Right Shoring: The Next Frontier for Small And Medium Businesses

Editor, SMEE - March 14, 2024

For many Australian and New Zealand small businesses, the idea of expanding their team overseas might seem daunting, but a volatile and disrupted business environment may make it a question of survival.   Irwin Hau, founder and director of digital agency Chromatix Web Design and the Australasian marketing SaaS start-up ConversionCow, believes a new approach called "Right Shoring" is the key to success in today's small business market.   "We've all been conditioned to think local for th...

Kiwis can endure being on hold, so long as their problem is solved

Editor, SMEE - December 22, 2023

Kiwis are more likely to put up with wait times for their calls to be answered by retail and business contact centres—even during the busy holiday and retail periods—provided the operator is empathetic, and their problem is solved, says industry body Customer Contact Network New Zealand (CCNNZ).  CCNNZ CEO Elias Kanaris says that, at the moment, the contact centre industry focuses on fast service (on keeping call waiting times as short as possible), but this may be at the expense of the ...

AirNZ's outsourcing move keeps local contact centre staff on their knees

Editor, SMEE - October 26, 2023

Air New Zealand's decision to temporarily outsource some call centre activities to the Philippines because there is a shortage of suitable staff is understandable, but also a self-perpetuating practise because it cheapens the profession—the moment you find a cheaper alternative, the less locals earn, says industry body Customer Contact Network New Zealand (CCNNZ). CCNNZ CEO, Elias Kanaris, said he understands Air New Zealand's decision to move contact centre activities offshore temporarily ...

Independent schools take the lead on indoor air quality

Editor, SMEE - March 8, 2022

Covid measures help improve classroom attentiveness. Over the last four months, building performance technology provider Tether has installed hundreds of its devices at private schools across New Zealand in partnership with the Independent Schools of New Zealand (NZ). In addition to a safer environment, children are using the technology to learn about air quality, said Tether chief executive Brandon van Blerk. Van Blerk said the goal of the rollout is to create a robust data set about t...

Nerra proves environmental innovation speaks louder than lip service

Sean Foster - March 25, 2021

Using 'environmentally friendly' and other hot social issues merely as a marketing ploy won't wash with New Zealand customers. If you take a position on an issue as a business, you need to do more than live it and breath it – you need to innovate. One company that is doing just that is Nerra. Nerra appears to be genuinely reinventing the old bicycle in ways that are beyond your imagination. They go way beyond the traditional 3R's of Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. The modern building industr...

Focus innovation funding to build world class firms

Colin Kennedy, Productivity Commission - January 18, 2021

The New Zealand Productivity Commission released its draft report on frontier firms which, the commission says, are a key pathway by which innovation in the form of new technologies and work practices make their way to firms behind the leading edge. New analysis undertaken by the Productivity Commission indicates that the productivity of New Zealand’s frontier firms is only about half that found in their counterparts in other small, advanced economies. “Innovation is the key to New Zea...