Inspiring Life Advice.

The Business Vitality Podcast. Starting With A Clean Slate with Costa Rica's Call Center, Richard Blank. Episode 137 Catherine Cantey’s goal is to partner with individuals and teams to create positive and measurable change. She brings more than 20 years of professional experience in sales, consulting, and coaching with focus on results. Some of her experiences include strategic planning with board and leadership teams, training, and speaking. Her ability to facilitate, collaborate and share ideas has earned her exceeding results. Business Vitality® and the Business Vitality® podcast are owned by Cantey Advisors. Your host, Catherine Cantey talks with Founder, Richard Blank, of Costa Rica's Call Center. Richard started his journey at 27 years old teaching English at his friend's call center. It wasn't long before he built his own call center company, and now shares with us his experience with providing the best employee experience, delegating, and so much more. Business Vitality podcast has accepted Richard Blank's invitation to join the audience for a solid discussion regarding starting a company from scratch in Costa Rica as an expat. Topics include: advanced telemarketing strategy, conflict management, interpersonal soft skills, customer support, rhetoric, gamification, employee motivation, phonetic micro expression reading. Effective Communication and Vocabulary Sensitivity Sure, regardless if it's a first time connection or the person you've known your entire life, the best bit of advice that I could do would be more for conflict management and strategy. We can always go into other topics later, but this is probably the starting point for me. It's better defense than offense. I believe in two ears, one mouth, double listening to one speech. You can still participate in the conversation, but there's some sort of hedging that you can do in order to let you lead and I could still dance with it. When you confirm things with people, they don't need to repeat it. So there's no rabbit holes. It shows active listening. Once again, you can refer to yourself possibly in third person or even mentioning things that could be done together just to get their attention again, to show that you are seeing a progression or something that is moving forward. Vocabulary is the most sensitive topic. And I always believe that a word like help, as simple as it sounds, could also provoke emotion or just knock you off. That could be the last straw. From Employee to Owner: A Journey of Empathy and Understanding Well, yeah, the best podcast. What an amazing question. Let me cut the pizza, okay? Because there's about four or five nice slices there. Let me go back to August of 2000. When I was 27 years old, I came to Costa Rica for only two months to work at my friend's call center who wanted me to teach English. I took this opportunity to stay and to learn the business. So I did not start at a C level. In fact, I wasn't even at manager supervisor level. I was with the people. I might have been friends with the owner, but I was with the proletariat with thousands of call center agents. So I would break bread with them, sit in the cubicles with them. And throughout those years, I learned every department of a call center, minus the C-suite. But you saw the good and the bad, the happy and the sad. And for me, I cracked a couple of codes in regards to empathy and making sure these individuals have their dignity and not to feel like a number and expendable. So I went from just being an employee at my friend's center to now owning a call center. Inspiring Life Advice Fortune favors the brave because if you can get past your parents' guilt, you can live anywhere in the world. That's number one. And number two, there's a lot of naysayers and grave believers out there. And these are the people that love you, but they may not understand you. And as long as you're willing to die with your boots on, and you have a certain vision quest, a certain destiny that you feel you need to do while still being responsible with your family and your health, then by all means, live your life because you only get 100 years. https://youtu.be/tIp0F9mZlB4 https://youtu.be/3Xe4s6dKMnQ https://youtu.be/nkPtgFqvNgU https://youtu.be/sf1i0waKNts Richard’s journey in the call center space 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. https://costaricascallcenter.com/en/outbound-bpo-campaigns/ #RichardBlank #CostaRica #CallCenter #Outsourcing #Telemarketing #BPO #Sales #Entrepreneur #B2B #Business #Podcast #Leadgeneration #Appointmentsetting #businessvitality The Importance of Thinking Outside the Box These are all of the best practices of leaders and opportunities that have been coming up decade after decade. And a lot of this stuff has been in practice for more than 20 years, 30 years and beyond. And what we're learning is a lot of these folks that are remaining vital in business today are having to think differently. And to share a quote from one of my CEOs that I've worked with in the past, he told me all day long he can hire folks, but what he needs more of are people who think outside the box. Live Bravely and Stay True to Yourself Richard, this is fantastic. Okay, so as we're kind of wrapping up, can you give maybe your best one or two pieces of advice? You have so much to offer. Is there even a way to give one or two pieces? Sure. Fortune favors the brave because if you can get past your parents' guilt, you can live anywhere in the world. That's number one. And number two, there's a lot of naysayers and grave believers out there. And these are the people that love you, but they may not understand you. And as long as you're willing to die with your boots on, and you have a certain vision quest, a certain destiny that you feel you need to do while still being responsible with your family and your health, then by all means, live your life because you only get 100 years. And the greatest thing you could do is look at yourself in the mirror and be very pleased that you were true to yourself when you were making these dreams and these promises back in the day. You didn't quit 80% in. And so that, my friend, if I could wrap it up in a nutshell, would be my best advice. And Captain, thank you so much for this time today. I really enjoyed our conversation. Specific Recognition in Leadership When it comes to the quality control, just circling back, if I pull a phone call from you and I walk by, I go, Hey, Karen, Catherine, you're doing a great job. You're like, okay, great. Catherine, last Thursday, when you spoke to Mrs. Jones for 12 minutes, turned it around, helped her out. The grandson came on and said, you were the greatest customer support representative. She just wrote into the company. I mean, doesn't that show that I'm legitimately not just saying good job, Catherine. I specifically mentioned exactly the kind of work that you've done. And I will try to do that. Not good job, Ace and Champ and Chief. I will specifically talk about a time that you rocked and I'll let you know why you were the greatest ever. And they go, wow, you really do listen, Richard, you really do. And I go, of course I do. Of course I do. And so for your supervisors, why don't you look at one of their plays, get the real detail of how they did it. That's when you give the high five in front of everybody. and letting them know why they're the chain. And then you start nicknaming them things, you know, the time that they won, when they had a coming of age moment. That's where you build the environment. You start becoming Maverick and Iceman. That's how you build things there. The Power of Clarity Breaks I love what you said about self-reflection and that being one of the best learnings that we can have is taking that time to pause and reflect. And I very often call it clarity breaks. And I emphasize to my clients to just take, in the beginning, I said, just take five minutes. And they're like, five minutes? It's five minutes to do what? I said, nothing. Just sit there and just take five minutes. They're like, do you know how long that takes? It's like, it's five minutes out of your entire day. And then if they do try it, they come back and they actually share that this is working and they can actually gain thought and traction and planning. And there's just this kind of aha moment that they're starting to experience. I'm like, okay, if you can do five, what can you do next month? And just keep challenging them. To be able to take that time and have that self-reflection and allow themselves to grow and not to constantly respond, respond, respond, react, react, react, because I think we have too much of that out there. The Power of Pausing for Better Decisions If there is no time sensitivity, and you want to say something, if you're allowed to sleep on it, walk away from it, write a draft, and then the following day decide to send it or make that phone call, do it. Because if you don't need to make a decision right, right, right, right now, even though they might be offended you didn't respond, the best thing to do is absorb it, take it, take it, When you have a moment to be able to walk away, to separate it, prioritize it, get rid of the fat because why do we want to go there? Address what needs to be addressed, figure out a way in a calm and cool way to reiterate it, to make your point because you might've overextended or not done enough in the moment. And then as generals do with Intel, they bring it back. And even Sherlock Holmes, he needed clues to solve the case. Give me a little bit of Intel. Let me process it, sleep on it, eat on it, work out on it, play pinball on it, drive to work in the convertible on it. And then when I'm at the office, forget about it. I'm going to solve this thing before my first cup of coffee. And that would be much more effective for me than getting Philadelphia angry yesterday and saying something that I would be regretting.

From Employee to Owner: A Journey of Empathy and Understanding.

The Business Vitality Podcast. Starting With A Clean Slate with Costa Rica's Call Center, Richard Blank. Episode 137 Catherine Cantey’s goal is to partner with individuals and teams to create positive and measurable change. She brings more than 20 years of professional experience in sales, consulting, and coaching with focus on results. Some of her experiences include strategic planning with board and leadership teams, training, and speaking. Her ability to facilitate, collaborate and share ideas has earned her exceeding results. Business Vitality® and the Business Vitality® podcast are owned by Cantey Advisors. Your host, Catherine Cantey talks with Founder, Richard Blank, of Costa Rica's Call Center. Richard started his journey at 27 years old teaching English at his friend's call center. It wasn't long before he built his own call center company, and now shares with us his experience with providing the best employee experience, delegating, and so much more. Business Vitality podcast has accepted Richard Blank's invitation to join the audience for a solid discussion regarding starting a company from scratch in Costa Rica as an expat. Topics include: advanced telemarketing strategy, conflict management, interpersonal soft skills, customer support, rhetoric, gamification, employee motivation, phonetic micro expression reading. Effective Communication and Vocabulary Sensitivity Sure, regardless if it's a first time connection or the person you've known your entire life, the best bit of advice that I could do would be more for conflict management and strategy. We can always go into other topics later, but this is probably the starting point for me. It's better defense than offense. I believe in two ears, one mouth, double listening to one speech. You can still participate in the conversation, but there's some sort of hedging that you can do in order to let you lead and I could still dance with it. When you confirm things with people, they don't need to repeat it. So there's no rabbit holes. It shows active listening. Once again, you can refer to yourself possibly in third person or even mentioning things that could be done together just to get their attention again, to show that you are seeing a progression or something that is moving forward. Vocabulary is the most sensitive topic. And I always believe that a word like help, as simple as it sounds, could also provoke emotion or just knock you off. That could be the last straw. From Employee to Owner: A Journey of Empathy and Understanding Well, yeah, the best podcast. What an amazing question. Let me cut the pizza, okay? Because there's about four or five nice slices there. Let me go back to August of 2000. When I was 27 years old, I came to Costa Rica for only two months to work at my friend's call center who wanted me to teach English. I took this opportunity to stay and to learn the business. So I did not start at a C level. In fact, I wasn't even at manager supervisor level. I was with the people. I might have been friends with the owner, but I was with the proletariat with thousands of call center agents. So I would break bread with them, sit in the cubicles with them. And throughout those years, I learned every department of a call center, minus the C-suite. But you saw the good and the bad, the happy and the sad. And for me, I cracked a couple of codes in regards to empathy and making sure these individuals have their dignity and not to feel like a number and expendable. So I went from just being an employee at my friend's center to now owning a call center. https://youtu.be/tIp0F9mZlB4 https://youtu.be/3Xe4s6dKMnQ https://youtu.be/nkPtgFqvNgU Richard’s journey in the call center space 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. https://costaricascallcenter.com/en/outbound-bpo-campaigns/ #RichardBlank #CostaRica #CallCenter #Outsourcing #Telemarketing #BPO #Sales #Entrepreneur #B2B #Business #Podcast #Leadgeneration #Appointmentsetting #businessvitality The Importance of Thinking Outside the Box These are all of the best practices of leaders and opportunities that have been coming up decade after decade. And a lot of this stuff has been in practice for more than 20 years, 30 years and beyond. And what we're learning is a lot of these folks that are remaining vital in business today are having to think differently. And to share a quote from one of my CEOs that I've worked with in the past, he told me all day long he can hire folks, but what he needs more of are people who think outside the box. Live Bravely and Stay True to Yourself Richard, this is fantastic. Okay, so as we're kind of wrapping up, can you give maybe your best one or two pieces of advice? You have so much to offer. Is there even a way to give one or two pieces? Sure. Fortune favors the brave because if you can get past your parents' guilt, you can live anywhere in the world. That's number one. And number two, there's a lot of naysayers and grave believers out there. And these are the people that love you, but they may not understand you. And as long as you're willing to die with your boots on, and you have a certain vision quest, a certain destiny that you feel you need to do while still being responsible with your family and your health, then by all means, live your life because you only get 100 years. And the greatest thing you could do is look at yourself in the mirror and be very pleased that you were true to yourself when you were making these dreams and these promises back in the day. You didn't quit 80% in. And so that, my friend, if I could wrap it up in a nutshell, would be my best advice. And Captain, thank you so much for this time today. I really enjoyed our conversation. Specific Recognition in Leadership When it comes to the quality control, just circling back, if I pull a phone call from you and I walk by, I go, Hey, Karen, Catherine, you're doing a great job. You're like, okay, great. Catherine, last Thursday, when you spoke to Mrs. Jones for 12 minutes, turned it around, helped her out. The grandson came on and said, you were the greatest customer support representative. She just wrote into the company. I mean, doesn't that show that I'm legitimately not just saying good job, Catherine. I specifically mentioned exactly the kind of work that you've done. And I will try to do that. Not good job, Ace and Champ and Chief. I will specifically talk about a time that you rocked and I'll let you know why you were the greatest ever. And they go, wow, you really do listen, Richard, you really do. And I go, of course I do. Of course I do. And so for your supervisors, why don't you look at one of their plays, get the real detail of how they did it. That's when you give the high five in front of everybody. and letting them know why they're the chain. And then you start nicknaming them things, you know, the time that they won, when they had a coming of age moment. That's where you build the environment. You start becoming Maverick and Iceman. That's how you build things there. The Power of Clarity Breaks I love what you said about self-reflection and that being one of the best learnings that we can have is taking that time to pause and reflect. And I very often call it clarity breaks. And I emphasize to my clients to just take, in the beginning, I said, just take five minutes. And they're like, five minutes? It's five minutes to do what? I said, nothing. Just sit there and just take five minutes. They're like, do you know how long that takes? It's like, it's five minutes out of your entire day. And then if they do try it, they come back and they actually share that this is working and they can actually gain thought and traction and planning. And there's just this kind of aha moment that they're starting to experience. I'm like, okay, if you can do five, what can you do next month? And just keep challenging them. To be able to take that time and have that self-reflection and allow themselves to grow and not to constantly respond, respond, respond, react, react, react, because I think we have too much of that out there. The Power of Pausing for Better Decisions If there is no time sensitivity, and you want to say something, if you're allowed to sleep on it, walk away from it, write a draft, and then the following day decide to send it or make that phone call, do it. Because if you don't need to make a decision right, right, right, right now, even though they might be offended you didn't respond, the best thing to do is absorb it, take it, take it, When you have a moment to be able to walk away, to separate it, prioritize it, get rid of the fat because why do we want to go there? Address what needs to be addressed, figure out a way in a calm and cool way to reiterate it, to make your point because you might've overextended or not done enough in the moment. And then as generals do with Intel, they bring it back. And even Sherlock Holmes, he needed clues to solve the case. Give me a little bit of Intel. Let me process it, sleep on it, eat on it, work out on it, play pinball on it, drive to work in the convertible on it. And then when I'm at the office, forget about it. I'm going to solve this thing before my first cup of coffee. And that would be much more effective for me than getting Philadelphia angry yesterday and saying something that I would be regretting. Inspiring Life Advice Fortune favors the brave because if you can get past your parents' guilt, you can live anywhere in the world. That's number one. And number two, there's a lot of naysayers and grave believers out there. And these are the people that love you, but they may not understand you. And as long as you're willing to die with your boots on, and you have a certain vision quest, a certain destiny that you feel you need to do while still being responsible with your family and your health, then by all means, live your life because you only get 100 years.

Vulnerability and Growth. #business #callcenter #entrepreneur #b2b #bpo ...

Bizhaps Podcast created by Ana Gonzalez. Running out of gas in the rain with Richard Blank. An inspiring story about pushing his car in the rain with a client, which turned into a memorable bonding experience. The conversation highlights the importance of vulnerability, human connections in business, and the dedication to overcoming challenges. Richard also discusses his business and the unique opportunities in Costa Rica. The time when I turned misfortune into a memorable moment with Richard Blank Ana Gonzalez Ana helps businesses multiply their productivity by automating their sales and support with AI. She has an unrelenting passion for learning, constantly seeking new knowledge and getting excited by new discoveries. Originally from Mexico City, Ana now calls Austin, Texas her home. What if you could 4x your lead conversions without changing a thing in your business? That’s exactly what I help businesses do with my Conversational Funnels at Anabots, an AI-powered method that turns every lead into an opportunity, every interaction into a conversion, and every business into a success story. Originally trained as an architect, I now build sales systems that never sleep, never miss a lead, and always show up when your customers are ready to buy. AI isn’t about replacing you or your team; it’s about giving you the tools to work smarter. The best part is that you don’t need to be a tech expert to make it work. Conversational Funnels is simple, effective, and built for business owners who value their time. Beyond building AI strategies, I co-host two podcasts, Basic Business AI and BizHaps, where I break down complex AI strategies into simple terms and highlight real stories from entrepreneurs. I’m always looking for fresh voices, so if you’d like to share your insights or story, let’s talk about having you on as a guest! If you’d like to know about how this could work for your business, let’s chat. Vulnerability and Growth I could have done the easy thing and punked out, but I did the tough thing and just sucked it up. And little did I know that this individual might've been in this situation before, And so they extended some empathy, got out there and pushed with me. And I can also take the jokes and the jabs. That's what it's all about. It only gives you more foundation, more bonding and a funny sort of talk about during cocktails. I knew this in business. If you can make yourself vulnerable, my good friend, Anna, it makes you powerful. And that was one of the days I shed some skin and actually grew as a person. And if you're just looking to connect or explore collaborations, I’d love to hear from you! Bizhaps are quick stories of heroic wins, hilarious losses, and a whole lot of in-between. Anything about the day-to-day grind of aan entrepreneur: employees, customers, or weird situations. Bizhaps can be good, bad, funny, or sad. They can be a big win, a tough loss, or a valuable lesson. They’re short, sweet, to the point, and designed to educate, entertain, or inspire. One Bizhap per day keeps burnout away! welcome to baps we're entrepreneurs that quick hit bide stories from their business life that teach entertain and Inspire us to grow my name is Anna Gonzalez and I'm your host baps is brought to you by anab Bots we automate sales and support with AI so you can close more deals save more money and make your team more productive visit anab buts. to get started that's anab bot ts. a today's guest is Richard Blanc he is the CEO of Costa Rica's call center his Bish up is about that time when in a suit and out of gas he pushed his car in the ring and his client even helped so Richard welcome to the show let's get into your story and I'm so happy to be with you and your audience today so my biz have my goodness gracious about 10 years ago I was enjoying a sunny day with my 1992 Volkswagen Cabriolet convertible but then all of a sudden it's the rainy season so you got to put the top up little did I know I forgot that I ran out of gas and so when I was going to take a client out to dinner on P cologne which is the main street all I had to do is go down one block make it right and I'm on the highway well did I know a quarter of a block there the car conks out what do I do I'm in a suit the guy's sitting next to me and I said listen I took my jacket off I go I'm gonna push this thing you mind sitting in the driver's seat and we'll get it to the gas station my buddy looks at me goes no man I'm taking my jacket off too getting out there and I'm going to help you push this oh my go are you serious he goes absolutely this never happens and so in the rain pushing it down Main Street cars of course hitting puddles on purpose just to soak me thank you beeping the works all I know is when I pulled that thing into the gas station filled her up I'm looking at the guy I'm drenched suits ruined he looks at me and he goes listen just dropped me off at the hotel picked me up a half an hour later after our change we're still getting dinner and I was like my man and so don't kid yourself when things like this happen you get to see a certain side of you there's character during chaos Anna I could have done the easy thing and punked out but I did the tough thing and just sucked it up little did I know that this individual might have been in this situation before and so they extended some empathy got out there and pushed with me and I can also take the jokes and the Jabs that's what it's all about it only gives you more Foundation more bonding and a funny story to talk about during cocktails oh oh yes yes I knew this in business if you can make yourself vulnerable hble my good friend Anna it makes you powerful and that was one of the days I shed some skin and actually grew as a person I love this phrase that you just said if you can make yourself vulnerable vulnerable it makes you powerful because yes we're not robots I can see how that was a great bonding moment with your client still client to this day he's like hey what's up gas man I'm like thanks okay of course call me the gas man so uh that's just how it goes that's awesome and yeah I mean my biggest takeaway is yes you're doing business with your clients but you're also a human being and if they can see that it builds trust with them well I literally danced in the rain and they saw it and they saw what happened when the chips were down and a client's there and times's a ticking what do you do well you step up to the plate you do what you think is best and and you can laugh a minute because if you can laugh it lets off so much Steam and I went from like a 10 to a two and I took that eight and I used that to push my car but uh it's not the point the point is we're not perfect we don't b a thousand I think if you get a scar and you're proud of it or if there is an experience that you grew from it then it only makes you better person and so I'm more than happy to talk to you and your tens of thousands of amazing fans and spilling my guts I'm letting you know that it happened to me and it may me today you tomorrow so just be prepared you know some of these things do come up and uh when you do it just capture it drink life enjoy it and then you get to get on Anna's amazing show and tell your story about it fantastic thanks so much for that so Richard who do you serve and how can those people find you well I got a huge Facebook fan page of 137,000 local Costa Rican tikos once this goes live you have so much new fans but it also gives your audience a chance a grasp of the business process Outsourcing industry in Central America North of Panama south of Nicaragua only Democratic Society in Central America no standing army so we have a 95% literacy rate in education Amazon HP Intel oror here and we're known for ecotourism so it's a great place to be and I've been here the last 24 years that's awesome thank you so much to Our Guest Richard blank for coming in and sharing his story about how in a suit and out of gas he pushes car in the rain and even his client help there great bonding moment. Richard’s journey in the call center space 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. We encourage you to visit one of our call centers on your next personal vacation or business trip to Central America’s paradise, Costa Rica. While you are here, we would recommend taking an extra day of your trip to visit breathtaking virgin beaches, play golf next to the ocean, try your luck at deep sea fishing, explore tropical jungles, climb volcanos or just relax in natural hot springs. Come and see for yourself why call center outsourcing in Costa Rica is a perfect solution for your growing company and a powerhouse in the BPO industry. https://costaricascallcenter.com/en/outbound-bpo-campaigns/

#AnaGonzalez #BizhapsPodcast #RichardBlank #CostaRica #CallCenter #Outsourcing #Telemarketing #BPO #Sales #Entrepreneur #B2B #Business #Podcast #Gamification #CEO https://youtu.be/v0fPM23c5qE https://youtube.com/shorts/Hf1i2TcUfaU https://youtube.com/shorts/MScEQSntPyo

Effective Communication and Vocabulary Sensitivity.

The Business Vitality Podcast. Starting With A Clean Slate with Costa Rica's Call Center, Richard Blank. Episode 137 Catherine Cantey’s goal is to partner with individuals and teams to create positive and measurable change. She brings more than 20 years of professional experience in sales, consulting, and coaching with focus on results. Some of her experiences include strategic planning with board and leadership teams, training, and speaking. Her ability to facilitate, collaborate and share ideas has earned her exceeding results. Business Vitality® and the Business Vitality® podcast are owned by Cantey Advisors. Your host, Catherine Cantey talks with Founder, Richard Blank, of Costa Rica's Call Center. Richard started his journey at 27 years old teaching English at his friend's call center. It wasn't long before he built his own call center company, and now shares with us his experience with providing the best employee experience, delegating, and so much more. Business Vitality podcast has accepted Richard Blank's invitation to join the audience for a solid discussion regarding starting a company from scratch in Costa Rica as an expat. Topics include: advanced telemarketing strategy, conflict management, interpersonal soft skills, customer support, rhetoric, gamification, employee motivation, phonetic micro expression reading. Effective Communication and Vocabulary Sensitivity Sure, regardless if it's a first time connection or the person you've known your entire life, the best bit of advice that I could do would be more for conflict management and strategy. We can always go into other topics later, but this is probably the starting point for me. It's better defense than offense. I believe in two ears, one mouth, double listening to one speech. You can still participate in the conversation, but there's some sort of hedging that you can do in order to let you lead and I could still dance with it. When you confirm things with people, they don't need to repeat it. So there's no rabbit holes. It shows active listening. Once again, you can refer to yourself possibly in third person or even mentioning things that could be done together just to get their attention again, to show that you are seeing a progression or something that is moving forward. Vocabulary is the most sensitive topic. And I always believe that a word like help, as simple as it sounds, could also provoke emotion or just knock you off. That could be the last straw. https://youtu.be/tIp0F9mZlB4 https://youtu.be/3Xe4s6dKMnQ Richard’s journey in the call center space 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. https://costaricascallcenter.com/en/outbound-bpo-campaigns/ #RichardBlank #CostaRica #CallCenter #Outsourcing #Telemarketing #BPO #Sales #Entrepreneur #B2B #Business #Podcast #Leadgeneration #Appointmentsetting #businessvitality The Importance of Thinking Outside the Box These are all of the best practices of leaders and opportunities that have been coming up decade after decade. And a lot of this stuff has been in practice for more than 20 years, 30 years and beyond. And what we're learning is a lot of these folks that are remaining vital in business today are having to think differently. And to share a quote from one of my CEOs that I've worked with in the past, he told me all day long he can hire folks, but what he needs more of are people who think outside the box. From Employee to Owner: A Journey of Empathy and Understanding Well, yeah, the best podcast. What an amazing question. Let me cut the pizza, okay? Because there's about four or five nice slices there. Let me go back to August of 2000. When I was 27 years old, I came to Costa Rica for only two months to work at my friend's call center who wanted me to teach English. I took this opportunity to stay and to learn the business. So I did not start at a C level. In fact, I wasn't even at manager supervisor level. I was with the people. I might have been friends with the owner, but I was with the proletariat with thousands of call center agents. So I would break bread with them, sit in the cubicles with them. And throughout those years, I learned every department of a call center, minus the C-suite. But you saw the good and the bad, the happy and the sad. And for me, I cracked a couple of codes in regards to empathy and making sure these individuals have their dignity and not to feel like a number and expendable. So I went from just being an employee at my friend's center to now owning a call center. Live Bravely and Stay True to Yourself Richard, this is fantastic. Okay, so as we're kind of wrapping up, can you give maybe your best one or two pieces of advice? You have so much to offer. Is there even a way to give one or two pieces? Sure. Fortune favors the brave because if you can get past your parents' guilt, you can live anywhere in the world. That's number one. And number two, there's a lot of naysayers and grave believers out there. And these are the people that love you, but they may not understand you. And as long as you're willing to die with your boots on, and you have a certain vision quest, a certain destiny that you feel you need to do while still being responsible with your family and your health, then by all means, live your life because you only get 100 years. And the greatest thing you could do is look at yourself in the mirror and be very pleased that you were true to yourself when you were making these dreams and these promises back in the day. You didn't quit 80% in. And so that, my friend, if I could wrap it up in a nutshell, would be my best advice. And Captain, thank you so much for this time today. I really enjoyed our conversation. Specific Recognition in Leadership When it comes to the quality control, just circling back, if I pull a phone call from you and I walk by, I go, Hey, Karen, Catherine, you're doing a great job. You're like, okay, great. Catherine, last Thursday, when you spoke to Mrs. Jones for 12 minutes, turned it around, helped her out. The grandson came on and said, you were the greatest customer support representative. She just wrote into the company. I mean, doesn't that show that I'm legitimately not just saying good job, Catherine. I specifically mentioned exactly the kind of work that you've done. And I will try to do that. Not good job, Ace and Champ and Chief. I will specifically talk about a time that you rocked and I'll let you know why you were the greatest ever. And they go, wow, you really do listen, Richard, you really do. And I go, of course I do. Of course I do. And so for your supervisors, why don't you look at one of their plays, get the real detail of how they did it. That's when you give the high five in front of everybody. and letting them know why they're the chain. And then you start nicknaming them things, you know, the time that they won, when they had a coming of age moment. That's where you build the environment. You start becoming Maverick and Iceman. That's how you build things there. The Power of Clarity Breaks I love what you said about self-reflection and that being one of the best learnings that we can have is taking that time to pause and reflect. And I very often call it clarity breaks. And I emphasize to my clients to just take, in the beginning, I said, just take five minutes. And they're like, five minutes? It's five minutes to do what? I said, nothing. Just sit there and just take five minutes. They're like, do you know how long that takes? It's like, it's five minutes out of your entire day. And then if they do try it, they come back and they actually share that this is working and they can actually gain thought and traction and planning. And there's just this kind of aha moment that they're starting to experience. I'm like, okay, if you can do five, what can you do next month? And just keep challenging them. To be able to take that time and have that self-reflection and allow themselves to grow and not to constantly respond, respond, respond, react, react, react, because I think we have too much of that out there. The Power of Pausing for Better Decisions If there is no time sensitivity, and you want to say something, if you're allowed to sleep on it, walk away from it, write a draft, and then the following day decide to send it or make that phone call, do it. Because if you don't need to make a decision right, right, right, right now, even though they might be offended you didn't respond, the best thing to do is absorb it, take it, take it, When you have a moment to be able to walk away, to separate it, prioritize it, get rid of the fat because why do we want to go there? Address what needs to be addressed, figure out a way in a calm and cool way to reiterate it, to make your point because you might've overextended or not done enough in the moment. And then as generals do with Intel, they bring it back. And even Sherlock Holmes, he needed clues to solve the case. Give me a little bit of Intel. Let me process it, sleep on it, eat on it, work out on it, play pinball on it, drive to work in the convertible on it. And then when I'm at the office, forget about it. I'm going to solve this thing before my first cup of coffee. And that would be much more effective for me than getting Philadelphia angry yesterday and saying something that I would be regretting. Inspiring Life Advice Fortune favors the brave because if you can get past your parents' guilt, you can live anywhere in the world. That's number one. And number two, there's a lot of naysayers and grave believers out there. And these are the people that love you, but they may not understand you. And as long as you're willing to die with your boots on, and you have a certain vision quest, a certain destiny that you feel you need to do while still being responsible with your family and your health, then by all means, live your life because you only get 100 years.