The Office Response Telephone Answering Blog

Jobcentre Plus Awards

Following our recent success at the South West Contact Centre Awards, Office Response have again been recognised for our work with young people by Jobcentre Plus. The Jobcentre Plus Awards showcase the achievements of companies, partnerships and individuals who’ve worked with Jobcentre Plus over the past year. At the South West region awards yesterday we picked up the Skills Development Award and came runners-up in the Youth Employment Award. Seeing as RBS, Royal Mail, Wilkinsons, Waitrose and Comet were also shortlisted we’re quite chuffed at this achievement.

Our Head of Contact Centre, Heather Dawes, and Recruitment Manager, Alan Bell, (the picture above shows him basking in glory) attended the awards and were encouraged to see lots of well known companies supporting people back into work.

Alan and Heather commented, “The contact centre industry thrives on young people. We have created an apprenticeship  scheme to give 16-18 year olds the important skills needed to work in the contact centre environment. It’s good to share this success with the members of staff that have benefited most and we plan to continue developing our relationship with Jobcentre Plus in the future. ”

By Steve West

Marketing & Business Development Manager

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South West Contact Centre Forum Awards

After cycling the 21 miles to work I was starving, I resisted drinking too much of the free (and rather good) Chablis, and moaned constantly about my hunger until Stuart Coleman, super pushy salesman from the evening’s sponsors Sabio, secured me a second main course. I scoffed it quickly and finally put a halt to my stomach’s grumblings.

It’s easy to be cynical about award ceremonies but watching the unsuccessful finalists’ body language you can see these events mean a lot to the winners and losers. The unsuccessful finalists slump back in their chairs before pretending they did not really want to win anyway.

We won the “People Development Award”. Since October 09 we have been working with young people to give them an introduction to work. They follow a structured training programme leading to National Vocational Qualifications and we pick the best and give them junior positions.

We’ve been through a steep learning curve but after 9 months the best graduates from the scheme are turning into some of our top agents. It’s not a universal sentiment but many of our apprentices are grateful for their chance and are rewarding us with loyalty and a good standard of work.

Congratulations go to our Contact Centre Manager, Heather Dawes and her able assistant Sean Colledge, who run the training scheme and effectively won the award for Office Response.

Martin Blain

Sales Director

For more information;

Apprenticeships, http://www.apprenticeships.org.uk/

South West Contact Centre Forum http://www.swccf.co.uk/