Information Builders Customer Service Achieves Certification in Support Staff Excellence From SSPA

NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwire - April 16, 2008) - Information Builders, the independent leader in production business intelligence (BI) systems, was awarded Support Staff Excellence Certification by the Service & Support Professionals Association (SSPA). The first in the business intelligence industry to achieve 100 percent SSPA Support Staff Excellence Certification, Information Builders had 69 technicians, supervisors, and managers across the U.S., Australia, and Western Europe complete training and receive the prestigious CSP-I and CSP-S certification.

"The SSPA Certification program is the technology industry standard for customer service soft skills training and certification," explains Stephen Smith, executive director of the SSPA. "SSPA research has proven that strong employee development programs are a key driver in finding, motivating, and retaining top talent. Highly engaged employees are more customer focused, leading to higher customer satisfaction, loyalty, and retention."

Information Builders chose SSPA because its training program engages and brings something of value to both its highly technical staff and to the organization as a whole. The SSPA, an association with more than 15 years' experience working with Information Builders, was founded in 1989 and has grown to become the largest and most influential industry trade group for technology service and support professionals. Its nearly 200 member companies represent technical support, field service, and customer relations organizations worldwide.

To build consistency and personal effectiveness across the management team, Information Builders also worked with Impact Learning Systems, an SSPA partner that provides online customer service training and corresponding tests for The SSPA. After completing Impact Learning's "Essentials of Technical Support Communication"™, which teaches competencies agreed by the industry to be critical for outstanding customer satisfaction, Information Builders managers and supervisors completed Impact Learning's "Making It Happen"™, which focuses on coaching, monitoring performance and finding ways to reinforce service skills on the job. Information Builders adopted the skills and best practices, both domestically and abroad, to further differentiate its customer service organization from others within the business intelligence industry.

SSPA Certification Highlights:

--  US- and EMEA-based Technical Support Representatives, supervisors and
    managers completed "Essentials of Technical Support Communication" in fewer
    than two months
--  Sixty-nine technical support representatives, supervisors, and
    managers passed their CSP-I Certification: two from APAC, 10 from EMEA, and
    57 from the U.S. - based in remote, sales office, or corporate locations
--  All technical support managers completed "Making It Happen"
    supervisory and coaching training, and passed the CSP-S Certification
--  Customer satisfaction scores, post-training, are now 90.5 percent
    

"Customer service is everything," said Doug Tina, director of customer support services for Information Builders. "We chose SSPA because we wanted to find a certification program that would help our team deliver world-class customer service. The training gave us a chance to build a common service language, take some time to think about how to treat people, and refresh everyone's service skills to move the organization forward."

About the SSPA

As the industry's foremost professionals association, the Service & Support Professionals Association (SSPA) is a key resource for the information and best practices needed to make better business decisions. It brings together the best minds from across the industry spectrum -- from established companies with successful track records to the pioneering newcomers with out-of-the-box ideas. The SSPA also partners with thought leaders such as J.D. Power and Associates and the Wharton School to create programs that benefit the industry. The SSPA is a member of a global network of associations that includes the Technology Professional Services Association (TPSA) and the Association for Services Management International (AFSMI). For more information, visit http://www.thesspa.com.

About Impact Learning Systems International

Impact Learning Systems International helps companies increase their bottom line by improving the communication skills of their sales and service agents. As industry leaders in understanding and improving the representative/customer interaction, Impact offers training, consulting, and customized services to help the world's most successful companies build top-performing teams. For more information, visit http://www.impactlearning.com.

About Information Builders

Information Builders award-winning combination of business intelligence and enterprise integration software has been providing innovative solutions to more than 12,000 customers for the past 30 years. WebFOCUS is the world's most widely utilized business intelligence platform. It provides the security, scalability, and flexibility needed at every level of global extended enterprises. Its simplicity helps create executive, analytical, and operational applications that reach dozens to millions of users. Information Builders iWay Software suite provides state-of-the-art, multi-purpose, pre-built integration components that address all SOA, application, data, and information management requirements. Its integration adapters have been adopted by the leading software platform providers. Together, these products give Information Builders customers the ability to live up to the company motto: "Your Business. No Barriers."

Information Builders award-winning technology has successfully provided quality software and superior services to more than 12,000 customers, including most of the Fortune 100 and U.S. federal government agencies. Headquartered in New York City with 90 offices worldwide, the company employs 1,450 people and has more than 350 business partners. For more information visit http://www.informationbuilders.com.

Contact Information: Press Contacts Kathleen Moran Information Builders (212) 736-4433 Jennifer Moebius Emerge PR (617) 729-3183