customers, including incident management, knowledgebases, multi-channel tools and web collaboration.
• Field Services: Technology used to automate the field service process, including mobility, scheduling and dispatch, and parts logistics and warehousing.
• Professional Services: Professional Services Automation (PSA) platforms to manage PS resources, projects and performance.
• Education Services: The various tools used to deliver customer training, including Learning Management Systems (LMS) and Learning Content Development (LCD).

In addition to these technology categories, the survey also tracks tools used across service lines, including Customer Relationship Management (CRM), social media and online communities, and reporting and analytic platforms. The survey also includes questions regarding the use of third party service providers/outsourcers and c0nsultants.

The results of this survey are usually available only to members of the TSIA, but for this 2012 survey, everyone who completes the survey will receive a complimentary copy of the survey results. Armed with this information, companies can benchmark their rate of technology adoption compared to industry peers, illustrating where you may be losing a competitive edge due to lack of automation or technology sophistication. Additionally, by identifying the top installed products in each technology area, you can shortcut your next search for a tool or platform by starting with a list of “best fit” solutions.  For the first time, the 2012 survey will also track responses by geography, identifying top installed products and planned spending for the Americas, Europe and the Middle East, and Asia Pacific.

The survey will take less than 15 minutes of your time, and your answers are completely confidential and will only be reported in aggregate. The first 50 people to complete the survey will receive a US $5 Starbucks gift card. Again, everyone who completes the survey will be sent a copy of the resulting research when it is released in May.

Please follow this link and complete the survey at your earliest convenience: https://survey.vovici.com/se.ashx?s=7E212C5912872E80

Thank you so much for your support!