The 2010 Top Ranking Performers in the Contact Center World have been announced and medals handed out. What’s surprising about this year is the strong growth of best practices coming from the Asia Pacific countries and not the countries some would expect!

The rankings are based on awards for best practices – in 2010 over 1200 entries worldwide were received and through a process of elimination the best in each of 3 geographical regions of the world (Asia Pacific, Europe Middle East & Africa and the Americas) are scored and ranked. The best from each region then compete against each other at a global best practices event where the delegates judge entrants to determine the winners.

The US has traditionally been seen as a powerhouse and this year was no exception with a whopping 17 medals awarded. However other traditional markets such as the UK and even Canada faired less well compared to the best practices demonstrated by several Asia Pacific countries who came in positions 2nd through 5th. What made this even more surprising is that the small island nation of Singapore came second followed by Indonesia then Australia.

Raj Wadhwani, President of ContactCenterWorld - The Global Association for Contact Center Best Practices & Networking added "Initially one would expect the USA to be strong contenders in this process as they have a large number of centers, however the way that the awards and best practices events are run, entrants around the world have the same chances as any in the US and the results speak volumes for the global industry. Who would have expected Singapore to have the second highest medal count over places like India and even the Philippines who did not secure a single medal in the global rankings?!" he added "I commend the industry in Singapore, Indonesia, Australia and Malaysia for such a fantastic result and hope that these rankings make people in the industry realize finally that its not just the US who has the best practices – there is much to be gained by looking overseas, sometimes in places you would not consider"

Jim Bilger, VP Customer Care at CVS Caremark - an attendee at the 2010 Best Practices in the Contact Center World conference in Vegas (2-5th Nov 2010) added "Although the United States ranks #1 in the world the gap has surely narrowed. Performance metrics can be attained in any region, but I am amazed at the advances call centers in the Asia/Pacific region have made with regard to employee engagement and work environment."

Agina Fatima, CEO of PT Infomedia Nusantara in Indonesia added "The industry is growing rapidly in Indonesia, and more companies are already implementing a contact center solution for their customer contacts, customer service, inquiries and information, order and sales. At the moment, the Indonesia's contact center industry are beginning to spark the interest of the government bodies. Through call center association and companies, we are trying to make the government to notice the importance and the role of the contact center industries in the economy. Contact Center industries in Indonesia can generate a significant number of jobs from domestic and international jobs."

Raj Wadhwani concluded by telling us "If I was considering where to put a contact center in the world and I was looking outside of the US, I would refer to the table above to see where the best are and make a beeline to talk with officials in those countries - clearly the above speaks volumes and yet we are bombarded by messages about some countries and the strength of their industry and they don't even feature! - interesting and certainly food for thought in the contact center world!"

Every year ContactCenterWorld invites companies from around the world to enter the global awards – they are competing for their own pride and their nations. At the same time the entrants are benchmarking and learning through the unique best practices conferences that are part of the program. It’s a unique blend of awards, recognition and best practices rolled into one.

More details of the 2011 awards can be found at this link
http://www.contactcenterworld.com/worldawards/

And the best practices conferences for 2011 can be found at this link
http://www.contactcenterworld.com/conferences