GET TO KNOW ...
On the lighter side of things , we ask the industry experts what makes them tick . . . .
Daniel Harding , Director , Australia Operations , MaxContact
wWhat would you describe as your most memorable achievement ?
Introducing MaxContact to the APAC region while juggling the challenges of emigrating to a new country felt like quite a feat ! We arrived from the UK in 2016 , with a fouryear-old and a baby and all our worldly goods in a container ship , and I had a busy couple of years after that , setting up the company ’ s Down Under arm and settling the family in .
What first made you think of a career in technology ?
I came at it from a sideways direction . After finishing school , I did an engineering apprenticeship with Shell and spent a few years working as a refinery control room operator – friends used to joke that I was the North of England ’ s answer to Homer Simpson ! I wasn ’ t in the technology industry per se but the job itself was highly automated . We used technology to monitor and manage a stack of complex systems and processes . When the opportunity arose to make the shift to ICT , it didn ’ t feel like a huge leap .
What style of management philosophy do you employ with your current position ? always been the way I roll . We ’ re a small team so duties aren ’ t as demarcated as they would be in a larger organization . Everyone has to chip in and do whatever needs to be done . It helps that I work with people who are invested in the success of the company and can be trusted to get on with the job .
What do you think is the current hot technology talking point ?
Business Continuity ! To say it ’ s the hot topic for contact centers in 2020 would be an understatement . No one could have imagined the events of this year and the
impact they would have on companies around the globe . People who ’ ve never really planned for Business Continuity have either gotten lucky – or really unlucky . It ’ s created a huge opportunity for vendors like us that can help companies switch over seamlessly to a work-from-home or hybrid model . We ’ re also seeing big businesses moving their call centers back to Australia
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