Steve Morrell decided to embrace ContactBabel project in January 2000, when the hyped-up technological frenzy was about to plummet. Nevertheless the project was settled in a burgeoning and maturing milieu: the call and contact centre industry in UK. As the Biblical episode suggests, ContactBabel aims at providing a common language for the babel of voices in this market. The man at the helm on ContactBabel is a graduate at English literature whose big interest at the moment is learning more about wine
ContactBabels leader aims the project to stand as a trusted third-party between solution providers and the contact centres, explaining and guiding both sides to a mutually beneficial conclusion.
The CRM and customer contact technology market has been hyped so much and end-user businesses are so confused about what CRM is, does, and ultimately delivers. The full opportunities are often missed by vendors and end-users. My company tries to cut through these mixed messages and improve communications. Our job is to explain the vendors to the end-users and vice versa, notes Morell.
The Durham-based analysis firm (North-East UK) produces written reports and consultancy for solution providers explaining market attributes and the messages which contact centres need to hear. We also try to translate vendors messages into commercial language that end-users can understand through writing White Papers and presenting at conferences.
Each year ContactBabel issues a report on the state of affairs of the industry through a database including around 3,000 UK call centre operations and 12,000 key contacts. The firm has already worked for solution providers like Genesys, BT, Eyretel and Avaya.
Steve Morell, married, one child, was born in North Wales in 1972. He graduated from Durham University (UK) in 1994 at English literature. He joined Price Waterhouse as an IT adviser where he worked for three years as a SAP consultant.
In 1997, he joined Datamonitor, a leading market analysis firm, where he became interested in the way call centres were becoming a high-profile and critical part of many businesses strategies.
After writing numerous reports on the future of the European call centre market, he became global programme manager for Datamonitors CRM and contact centre division. Morell has been a judge for the European Call Centre of the Year awards and sat on a UK government steering committee to determine how contact centres can alleviate long-term unemployment.
His big interest at the moment is learning more about wine. The endless variety and complexity of wine means that it will a very long time before I get bored. Plus, the primary research can be quite enjoyable
Steve didnt forget though his literary past, trying to keep up-to-date with his reading, especially modern novels and science fiction. He says he would like to write a novel one of these days, although hes already co-author of a book called 20:20 CRM: A unique insight into customer contact. Aimed at key decision makers, 20:20 CRM provides an insight view of where businesses should be going with their customer contact operations. Morell defends that at the CRM core are the technological resources, which allow businesses maximising broader CRM strategies with a unique customer insight.
Steve is presently writing a report about IP-based contact centres resulting from a survey to over 100 UK companies, and hopes to roll out a similar report in June about quality-enhancing technologies such as interaction recording, e-learning and agent effectiveness tools.
Filipe Samora
2003-01-30
Em Foco – Pessoa