The November 2017 Issue of TAS Trader

Map Communications: Make more when you sell to us!

Be Thankful for Your Staff

By Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD

We will celebrate Thanksgiving Day next week in the United States. And our friends to the north celebrated it last month. Aside from having a day off from work—not that anyone in the answering service industry ever gets a day off, especially holidays—Thanksgiving is a time for us to think about things we’re thankful for.

Author Peter Lyle DeHaan

Top on most people’s list is family and friends. Other items might include our business or job. For most of us who work in the answering service industry, this implies we’re thankful for our clients who provide revenue and our staff who serve our clients.

Where would we be without our staff? This fall let’s take time to thank our employees for all the work they do to handle our clients’ communication needs and keep our business open.

Thankful Minds: We start with the realization that without our answering service staff, we would have no business to run and no clients to serve. Without our staff, we’re nothing. Even though we deal with staffing issues and employee problems from time to time, the reality is that our staff is essential to all that we do. Instead of complaining about errors, attendance, and attitudes, we should develop a perspective of thankfulness. Let’s focus on the positive elements of our employees, because they give us much to be positive about.

Thankful Words: Once we have adjusted our outlook to be thankful for our staff, we need to let them know what our mind is thinking. We must take time to thank them for their work. While some managers feel there’s no need to thank employees for merely showing up and doing the job they were hired to do, that’s an old-school perspective. We need to take time to tell our staff we appreciate them. Thank them for coming to work. Thank them for trying to always do their best. Thank them for trying extra hard on a difficult phone call we’d have surely hung up on. Thank them for smiling most all the time. A simple word of thanks can go a long way in helping our employees feel appreciated.

Thankful Actions: Having the right attitude and saying the right words is a great start. But let’s build upon our thankful words with thankful actions. What actions can we do to show our thanks? While there’s no single right answer, there are many possible ideas. For some people a handwritten note or thoughtful card means a lot. For other people a bonus in their paycheck or even an envelope with cash speaks volumes. How about having a party just because? (Of course, we’d never have a party on Thanksgiving. Let’s save it for when the call traffic returns to normal.) Being publicly recognized goes a long way with others. What about a small gift, even a trinket, that reminds them—every time they look at it—of how thankful we are for them and their work?

We can use the celebration of Thanksgiving as a reminder to be thankful for our staff. Yet what we do in this season, we should carry over throughout the whole year. We need to be thankful for our staff and the work they do 365 days a year, 24/7.

When was the last time you thanked your employees?

Peter Lyle DeHaan, PhD, is the publisher and editor-in-chief of TAS Trader. Check out his latest book, Sticky Customer Service.


Classified Ads:

TAS Sales Rep: 40-year-old, multiple-location, answering service seeks outgoing, highly professional, hard-working, and self-motivated sales representatives. Previous sales experience is preferred. Strong written and verbal communications skills are required. Must be comfortable with phone sales, computer-literate, and capable of creating written sales proposals. Email resume to Janet Livingston at janet@callcenter-salespro.com.

Seeking Acquisitions: Reputable TAS, in business since 1967 and still owned by the founding family, seeks a small TAS acquisition in the USA. Ideally, you’re billing under $50k per month. Smaller is better. We’ll treat you right, and your employees and customers. Let’s talk. Contact Doug at 888-693-7935 or douganswerphone@gmail.com.


The TAS Industry Responds to Help Its Own

By Lina Cunningham

The past couple of months we have been hit hard by hurricanes, earthquakes, and natural disasters, as well as some not-so-natural gunmen tragedies. My heart goes out to all of those and their families who have been affected by these devastating circumstances.

Following hurricane Harvey, NAEO pulled together with the help of CAM-X and ATSI members, to raise funds for those in need, by establishing the NAEO Relief Fund. NAEO offered to match all donations up to 10,000 dollars. The contributions flooded in.

The relief fund’s mission is to provide financial assistance to needy employees of TAS industry companies who experience a natural disaster or suffer unexpected personal hardship. In a very short time we raised $44,500, and we received twenty-two applications for assistance.

After reviewing some very heart-wrenching stories from applicants, we are humbled to announce that all twenty-two requests were granted. Each recipient received the maximum disbursement amount of $1,500.

I would like to extend a heartfelt thank you to all who made donations. A big thank you goes out to the Maryann Wetmore Foundation for a generous $10,000 donation. I would also like to give a special “Thank you” to CAM-X members and Linda Osip who participated in a challenge that helped raise $11,573.84 CAD. Combined with the individual donations made on the NAEO website and the contribution matched by NAEO, our expectations were pleasantly exceeded.

I know these donations will be put to good use and are very much appreciated by the recipients. I’m proud to be a part of a group of people who care so much for each other. Thank you all.

If you would like to donate, it’s not too late.

Lina Cunningham is the NAEO president, 2017.


Telephone Answering Service News

Call Center Sales Pro Taps Chris Calhoun as VP of Operations: Call Center Sales Pro announced that Chris Calhoun has joined their team to fill the newly created position of vice president of operations. In this role, Calhoun will focus on optimizing the company’s infrastructure to maximize staff effectiveness to better serve clients. Janet Livingston, founder of Call Center Sales Pro, brought Calhoun on board to provide added structure to her mission to serve the call center industry. “Chris brings the leadership and team-building skills to the table that will allow us to better scale Call Center Sales Pro,” Livingston said. “This will enable us to provide more services, products, and innovations to the call center and contact center industry.” Calhoun added, “I look forward to bringing my thirty plus years of leadership, management, and systematic approach to human performance to the Call Center Sales Pro team.”

Amtelco Announces miSecureMessages Version 6.6: New features in miSecureMessages (MSM) version 6.6 were developed in collaboration with members of the miSecureMessages Certified Partner program and MSM app users and are designed to make it easier to use. These include contact importing, email registration, password expiration and reset, personal circle, fingerprint scanning, and more group settings. Many system settings are configurable on a per-group basis allowing device-to-device messaging, registration type, default notification attempts and interval, and the IS web settings.

Send us your TAS articles and news for consideration in the next issue.


Quotes for the Month

“The highest result of education is tolerance.” -Helen Keller

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