QlikView revolutionises information culture at Blake

Blake is an outsourced contact centre provider offering inbound and outbound contact services on behalf of clients. Its business is extraordinarily complex, featuring intricate business processes and serving more than 50 clients, each with its own requirements and data.

In November 2009, the company identified a need for a business intelligence (BI) tool - initially to track statistics in its outbound operations (collections and sales). “To improve efficiencies, we wanted to analyse certain key metrics,” says Janet McFarlane, Blake BI Executive.

Previously, the company compiled reports for this purpose with data from the contact centre management system. “Every report took time to code, test and release, and tied up IT resources,” says McFarlane.

“We needed a tool that could provide a holistic view of our data and give insightful trending by seamlessly and easily integrating various different systems. We wanted to decrease our reliance on IT, and of course, there were considerations of cost and time.”

In 12 years as a BI executive, McFarlane had been exposed to many BI tools. “I wanted to see what QlikView could do, so we invited a demo from Durban-based QlikView Partner, Insight Consulting.”

Upuli de Abrew, director at Insight, says Insight developed a proof of concept (POC) analytical model, incorporating PTP and collections data. Sceptical at first about QlikView's claims of quick development; deep, user-driven analytics; ultra-fast queries; and flexible, consolidated presentation, McFarlane was impressed by the POC. “Insight Consulting proved that QlikView could easily meet all our requirements and more, and that the value-add would be large. We chose QlikView as our main information platform across the business.”

The first data model to be built by Insight Consulting was a fully-fledged collections model. To this end, Blake acquired QlikView Enterprise Server with client access licences and a large, powerful server. “The hardware had to support the high data volumes of a contact centre and the transformation of complex data from disparate sources into simple, easy-to-use QlikView data models,” De Abrew explains.

She says while initial development was concluded fairly quickly, enhancements and refinements were introduced later. “Blake revised their key performance indicators [KPIs] a few times, which required changes to the logic. Fortunately, QlikView lends itself to agile, iterative development.”

De Abrew notes that many of the users were BI novices and were at first reluctant to change their ways. “But once the ease-of-use was demonstrated to them, it became a non-issue.” Soon after go-live, the tool became fully utilised, she says. In addition to good user acceptance, the in-house BI team has begun developing new data models themselves; the first a telephony model that monitors calling stats with a view to improving staff efficiency.

McFarlane says the new BI tool revolutionised the company's information culture. “Blake had never had such easy access to information, or such deep analytics or easy views.”

* Quick and easy access - QlikView is user-driven and offers quick and easy analysis of voluminous, complex data from disparate sources. Its easy-to-navigate interface facilitates trend analysis and problem isolation.
* Easy development - After a four-day training course, Blake's BI team is developing and delivering high-quality QlikView data models.
* Up-to-date - Data models are refreshed daily, so the information is always fresh.
* Powerful analysis - QlikView allows users to navigate down to debtor or agent level, allowing easy identification of problems and intervention.

“We've only done about 40% of what we want to achieve with QlikView,” says McFarlane. “In time we want to do a systems-wide implementation to get a holistic view of our HR, finance and operations, to enable better strategic decisions across the business, seamlessly and without effort.”

A user survey yielded the following comments:

* QlikView gives you the exact information in one place, quickly and in a few clicks. The integrity of the data is proven and trusted. And the fact that you can drill down to the last detail lets you get to the root of problems.
* QlikView is a one-stop shop. I can now ascertain, for example, customers' PTP Paid percentage increases or decreases over time, which leaves staff well informed and motivated. Agents can also be trained much faster than previously, as there is no need to wait until the end of the cycle to extract live data.
* QlikView gives me a clear indication of the calls received, which agent took the call, what quick comment he or she captured, and even if an agent failed to action an account. I am able to ascertain wastage and improve on discipline.
* I cannot wait for TMS and HR reports to be added to QlikView.
* To collate month-end reports, I used three systems previously. Now I use one - QlikView.
* The comparisons allow me to do trend analysis.
* QlikView allows me to prioritise accounts.
* Various reports have greatly assisted in better managing the teams and allowed me to watch performance closely.