Andrew Hewitt, our resident enterprise IT and remote work expert, and I caught up for a quick pulse check on how service providers are faring during the pandemic.

Business process outsourcers (BPOs) and contact centers felt the heat from the pandemic a lot more and a lot earlier than other businesses. Even as global brands wound down their operations and worldwide shelter-in-place restrictions were implemented, contact center service providers continued customer support operations. Despite unique challenges around people and technology provisioning, we saw some astounding efforts from service providers to adopt work-from-home and remote support to keep the lights on.

We saw reports of some service providers successfully migrating more than 70% of their agents to work from home. We read stories of how service providers went all hands on deck, literally, hand-delivering laptops and communication equipment to agents’ homes. Many service providers were agile in establishing VPNs for a secure and functional remote support environment.

A more detailed overview of the challenges, upcoming hurdles for work-at-home agents (WAHAs), and Forrester’s point of view on the unexpected digital adoption that service providers have to deal with are all available here.

For more information and guidance about pandemic management, check out our latest research or schedule an inquiry with us.