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A telecommunications organization servicing more than 70,000 customer care calls per day had a high cancellation rate for customers that continued to experience a service outage 90 minutes after a calling customer care. Existing systems within the organization took days to report whether service was restored after calling customer care. As a result, the organization could not respond quickly to keep high-risk customers from leaving.

Most significant challenges included:

  • Data Access: Different groups within the organization, each with its own policies, procedures, and technologies, controlled critical non-overlapping pieces of data.
  • Full Availability: Due to high call volumes, bonding the system to the customer care workflow required a zero downtime
  • Real Time: To be effective the solution needed to provide up to the minute information to the customer care representative.
  • Highly Responsive: Customer care consultants could not be delayed by waiting for the system.

A web-based solution was developed to meet all of the key challenges:

  • Data Access: An extensible ETL framework was developed so that each data source could be integrated without changing the processes or technology of the owning group.
  • Full Availability: System uptime is assured through fully redundant systems located at geographically dispersed sites. The sites are synchronized using a parallel load strategy.
  • Real Time: Preemptive caching was used to collect and process data in anticipation of user requests.
  • Highly Responsive: The average system response time was less than 200 ms, including network latency.

Through the new web solution, the call center experienced a sharp reduction in cancellations, since customers were able to resolve issues as they were happening. With a call time reduction of 2 minutes per call, the resulting efficiency improvements saved the client tens of millions of dollars per year. The increased customer satisfaction scores were also validated through measurement by independent outside surveys.

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Cory’s interdisciplinary background gave him the ability to see patterns and solutions across different domains that were not apparent to others on the team. These valuable insights have led to opportunities for improvement in the way Intel manages its relationships with academic institutions. I am looking forward to my next occasion to work with Cory.

Ken Anderson
Principal Researcher / Intel Corporation

David has a superior ability to quickly assess a situation and identify business needs then translate them into an action plan.

Kerry Little

Cory was a pleasure to work with on a critical training development project. He brought deep knowledge of adult learning theories to his work and presented us with practical suggestions that improved our training delivery almost immediately. In addition to delivering the project, Cory also helped us to gain better insight into our own processes and work culture.

Sara Ulius-Sabel
Global Innovation Senior Manager / Whirlpool Corporation

David has the uncanny gift of identifying business needs by asking on-the-mark questions at a macro level and translating them to applications in a most granular and accurate fashion.

Gerard Broussard

I hired Cory to lead the design and development of a website documenting the research network. Cory identified a great designer/ developer and managed the project perfectly. The design and content were outstanding, and the website launched on schedule. Simply put, Cory is outstanding and I will hire him again.

Carl DiSalvo
Associate Professor / Georgia Institute of Technology

David drove the project to completion and was extremely effective in a difficult corporate environment. I would hire him again without question.

Warren Schlicting
Senior Vice President / Comcast

I engaged with Research At Work Consulting for review of the University of Michigan Enterprise Analytics Roadmap. We asked the RAW team to look for areas that were either underrepresented or missing. Since we thought we had done a comprehensive roadmap, we were surprised with the results. The RAW team did an excellent job of comparing our roadmap to national standards and identifying areas requiring additional definition. It was a thoughtful and thorough review.

Mary Hill
Director of Data Management Services / University of Michigan Medical School

I had the opportunity to hire Cory to document a multi-year, multi-institution (academic and industry) research network that involved over 70 participants with as many projects. Cory conducted interviews with key members of the research network, reviewed key projects, analyzed this data, and produced a detailed report on the activities of the network, with an emphasis on analyzing the structures of collaboration that did and did not work. The report was simply outstanding. Throughout the project, Cory constantly excelled in both his social skills and his research skills. His deliverables were on time and thorough, and his insights were exceptional.

Carl DiSalvo
Associate Professor / Georgia Institute of Technology

Cory is a top notch professional. In addition to being a strong Human Factors consultant, he was also instrumental in management collaboration and decision making. His expertise, focus, and creativity under pressure made him a tremendous asset to our team.

Paul Cutsforth
District Sales Manager / Cequent Performance Products

Cory contributed great thought leadership to our project - especially in the area of adult learning and best practices. He was attentive, diligent, and a pleasure to work with. If you're looking for a strategic consultancy with a diverse yet competent portfolio, RAW Consulting should be your clear stop!

Annaliese Wimbleton
Global Innovation Manager / Whirlpool Corporation