Welcome to the Working Solutions Blog

In his 2012 State of the Union address to Congress, President Obama said, “Ask yourselves what you can do to bring jobs back to your country, and your country will do everything we can to help you succeed.”

We at Working Solutions have been quietly keeping jobs in our country, one contact center seat at a time, for 16 years. Our business model has been based on a simple belief: American agents, with the right recruitment practices and the most rigorous training in the industry, provide the best customer service in the world, especially when working with the most discriminating and demanding customer in the world: their fellow Americans.

Of course, we’re not the only ones to recognize that. It’s no secret that “homeshoring” is the fast-growing trend in the contact center space that isn’t going to slow down anytime soon. The rise of of the middle-class in developing countries such as India and the Philippines—traditional sources of offshore call center agents—has inevitably led to a steady increase in labor costs, the primary reason why U.S. companies took their call center jobs overseas in the first place. There are also the many real challenges of connecting a foreign-born and foreign-educated agent located in a call center in Mumbai with an American customer in Atlanta. Companies employing offshore call centers are experiencing a backlash in the form of customer rage against “accent fatigue,” cultural differences and inadequate training.

Sixteen years has afforded us with plenty of insight and intelligence into what goes into the making of a world-class, U.S.-based virtual call center. Now we want to share some of our key learnings about customer service, call center best practices, sales techniques, management and Working Solutions itself. Several members of the Working Solutions executive team will be writing posts on a rotating basis, focusing on our respective expertise. We welcome your comments and feedback and hope you return often.