13 Years of Innovation: What It Means to Be Trailblazers of CX
By Yoni Epstein, CD - itel CEO & Founding Chairman
This year marks itel’s 13th anniversary as a Customer Experience (CX) trailblazer. What does that mean? To me, trailblazers are leaders and innovators. They have the imagination and vision to see what could be, and the fearless courage to go after it. Trailblazing isn’t always easy. It calls for disruption, for the unconventional, to press forward even when people say it is impossible. Yet, that courage, that spirit of perseverance, is what has defined our success as a company. It is our ability to adapt, to grow, and to innovate over the past 13 years that has allowed us to become leaders in CX delivery.
So much has changed since I started this company. CX is now on the front lines in the battle for customer loyalty. It is what defines a brand, even more than its products, and contact centers have become vital hubs for all kinds of customer engagement. Technology has also changed the way we serve customers and clients. Our industry has been supercharged by AI, analytics, and automation, and it’s called for a rapid evolution in everything from our QA processes to how we train employees.
To remain competitive, we have learned to move fast and adapt. We established a work-at-home platform, long before remote work became the norm. Our company has been at the fore of prioritizing employee experience and understanding how it affects the customer experience. This led to some of the first contact centers designed specifically for employee well-being, health, safety and comfort. We were early adopters of AI tools and technologies that empower our team members, before eventually developing our own AI platform.
And why? Because, in the battle for customer loyalty, we understand the winners will be those who can deliver solutions that serve customers more efficiently, more effectively, and with greater ease. United by our 4Ys values of Quality, Integrity, Reliability, and Family; together we are stronger and more resilient. We are ONE itel. Our diversity and open doors allow trailblazing ideas to flow from anywhere and anyone.
We are so proud of what we have already accomplished. We have built this company from a one-room call center in Montego Bay into the leading nearshore CX partner for the world’s largest brands, with contact centers across the Caribbean, U.S., and Latin America. We have worked with governments and industry associations to elevate nearshore outsourcing and to place it on the world stage.
But, we want our legacy to be more than that. We want our region to be known as a place of technological innovation. That is why our Data Science & Innovation team is always searching for the next great advancement in customer service. From assisting frontline agents with advanced analytics and real-time AI prompts, to developing new advanced chatbots and fully autonomous AI agents, we want our legacy to be customer service technology that is both more human, more advanced, more empathic, and more empowering than we ever thought possible.
That is why we are trailblazers, because we are fearless and passionate industry pioneers. It is also why we will continue to challenge ourselves to do more and to go further because trailblazers never stop. They always look ahead to new horizons and new opportunities.
