BUSINESS CONTINUITY CHALLENGES IN THE MULTILINGUAL CONTACT CENTRE ENVIRONMENT

BUSINESS CONTINUITY CHALLENGES IN THE MULTILINGUAL CONTACT CENTRE ENVIRONMENT Business Continuity (BC) and Disaster Recovery (DR) can mean life or death for any organisation and this is every bit as true in the Multilingual Contact Centre environment. In an environment where you are servicing clients over multiple channels, in multiple languages and across time zones the potential risks are categorically amplified. In the event of a business disruption, Business Continuity Plans (BCP) are designed to ensure critical business functions can continue or can recover quickly, but what do you do when you are servicing clients in multiple languages? This adds an element to your planning that other contact centres do not have to think about. According to Continuity Insights and KPMG LLP 2011-2012 Global Business Continuity Management Program Benchmarking Study, which surveyed 685 executives from over 40 countries, the leading causes of operational disruption are severe weather (50%), power outrage (47%), flood (31%) and various IT related interruptions. This survey clearly shows the potential for area-wide disasters that could affect an entire country and result in significant loss to an organisation, are real possibilities. To ensure long-term sustainability, it is accepted that the board and executive management are responsible for ensuring that the organisation identifies, assesses, prioritises, manages and controls these risks. Yet, according to this survey many businesses do not have a BCP in place. In addition, according to the US National Archives and Records Administration, 93 percent of companies that lost their datacentre for 10 days or more due to a disaster, file for bankruptcy within one year of the disaster. Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 2

Advancement in business process and technology, increase in terrorism attacks and catastrophic natural disasters make it obvious that the need for an effective BCP is no longer an option. In a Multilingual contact centre this need is intensified, due to 24/7 customer service and multilingual requirements. Today, a business cannot afford to be down for continued periods of time. This whitepaper will focus on key areas that executive management need to consider when putting their BCP in place to ensure business as usual, as well as delve into Mindpearl s Business Continuity Solution. Key areas in Business Continuity Planning to ensure business as usual Business Continuity vs. Disaster Recovery Integrate a risk based framework Instill risk culture and awareness Maintain cash and work flow Stress test business continuity plans Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 3

Business Continuity vs. Disaster Recovery BCP and DR are often seen as interchangeable. They are in fact completely different, but complement each other. The first step in planning for disaster is distinguishing between the two. BCP involves identifying risk and having contingencies in place to ensure business does not halt whilst critical components and functions are recovered. It is a comprehensive approach to ensure that the business can continue to make money, not only after a natural calamity, but also in the event of smaller disruptions. DR involves the recovery of systems and infrastructure components after significant event that disrupts the business. BCP and DR are both essential to ensure prevention and reaction to calamities. Integrating a risk based framework When putting your BCP in place it is necessary to plan for expected and unexpected events. Routine disruptions such as office moves, service promotional uptake and holiday season increased demand need to be factored into your BCP. As well as more serious events such as product disasters, cyberattacks, severe weather effects on operations or sales, terrorist situations, industrial action, telecommunications or power failure in specific geographies, to name a few. Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 4

Your BCP needs to firstly identify critical operational areas, in terms of the customer, facilities, options available and critical decision timelines relevant to the site and type of event. Key considerations for a risk based framework are: people, location (dual & multi), technology, network virtualisation, duplicated circuits, off-net back up, separate & independent power supplies, UPS, generators, as well as, water, food and basic amenities. Integrating a risk based framework: It is also worth mentioning that when faced with a time critical event, the importance of having a user-friendly, workable document giving you an immediate view of all critical aspect, as well as a notification matrix cannot be overstated. Basically identify your risks and plan accordingly. Instil risk culture and awareness This is all about good housekeeping. Remember your continuity is reliant to employees, customers and suppliers. They are key stakeholders, because they can all be affected in some way should an event arise, either by your contingency plan or the event itself. Therefore, they need to be an integral part of your plan. Educate, communicate and involve key stakeholders! For your BCP to be successful consistency across the organisation is important, whether you have one site or multiple sites. Identifying key business owners for the BCP within your organisation is also necessary. Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 5

Good housekeeping also involves another people element that needs to be planned for whether things are going smoothly or not. In a multilingual 24/7 contact centre environment this is even more critical, as a majority of staff could have scarce linguistic skills which need to be duplicated across time zones should an event arise. Considerations include resource planning, temporary/part time, seasonal workers, temporary relocation of staff and load sharing between centres, geographies and time zones. Maintain cash and work flow Maintaining cash and work flow during a crisis is your ultimate goal. Your considerations need to include, your contractual obligations to your customers and suppliers, the longevity of your BCP, adequate insurance coverage in case of an event (and have you read the small print?), are you prepared to be flexible and unorthodox where needed; your customer permissions & processes (will they work?); supplier & customer BCP s (how do these affect you and are they regularly enacted/tested?); and people considerations in terms of labour laws and additional human resource. The answer to these deliberations could mean the difference between as usual and crippling your cash and/or work flow. Stress Test Business Continuity Plans Stress testing your BCP is an essential part of the process. You do not want to find out that it does not work during an event. Stress testing must include annual testing of all emergency numbers/network failover services/acd failover services; local testing and maintenance of UPS and Generators; local site building emergency drills e.g. fire drills; incident reporting of even minor and or "successful" incidents; checking that procedures really met expectations, and continually improving the process; testing the notification procedure, communication plan, roles & responsibilities; test your local & global vendor escalation; check that you know your customer requirements & procedures and recognise the limitations of your local site plan. Testing should include incident reports and check lists. This al- Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 6

lows you to review and continually improve the processes. In business change takes place rapidly, your BCP must be a working, living document which is correct when you need it, as well as accessible and easy to use for everyone. MINDPEARL S STRATEGY FOR BUSINESS CONTINUITY AND DISASTER RECOVERY Business Continuity Planning Mindpearl s global BCP/DR approach is to fail over to other Mindpearl facilities and utilize existing Mindpearl infrastructure and services/skills. The benefit in leveraging the Mindpearl location is that applications and connectivity can be perpetually tested, DR site is geographically remote to BCP event, and resources can be rapidly made available to support overflow. Mindpearl has implemented an Avaya virtual call centre between its global locations. Calls are queued in global virtual queues allowing Mindpearl to support call volume from any location instantly. Mindpearl s BCP Structure provides a process through which information is gathered, decisions are taken and specific business continuity services are invoked. Mindpearl has the capability to support a number of BCP models including: Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 7

Different incidents require different types/levels of business continuity services. Mindpearl s Customer BCP cover details of the existing services and alternatives depending on the area of business impact. The Mindpearl DR test plans are aligned with the individual business requirements in the BCP. As most businesses share a common understanding of business critical components, the plans at each site are similar. Mindpearl DR test plans per site: Typically Mindpearl tests and reviews BCPs every 6 months but this is dependent on customer requirements and impact to environment. Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 8

Disaster Recovery Site Ultimately the most suitable DR location is an active location that can ramp up to support a DR issue. A number of Mindpearl s clients have leveraged our virtualised architecture and linguistic services in other centres. This provides them with a well-trained and flexible workforce ready to support issues in other centres. By leveraging the virtualised Avaya design all locations can be operational and taking calls within minutes by just skilling agents with the specific skills, all call flow and announcements can be duplicated in any one of Mindpearl s centres to provide a transparent cutover to any callers. In addition, all Mindpearl s contact centres have additional seat capacity to accommodate BCP. Mindpearl s centres have strategically been selected; they are serviced well by transport, accommodation and telecommunication services to ensure immediate failover to anyone of Mindpearl s contact centres. Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 9

Conclusion The bottom line is no strategy will be risk-proof, but you can get extremely close through meticulous planning and preparedness. You must get all stakeholders on board. BCP cannot work in isolation. DR only sites can and do work, but are expensive & limiting. Multisite readiness is the safest structured solution, preferably in different geographies. These can and in most cases should be part of your steady state operational model. Business Continuity planning is not a once off project. It is a continuous process and requires continued focus & improvement. BCP is an investment, not an expense. You need to allocate resources, time and money in this critical area of business. Consider how much it could cost your organisation if you are not ready? Contributors: Alan Graham Chief Commercial Officer Nigel Clarke Global IT Director Candace Laubscher Sales and Marketing Consultant Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 10

Visit www.mindpearl.com About Mindpearl: Mindpearl designs, implements and operates multi-channel contact centres around the world. With a comprehensive portfolio of customer contact solutions specifically tailored to suit each client, Mindpearl provides a seamless transition from a client s in-house service. With a background stemming from the travel and airline sectors, Mindpearl provide contact centre solutions for global names in the aviation, telecommunications, retail and weight management industries, offering multilingual services around the globe on a 24 x 7 basis, if required. Mindpearl operates contact centre locations in Brisbane, Barcelona, Cape Town and Suva, Fiji. Copyright 2013 Mindpearl Group Limited 11