The CC/CX Update - The 50th Birthday Edition

Hi Everyone,

Now let me start off by saying that the eagle eyed, regular readers amongst you might be saying "Hang on James, the last edition of your newsletter was volume 48?". Indeed it was!

However, way back on July 15th 2022 I published an article called The Beginning. It wasn't numbered but it in fact market the start of The CC/CX Update (or The CC/CX Industry Update as it was called then) so this is in fact the 50th edition which marks 2 years of this humble newsletter.

https://www.dhirubhai.net/pulse/beginning-james-parkin/?trackingId=IqVPyLBSQ4aePuL%2FB2KDmA%3D%3D

Over the last 2 years a few small things have changed, thanks in part to feedback from my subscribers but in general we are still gathering together once every 2 weeks for the same news, opinion and data from the CC/CX space as viewed by a 20 year veteran of recruiting.

Thank you to everyone that reads and subscribes, that provides comments and feedback which help improve the newsletter for everyone and who has agreed to be interviewed on various CX related topics for the audience. With the thank yous out the way and with me looking forward to celebrating edition 100 in another 2 years, Lets Dive In!

Current Recruitment Trends

Redundancies & Layoffs Are Back. Some might feel that these haven't really gone away in the tech sector for the last two years but that's not quite true on the grand scale.

According to Layoffs.fyi 2022 saw 165269 layoffs in the tech sector while 2023 saw 263180! So far in 2024 the same site has recorded 107370 (correct at time of writing). This is a snapshot of 5000 tech companies but it shows the increasing trend into 2023 and then a decline in the early part of 2024 but that is now returning and it looks like 2024 could end up some between the two preceding years in terms of numbers of redundancies.

Personally I have seen this impact a lot of people that I've spoken to in recent weeks going back as far as April.

As always, redundancies create further indirect movement of people who are unhappy or unsettled with the general direction of their employer. I would argue this is an intended consequence and factored in to the act itself by the employer. Ultimately this is creating a lot of movement in the talent pool and that is creating some new opportunities within businesses that have better headcount planning or the investment to take advantage of the opportunity this movement of people creates.

I've talked before about 2024 being a big year for M&A in the CX space and we have already seen that play out. This round of layoffs probably precedes yet more acquisitions as companies look to make the books more attractive. That in turn will create more movement of people and the cycle continues. It's going to be a bumpy end to the year but that is far better than the dead calm waters we have sailed for most of 2024 so far.

Back to Basics. The market demand, certainly in Europe, has returned its focus to core cloud CC skills (delivery and support). The rush to sell "AI" has slowed and therefore has impacted demand for talent. Several high profile customer service incidents have probably impacted confidence and the relative immaturity of products has meant that sales people are having more success focusing on core functionality which is still not deployed in the majority of cases. Just look at the numbers of CCs without conversational analytics in place still!

Early Careers Training. Okay, this is a bit of a trend that I'm creating but still, it's happening. Attrition rates for early careers hires in contact centres are around 40%! They are one of the highest turnover areas for any B2C organisation. The money invested and then wasted in this hiring is immense, especially when you factor in the time cost of the people involved in the hiring, training and leading of those people that move on from the team.

Getting early careers hiring in contact centers and SDR roles is massively important not just because of the ROI, the improvement in CX for customers (and therefore the ROI from this) but also because retaining and developing this talent for your business brings valuable knowledge to all your teams. People from the front lines should be developed for careers in every other part of the organisation. Who better to advise on product than someone that has worked with the consumer? Who better to advise on sales operations changes than someone who knows what its like to deal with a customer that cant get a simple solution to a purchase problem? Who better to hire people for your business than someone who understands the people your business serves?

I'll be dropping some links in the comments below to groups/communities that will in the next few weeks be fully introduced to fastracx. This is a unique, CX specific, early careers micro learning platform for people wanting to join our space and its going to create the leaders of the future. Join Us.

Recruitment News

This edition I thought it was time for a further update on salaries. Recently I posted on LI about the overall decline in salaries within our sector. The range in reductions was from 3% to a massive 21% over the last year! Check out the data in the post below;

https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/jamesparkin_recruitment-hiring-career-activity-7214212521509974016-kMu_?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop

However, there has been a change for the better in the last couple of weeks in some key areas, mainly those in the Hot Skills in Demand section below. I have seen modest increases in salaries being offered which are bringing them back in line with what I would consider to be "market rate". Now this does not make it a great time to be looking for a new role if you are already on a strong package, far from it. But, if you are being underpaid or not getting regular salary reviews then you could see this as the start of the market you want to be looking in.

The chances are that this will stick around for a while as plenty of companies have had roles open for far too long because the offer was not attractive enough and now this will solve that problem. But, it wont impact all hirers equally so you'll probably see a wider range of salaries being discussed with you than you might expect. Remember this is down to the market situation rather than your skills/experience and value!

Hot Skills in Demand

• Genesys Cloud solutions consulting/engineering - Global (still No.1)
• Bi-Lingual CX Consulting - Europe
• Entry Level/Early Careers SDR/Lead Gen - Europe
• Account Management/Customer Success - Global
• CX Solution Sales - Europe
• Project Manager - Europe

CC/CX Industry Events

Sept 5th-7th - CX Festival - Kiessee Ruhlsdorf, Germany

Register here

Sept 17th-19th - Dreamforce - San Francisco, California

Get this in your calendar

Oct 1st - Oct 2nd - Customer Experience for Financial Services Summit 2024 - Toronto, Canada

Register Here

Event season is quietening down here in the UK for the moment. What is your favourite event to attend, comment below!

Thank You!

Next edition I have an interview coming with someone I have been hoping to get on the newsletter for some time and we'll be discussing the application of Virtual Reality in CX which is really cutting edge stuff! So don't miss out and subscribe using the button at the top!

I am now offering opportunities for paid advertising in some future editions of The CC/CX Update. If you have a relevant product, organisation, vacancy or event that you would like to advertise to our thousands of CC/CX subscribers, the wider connected audience and our global YouTube audience then contact me for information on pricing. [email protected]

Thanks for reading, liking and subscribing!

James

Click here to see all our interviews and advice videos so far!