Jenni Laing Email & Phone Number

www.lortonandhorn.co.ukLorton & Horn was founded to offer beautifully designed leather goods, at a fair price.Every idea starts with a problem.Ours was that we wanted somewhere to store all our essentials when we were travelling. However, leather travel wallets from established brands were unjustifiably expensive; whereas reasonably-priced travel wallets were poorly designed and made from cheap synthetic materials, like polyester and nylon.It turned out there was a simple solution. The premium leather goods industry has overheads that push prices skyward – shops, warehouses, glossy ads and middlemen.Our approach is different: Quality is the most important thing. The products need to be incredible, with a focus on using the finest materials. Secondly, we sell directly to our customers, allowing us to offer beautifully-designed products, at fair prices.www.instagram.com/lortonhorn/

Nottingham, United Kingdom

Customer Service Operations.Customer complaints and resolutions.

Long Bennington, Lincolnshire

The Helpline Contact Centre deals with all the initial client contact into Payplan through a variety of mediums including telephone, letter, e-mail and live online chat. We deal with over 2000 clients each week. I am responsible for ensuring that all client contact is dealt with in a friendly andprofessional manner and that my staff are setting the exceptional customer service level that is expected throughout a client’s continued experience with Payplan. We are constantly trialing new initiatives to generate new business. I am responsible for effectively managing and communicating these initiatives to ensure their success.Skills required: Leadership. Forward planning and strategy coupled with problem solving and critical thinking. Ability to build companywide relationships to encourage effective communication and collaboration. An excellent knowledge of Excel, telephony and in-house data systems. Complete openness and ability to change.Projects/achievements:Trial and implementation of website key word tracking linked to Helpline telephony to calculate most effective pay-per-click spend.Changing the Helpline’s hours of operation from 0800-2100 (5 days a week) to 24 hours (7 days a week) with 10 days’ notice.Project sponsor for trial of ‘Workforce Management’, a new product provided by our contact solutions supplier, New Voice Media.Implementation of performance management structure to allow for tracking of KPI’s and the introduction of a bonus scheme.

Long Bennington, Lincolnshire

Overseeing the day to day running of the Helpline Contact Center, including: dealing with any staff issues, holding regular staff updates and performance reviews, managing and implementing new ideas initiated by the Helpline manager, liaising with sales and marketing in relation to new referrers and recruiting new staff.Skills: People management, delegation, knowledge of in-house telephony, software packages and data systems.Projects/Achievements:Abolished use of formal scripting by staff to encourage better, more natural client relationships.Worked with IT team to introduce new analytics and management information for Helpline, enabling us to create KPIs.Introduced Belbin personality tests to encourage better understanding of our staff and improved team performance.Implemented Live WEB Chat as an additional method of communication with potential clients.

Lead a team of eleven staff in the IVA Client Support department of Payplan. My role was to ensure IVAs were kept compliant and to motivate my staff to achieve their targets. In order to improve and maintain my team’s performance I created and collated statistics using Excel and shared analysis with my team, team leaders and managers. This analysis contained financial updates, product referrals and business conversions, shortfalls in any areas/targets and how I intended to rectify these. I held regular team meetings to present and discuss issues and achievements and to also invite and encourage ideas.Part of my role was to answer technical queries, spot check the team client base, assist with recruitment, address and arrange training, carry out performance reviews and appraisals and also conduct any disciplinary action necessary. IVA Client Support is an incredibly busy, fast paced andchangeable department therefore organization, decisiveness and efficiency were required daily.

During my eight months in the position of Assistant to Senior Manager of Acquisition my duties involved dealing with telephone enquiries, emails and incoming and outgoing correspondence, and organising my manager’s diary. I organised and attended meetings, took minutes and distributeddocumentation. I produced documents, presentations and created several original reports and spreadsheets using Excel and local systems to track the growth/decline and movements of business and ongoing projects undertaken by the department.Following this, and at my own request for personal development, I was given a project to manage alone. For this project, I was appointed team leader of a new mini-department that would cross sell household products such as energy suppliers and insurances to clients accessing the company via our Helpline.I drew up a business plan containing a proposal for the trial of the project and liaised with Marketing, Sales, IT and the Financial Services Department to obtain the correct training and information required. I also sought out new potential opportunities to improve the department andfeedback to senior management. This department is still running successfully and has become an important part of the business.