From Tarzan Dreams to Entrepreneurship.

On Another Track Podcast. Emigrate to Costa Rica to become a ‘Pinball Wizard’ like Richard Blank. David Wilson is "On Another Track". It's been the story of my life and many other people that I have met. That is the motivation behind this podcast series. I want to take you on a journey, exploring people and places from around the world. I'll take you to places you have never been and to places where you might not want to go! My Dream. Welcome to the 66th episode of my podcast series that shines a light on how people have changed their lives and what was involved in getting themselves On Another Track! When you first meet Richard you are blown away by his clarity and amazing energy. Having been involved in call centres since the age of 27, what Richard doesn’t know about empathy and having a downright good time in the workplace, is not worth knowing. Don’t get me wrong, he’s no pushover as he competes with the likes of Amazon but at the same time he manages to keep 150 local people employed in this Caribbean paradise. David Wilson shines a light on how people have changed up their lives and what was involved in getting themselves On Another Track! I want to leave a legacy not only for today but for people searching for a future to life, the universe and all that! Sounds big? It is but guess what? There are so many people out there have great stories and advice. Are they willing to share it with the world? Let's find out, lets get "On Another Track!" Being an army "Brat" for 25 years of my life has allowed me to be confident at meeting and talking to people around the world. Friends would often say "have you had your interview with David yet?" to the people I had just met.Coming from a Celtic, Glaswegian background, being a shrinking violet was not an option. You were in danger of being thought aloof if you didn't converse and pass the time of day. Especially if you were on a Glasgow bus! Fast forward to my start in broadcasting in the 1980's. Leaving Germany and arriving in a small market town called Devizes in Wiltshire (20 miles north of Stonehenge) in the UK, I was looking to do something with my spare time. I happen to open the local paper to see an advert for "new presenters required at Devizes Hospital Broadcasting Service". That was it. I was off to the races!It was more than spinning records and sounding good on the radio. It was the old school way of learning to talk to people. I spent 15 happy years in broadcasting. Who would have thought it would hold me in good stead in the 2020's? I now reside in Canada but still broadcast back to the UK via the wonders of the world wide web and also host my weekly talks podcast series On Another Track. Richard’s vision quest journey is filled with twists and turns. When he was 27 years old, he relocated to Costa Rica to train employees for one of the larger call centers in San Jose. With a mix of motivational public speaking style backed by tactful and appropriate rhetoric, Richard shared his knowledge and trained over 10 000 bilingual telemarketers. Richard Blank has the largest collection of restored American Pinball machines and antique Rockola Jukeboxes in Central America making gamification a strong part of CCC culture.Richard Blank is the Chief Executive Officer for Costa Rica’s Call Center since 2008. Mr. Richard Blank holds a bachelors degree in Communication and Spanish from the University of Arizona and a certificate of language proficiency from the University of Sevilla, Spain. A Keynote speaker for Philadelphia's Abington High School 68th National Honors Society induction ceremony. In addition, inducted into the 2023 Hall of Fame for Business. Giving back to Abington Senior High School is very important to Mr. Blank. As such, he endows a scholarship each year for students that plan on majoring in a world language at the university level. Costa Rica’s Call Center (CCC) is a state of the art BPO telemarketing outsource company located in the capital city of San Jose, Costa Rica. Our main focus has been, and will always be to personally train each and every Central America call center agent so that we may offer the highest quality of outbound and inbound telemarketing solutions and bilingual customer service to small and medium sized international companies, entrepreneurs as well as fortune 500 companies. Building a Business Brick by Brick You're just buying it used, but it's never been used. And so by being smart, frugal, and having people, not myself, because they'll charge 20% more because I'm a gringo, but local contacts to bring you this stuff, I was able to save tens of thousands of dollars ramping this thing up. And so after two years of paying per station, I rented space for about six years. And after saving enough money and weathering a storm in 2010, I was capable of building a three-floor business that can house 300 seats. In fact, you can see the bricks behind me. And I know that you're expecting me to tell you about taking out mortgages, loans, partners. But once again, that's not how I was raised. It might have taken me 14 years to get to where I am today. But I was able to sleep at night. I could weather any storm. I had a ton of resources to handle that. Evolution of Personal Priorities But I don't know. I mean, when you're eight years old, you're different from you're 18 to 28 to even 38. And, oh, David, mind you this, you know, when I, at 35, I started my company. So imagine when I was 15, I had no clue about even wanting to run a company. And so you could look at yourself differently from your hairstyles to the clothes and friends that you have, the music and your tastes. But I think a lot of it has to do with priority. From Scratch: Early Challenges in Building a Call Center I put up my website October 4th of 2007, and I landed my first account February 6th of 2008. It was one seat for 50 hours. Now, I didn't have that call center space then. So what I was doing was renting a station from more of a blended or a mixed center. It was more of like an open floor plan, no real private office. You put in your people, but it's a turnkey station. They had the IT support, the security, and the headset, the computer, but it just wasn't private, right? And so I could pay my people, pay this guy, make a margin, and start growing from there. The moment that I landed that first account, it wasn't the size of the account. It was more of the shedding the skin of one past life to a new life of something that was created and you could build on that. From Tarzan Dreams to Entrepreneurship i wanted to be a fireman, but I think when I was really, really young, I maybe wanted to be Tarzan or something because I always thought that was kind of cool, swinging from trees and living, you know, free and animals and stuff. I don't think I could have survived being Tarzan, you know, with camping. But I don't know. I mean, when you're eight years old, you're different from you're 18 to 28 to even 38. And, oh, David, mind you this, you know, when I, at 35, I started my company. So imagine when I was 15, I had no clue about even wanting to run a company. https://costaricascallcenter.com/en/outbound-bpo-campaigns/ #RichardBlank #CostaRica #CallCenter #Outsourcing #Telemarketing #BPO #Sales #Entrepreneur #B2B #Business #Podcast #Leadgeneration #Appointmentsetting #onanothertrack On Another Track Podcast. Emigrate to Costa Rica to become a ‘Pinball Wizard’ like Richard Blank. https://youtu.be/WsS6kIf_Oh4 https://youtube.com/shorts/kx62S3YGY-Y https://youtube.com/shorts/twhyzq6UrRE https://youtube.com/shorts/-suD2OUnKGc https://youtube.com/shorts/HR2qIQPEE7Y