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October - 2007 - issue > Company of the Month
Real Soft Really ambitious
Jaya Smitha Menon
Tuesday, October 2, 2007
In the middle of the day you decide to request for a cheque book as you find your cheque leaves exhausted. Thanks to the rapid development of Interactive Voice Response (IVR) technology you don’t need to go to the bank physically to do it. You just dial the customer contact number and are greeted by the IVR. You follow the instructions of the voice and are able to place the request in about two to three minutes’ time. Faced with constant customer pressure and to keep the commitment to customer satisfaction, the financial and telecom sectors, like many others are increasingly using IVR technology to connect with customers instantly. Today, thanks to IVR, customer service is just a call away.

It is on this voice based customer service technology that the engineers at Real Soft (Intl) focus on. Real Soft provides solutions to contact centers and enterprises, integrating business processes with the converged communication network. IVR and related applications are being used in hospitals as well to make appointments and other requirements, says, S.Sundararajan, Head of Operations at Real Soft. With headquarters at New Jersey, U.S.A., Real Soft started its India operations in March 2000 with development centers in Bangalore and Baroda. Real Soft is a Platinum Devconnect Member of Avaya which supplies IVR devices to the market.

Real Soft not only provides speech based solutions for IVR devices but also has products for IVR management. Its tools like Admin Central and Insta Alert can be integrated with the Avaya devices. Admin Central and One Manage help the administration department in fault reporting, configuration, and monitoring of voice applications. It provides call detail reports, application usage data, configuration management control, and even get real-time reports on the IVR systems’ performance. Admin Central helps the client access the entire IVR system of the company from any part of the world and One Manage helps in deployment of IVR applications. Insta Alert is yet another application developed by Real Soft. It provides alert and notifications on the function of the IVR system through email and telephone. Alerts can be set off based on time or events.

Real Soft is now working on the development of an application for the airline industry. In the event of a flight being postponed or preponed, the auto dialer will call up all the passengers of the flight and notify them on the changed schedule. The application can work in sync with the passenger management systems of the aviation industry.

Apart from speech enterprise solutions, Real Soft also deals with application development, maintenance, support, and testing. In the IT world crammed with application service providers, Real Soft has devised a methodology to differentiate itself in the market. Termed as the dotECO methodology, it is defined as a dedicated offshore team extended, controlled, and could finally be owned by the client. In offshore model, projects fail mainly because of lack of involvement of the client, explains Sundararajan. But dotECO is a client managed offshore team, he adds. Under this methodology the offshore team functions as an extension of the client’s in-house software development center. The team works for the client in the areas of application development, product development, R&D, Help Desk, and a number of related services.

Life at Real Soft
In Real Soft, you will find the doors of Sundararajan’s cabin always open. Any employee can walk up to him any time of the day without any prior appointment or schedule and talk to him. He believes that transparency and direct communication is the key to the success of any company. The organizational culture of the company is also structured so as to enable transparency and communication. Every month the top management meets the employees and briefs them about the activities of the month. They discuss the issues relating to work, about achievements and failures of the previous month, explaining the reason for both, so that the employees have an idea about what is happening in the company.

The management also helps the employees in their career progress. The employees are asked to identify their career path and the company makes it a point to route their career according to their own perceptions. For example, if a technical lead wants to become a technical architect and not a project manager, the company routes him through the technical side. He is given a chance to apply his technical skill in areas outside his current position in the organization. “This gives him ample opportunity to assess his skills and decide on his career progression”, says Sundararajan.

Like career progression, employees are also given a chance to pursue their academic interests. Real Soft refunds the expenses incurred by the employee to take certifications and attend courses and seminars. Other postgraduate courses in the area of management are also encouraged under this policy, with certain guidelines. To expand the technical bandwidth, Real Soft has an internal knowledge sharing program called ‘Mahiti’. In Sanskrit it means knowledge. Every month an employee researches on a particular technical subject and offers training on the subject to his peers.

Real Soft has a reward program to encourage innovation and productivity in the organization and to recognize the best employees where the peers nominate each other for the Technical Guru Award, Good Samaritan Award, Veteran Award for the longest tenure in the company, and awards in other related categories. These awards are presented at the annual day of the company in which all employees come together with their families to enjoy and celebrate. Apart from the annual day, the last Friday of every month is called Fun Friday at Real Soft. On fun Fridays, the employees get together for games and other entertainment activities. Birthdays and wedding anniversaries are also celebrated on Fun Fridays.

On the recruitment side, Real Soft is looking at experienced professionals with hands on technical expertise to join the company. The ideal candidate is even given a sign on bonus. To celebrate his new job, he can go for lunch or dinner with his family at the expense of the company.

Looking ahead, Real Soft is planning to set up its own campuses in Bangalore and Baroda. It recently started its operations in Singapore. While the India office looks at the technology delivery, the U.S. office concentrates on sales and marketing. Sundararajan and his team are all set to make Real Soft a preferred solutions provider for small and medium enterprises with increased concentration in speech enterprise solution. The well laid out roadmap plan and the passion with which Sundararajan and his team is heading forward suggests a smooth ride ahead.

Established 2001
Headcount 150
Corporate Office Bangalore
Other Centres Baroda, Singapore
Vertical Telecom
Services Application development, Speech technology solutions
Website www.realsoftinc.com

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