We celebrate 14 years with Jo Rix
Q3 2014 What is WebRTC? And why your business should take interest?
The GP’s Surgery of the Future Questmark Updates and charity work
Booking Video Calls Online
Feedback Please We are on a mission to learn more
Over the last 12 months we have seen some great changes at Questmark. Exciting new technologies, procedures and services. But this newsletter focuses very much on people. Video Conferencing is all about relationships and interactions and using technology as a way to facilitate that. We echo that sentiment in this issue.
Jo Rix Celebrates 14 years. As many will know, Jo Rix has been a staple, leading figures at Questmark for a long time. And today marks 14 years since she first started at Questmark. Fresh back from Glastonbury we present her with flowers (image below), take a look over some of her best moments and look forward to another 14 years. Jo epitomises what Questmark is all about. Great customer care, a bright attitude and an unparalleled knowledge (how does she remember all those system names, customers’ holidays and installations from 10 years ago!) A few colleagues would like to pay tribute to her work over the last 14 years – and look forward to many more to come. “She is very, very special to me. We are very fortunate to have her in our lives as a truly great friend as well as in our business” Sam McMaster, CEO “What would we do without her? The font of all knowledge!” Helen Townsend, Service Desk Manager “We owe her a huge thanks for her work and commitment to Questmark and her customers” Jamie McMaster, Sales Director “Great service!” customer “A huge thanks to Jo Rix – extremely helpful” customer. “Jo is amazing to have on our team – she always brings energy… and occasionally a mid-day song” Sarah Dews, Logistics Manager. “It is great to work with someone who is so good at what she does and is an amazing friend as well” Lisa McMaster, Operations Director.
Staff Developments In addition to Jo’s commitment, we would also like to take the time to thank Leanne Sowter on our ServiceDesk who has now moved on to a new role in Leicester but has been crucial in helping Questmark develop the reporting statistics and procedures for our customers. And an introduction and welcome to Josh Bellamy who is taking on an apprenticeship on our ServiceDesk.
Jo Rix, ten years ago.
Flowers sent to say a big thank you. July 4th 2014
WebRTC What is it? What does is mean for your business? Opportunities, considerations and reality So what is WebRTC and what should your business know about it!?WebRTC, Web Real Time Communications is a relatively new technology that allows for video and audio links through web-browsers. It doesn’t require a download or plugin and is already proving to be opening up huge opportunities for virtual meetings. By being an open source and open language for communications, it is as simple as one click in a web browser to join a video or audio meeting through WebRTC. Unlike telephony or point to point video conferencing it is less of a case of call me directly and more of a “let’s meet here – similar to webinars and audio conferences where everyone dials in at an agreed time. With WebRTC no one has an “address” that will connect to their computer or tablet and access their webcam, It will be down to each partly to connect to a virtual meeting space in the cloud– you have full control of when you join the meeting and when you invite people to join yours.
WEBRTC OPPORTUNITIES The opportunities for this technology in business are extensive and new uses and integrated additions are being continually developed (think integrating text chat, directories, calendars and recordings just for starters) At the heart of it, WebRTC delivers a simple, free and usable connection method into a video meeting session. This makes it perfect for uses such as:
Recruitment and video interviews. With encrypted data it can offer business class security, and data sharing as well as reducing the requirement for those being recruited to have to download anything. Keeping dispersed teams together, as there are no downloads, and sessions that last for as long as required and with the ability to invite as many people as you could want this makes it very easy to keep ideas flowing despite locations. Video enabled support desks. The Amazon kindle advert with the MayDay button to actively have a video call with the ServiceDesk shows the importance that customers place on great support. WebRTC empowers more and more people to do that. Questmark have set it all up on our support desk (alongside the more traditional video links that have been in place previously) and indeed have it for immediate calls with our Sales, logistics and accounts teams through the website and on email footers
There are so many more uses – virtual water cooler chats, Account review meetings with customers, humanising your sales and marketing channels, online demonstrations. And with the WebRTC philosophy – meet easily from anywhere, it couldn’t be easier. You own your meeting space and can lock it down with PINs and sessions aren’t limited to the number of connections or locked down to certain participants.
WEBRTC CONSIDERATIONS. One drawback of basic WebRTC is that each stream is sent and received individually – something which can get bandwidth heavy and affect the quality of the call. Thankfully this is where additional features can really bring this technology into a business environment and add an extra layer to the opportunities. Bringing the WebRTC standards into the more traditional videoconferencing space (Polycom, Cisco, LifeSize) with a Virtual Meeting Room not only connects people through a vast range of technologies it also brings with it the very successfully the capacity for each individual connection to work to its own standard and be more bandwidth efficient for all participants. So if 5 people have great connections and one team member is struggling he won’t pull everyone else down with him.
A Meeting initiated from the Questmark.co.uk website
WEBRTC REALITY As a new technology there are a number of hurdles (rather than limitations). Most evident is that it will only work on Google Chrome, Mozilla and Opera operating systems. Internet Explorer and Safari are currently not allowing these standards to run on their browsers (Apple are also not allowing this on the Chrome app for iPads and iPhones as well currently)
SPREADING THE WEBRTC EXPERIENCE So as a free open technology WebRTC sits in a strange space that requires development around it to make it usable by real people in real life scenarios. Organisations are developing new ways of doing things and being proactive about using this technology. In Questmark’s roadmap for customers of our Caboodle Meet Me service (which brings together inviting people through a WebRTC link) is a plugin for IE and Safari. And with the reality of some restrictions, come the reality of the vast extent of this opportunity (IE and Apple’s concerns and lock downs are telling of how much WebRTC could change the current face of video communications) WebRTC is an open standard that has quickly become adaptable with the internationally recognised standards for video conferencing that professional business meetings are held on.
Questmark are the first UK professional video company to embrace WebRTC technology and integrate it with existing services in some truly unique ways – telemedicine video GP appointments, online British Sign Language Interpreting and of course for easy, free weblinks into traditional video conferencing meetings or even connections to Microsoft Lync. Please speak to your Account Manager for further information or to trial WebRTC connections to your meetings.
What do you think of Customer Feedback Forms? What a pain!!!
As if I have the time to fill one out
I get the point but they aren’t always relevant
I LOVE Questmark’s new one click system So Simple!2
Questmark love customer feedback whether it is good, constructive, bad or a bit of a kicking because then we know where we need to improve. But at the same time, from our own business experience, we know that we hate filling out forms, we don’t really want to complain directly and to be honest we are far too busy to sit there and answer 55 questions when we aren’t sure people will really be taking note anyway.
But for us we want to get to the heart of what our customers genuinely thing about all of the interactions that they have with us. Questmark has always been a people led business and our commitment to our customers is paramount to us So in the interests of giving consideration to people with busy days, and getting a genuine feel for you and your teams thoughts about interaction with Questmark at all layers and levels we have introduced a simple one click feedback form. So one question – four options – click one and we have a tone for how you feel. Additional comments are very appreciated but not essential - the feedback is logged with just one click.
If it is positive then we will give a well done to the team, process or person involved. If it is not so positive or we’ve really let you down then hopefully we can resolve this for you and not let any poor service on our part linger.
You may have already spotted smiling faces on everyone’s email footers – and we may send questions directly related to work we have done recently for you. So please give as many clicks as you want and leave us some feedback – we want the good the bad and the ugly about our services, our products and our interactions with you.
What’s New Cloud Video Services for the Public Sector Questmark have renewed our place on the G-Cloud purchasing framework and our video conferencing services can be purchased by any public sector organisation that is looking to reduce the costs of purchasing as well as look at the potential for cloud based services. Services offered include our fully managed services, systems and services to hit a range of meeting room sizes, access lines and individual services.
First Aid and Fire Marshalls We now have new trained first Aiders and trained Fire Marshalls – Sarah Dews and Chelsie Walker underwent Fire Marshall training on Monday 16th June and Sarah dews and Helen Cruse qualified in the First Aid training on Mon 23rd June – Thank you to all of them for participating in their new role – let’s hope we don’t have to use their services any time soon! .
#Footsies for Charity Questmark have been long-time supporters of an incredible charity Street Child Africa . This month one of their fundraising events – the annual Golf Day raised over £19,000 at the latest count. This is an incredible feat and Questmark were proud sponsors of this event. And with the trend for selfies, Street Child Africa sought the savvy move of raising awareness and donations through a foot selfie. With the lack of shoes for street children being a big issue this social media campaign was a huge success: See if you can guess which members of the Questmark team that these feet belong to? Street Child Africa support vulnerable street children in cities across Africa. There are over 100,000 in the cities where Street Child Africa provide support and vital work. This includes a street outreach programme, drop in and residential centres, education and training, family reintegration and poverty prevention. Last year the charity reached 37,000 street children and hope to extend this further. For further information on the amazing work that Street Child Africa are doing with the money raised please take a look at their website. And to donate £3.00 text STREET to 70660. http://www.streetchildafrica.org.uk/
Living Wage Employers Questmark are proud to be Living Wage Employees and are currently going through the process of formalising this with the Living Wage Foundation. Debates on legislating The Living Wage have been prominent in the press recently. It is an hourly rate that is calculated based upon the basic cost of living in the UK and is around 20% higher than the legal Minimum Wage. As a people based company Questmark are very aware of the benefits of supporting our staff and in turn the general community that we live and work in. As a service based company that works with our customers on an ongoing basis – we know that our relationships with our customers and each other only thrive when our teams feel appreciated, excited by their roles and are able to focus on their work rather than concerns about the cost of living.
Attracting and retaining great people is essential, and in line with our strong training and development programmes the Living Wage is helping us be a strong local SME employer. Having our minimum pay level set at this level is helping Questmark grow our business, invest in our staff and training and continue to be an organisation that is as much about having a strong corporate social responsibility as it is about our business practices. More details on the benefits for the Living Wage can be found at www.livingwage.org.uk
How Questmark’s Customers are
Booking the Trends
Customers that use Questmark’s services to manage, organise and create their video meetings have usage amongst their staff that is 5 x higher than the national average. That ensures a higher return on any investment, less travel, less CO2 in the atmosphere and more productive meetings bucking the trend One big reason for our customer’s success is our ServiceDesk – the biggest and most extensively trained for video conferencing in the UK that can support users immediately with knowledge (and a lot of the time resolve issues remotely!) Amongst the jobs the ServiceDesk does – booking video conferencing calls is one of the most powerful. Having real people behind it, testing, options for a concierge service and organising with external companies mean that even the most technophobic of staff feel confident that their video meetings will connect the offices they need and work every time. Questmark are therefore very excited to announce an additional layer to our Bookings Service with the ability to book through an online portal. The new booking portal is available to existing customers who currently book meetings through Questmark and for any other customers please speak to your account manager to find out more information. This booking portal is the first stage for online bookings and includes the ability for admin logins and reviewing existing bookings and cancellations. Contact the servicedesk for more information.