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Traditional workforce management (WFM) involves spreadsheets and manual time recording, which are onerous processes that decrease customer satisfaction. Contact Center Managers need a way to schedule people optimally, when the work is available for them to complete. This complexity of the randomness of work coming in, combined with the needs of the individuals completing the work, leads us to the need for more advanced solutions for scheduling.  

Today, forward-thinking managers are adopting a smarter, more streamlined approach to satisfy employees, which helps provide a better customer experience (CX). By better scheduling employees with WFM solutions, the center will be optimized as the work will be handled with the right amount of employees at that time. Many times, we see the exception to this on both sides…agents sitting around waiting for work, or so overworked that they quit.

Have you ever started an upgrade to your network only to find out that your licenses are too old? Has your IT maintenance contract ever lapsed, then when you try to add equipment back onto a contract, you learn that the manufacturer no longer supports the product? Are you left banging your head against your desk wondering why you weren’t aware of this before now, and now that it's too late?

When performing an IT upgrade, there's a variety of circumstances where you could find yourself left with an unsupported environment. That's why it's important to familiarize yourself with the correct terminology to ensure that you never lose coverage.

The enforcement period for the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) began on May 25, 2018, bringing significant changes to organizations in the European Union and beyond. Though a piece of European legislation, the GDPR impacts any organization that processes the personal data of those who reside in the Union, regardless of geographic location.

VPNFilter Infects 500K Networking Devices + Growing

Over the course of the last several months, researchers have investigated an advanced persistent threat known as VPNFilter, which has already infected 500,000 devices across 50+ countries, specifically targeting home office networks (or places utilizing small office and home office devices) as well as network-access storage (NAS) devices. The threat is believed to be sponsored by or affiliated with a nation state, which generally leads to well-funded, well-executed persistent threats that are properly managed with a defined end-game.

Based on research recently released by Cisco Talos, the US Department of Justice is urging anyone who owns small office home office (SOHO) and NAS devices to reboot their devices immediately. 

The VPNFilter malware operates via three unique stages, which are described below at a high level.

ConvergeOne is proud to congratulate Kathy Sobus, our Director of Customer Experience, who was recently included on CRN’s annual Women of the Channel listing which recognizes influential women leaders with extraordinary expertise and vision. This is Kathy's second consecutive year on this prestigious list.

Here's why Kathy is a Customer Experience Rock Star!

Kathy's passion lies in helping customers enhance their contact centers to more effectively respond to ever-changing needs. As an expert in her field, Kathy regularly develops and shares thought leadership and strategy, and is a staple at industry tradeshow and events. Kathy has been awarded thirteen patents, mainly in the area of identifying, routing, and reporting on events that happen within a business. She has also held roles that included global contact center lead, contact center strategist, and inventor.

We sat down with Kathy and asked her to share a few insights from her journey in customer experience so far. Here's what she had to say.

"Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters."

—Albert Einstein

We’ve all heard the old saying, “Be careful of the company you keep.” This is true for both people and technology. Consider blockchain. For many Americans, the immediate word association is “Bitcoin.” In fact, I would venture to guess that quite a few people think that they are one and the same. While this connection might be favorable for Bitcoin, it has become a bit of a boat anchor for blockchain. 

As we watched the successful launch of SpaceX Falcon Heavy, it struck us how fast technology was advancing. Think about it: Launching a 230 foot rocket with 27 engines. The boosters separate and nail a side by side landing back at the Cape. The coup d’état was sending Elon Musk’s Tesla on the way to Mars. That was unthinkable just a couple of years ago!

Believe it or not, our collaboration tools are evolving at warp speed too. The traditional PBX has rapidly evolved into an open architecture development platform that has the capability to radically improve the efficiencies of current workflows. Your company’s needs still drive solutions that include multiple vendors, and very likely a mix of cloud, hybrid cloud and on-prem solutions.

It has been a tough couple of weeks for the retail and restaurant industries. Under Armour, Panera, and Hudson Bay all came forward to announce major breaches of data entrusted to them. 

What can we learn from this continuing cavalcade of data breaches that we are becoming more and more inured to as time goes on? Let's take a closer look.

Content courtesy of our partner, NICE

Last week, our team of cloud experts came together for a webinar to introduce the exciting new ConvergeOne Cloud Experience (C1CX). A secure, scalable, and comprehensive collaboration solution, C1CX spans Unified Communications (UC) and Contact Centers (CC), with a host of software applications, expert integration, and professional services.