The CX analyst Peter Ryan, founder of Ryan Strategic Advisory recently published an article where he suggested that ‘Digital Nomads Can Fuel GigCX.’ Peter talked about Airbnb as one example of a company that has started exploring this global opportunity. He said: “Recently, Airbnb highlighted this opportunity when it announced that it will partner with twenty destinations around the world to make it more straightforward to live and work for the digital nomad community.”

Peter added: “As part of this forward-looking approach to work, Airbnb will help develop digital hubs that showcase long-term rentals, while also outlining important residential regulatory elements for prospective residents (such as immigration requirements and taxation). As a means of finding and retaining quality talent to manage customer interactions, this should be top of mind for outsourcers that use the gig CX.”

Peter’s article essentially suggested that this type of flexible and global use of resource should be normalised in the customer service environment. This is exactly what is now happening at ICON after the acquisition of the company by yoummday.

ICON has a solid track record in delivering contact centre solutions that deliver great value to B2B companies and companies that need CX within specialist areas, such as electric vehicles. The yoummday acquisition adds a very flexible and global approach to locating resource – improving all services on offer.

This approach matches much of what Peter Ryan has talked of in his commentary describing the future of CX. Consider just a few of these areas and topics:

• Global CX: smart BPOs know that if you can raise the bar and search for the best resource globally then you can ensure that your customer service operation has the best possible people on board – not just a selection of people within commuting distance of the office.
• Domain-focused: the previous focus with most contact centre hiring was to find people that will thrive in the customer service environment and then train them on the products being supported. This is often being reversed now with some interesting effects – real experts in specific products can be found and then trained in how to use the customer service system. It’s like hiring fans or advocates into the customer service team.
• Flexible: you don’t get flexibility just from facilitating a work-from-home (WFH) business model. Once smart workforce management is introduced and combined with WFH and the option to work with global resource then you have a solution that can scale up anytime support is needed, but this also offers individual flexibility to the team – no more 9-5pm Monday to Friday. This is genuinely how to manage a work/life balance.
• Diversity: there are many people that can’t – or would prefer not to – work in a traditional contact centre. They may struggle with a commute or the working hours. They might not want to be surrounded by the typically young employees in most contact centres. Creating a flexible customer service solution that embraces WFH allows you to include single parents, carers, the retired, and those with a disability that makes it difficult to get to an office. There is an enormous pool of untapped talent out there just struggling with the inflexibility of traditional employment.

Now ICON is working with yoummday, all these factors are a reality in how we design customer service solutions. You don’t need to listen to analysts talking about the future of CX to see the reality up close.

Interested in learning more about outsourcing with yoummday? Message Mark Matthews.