Dr Jo Casebourne is responsible for Nesta's research and policy work on public and social innovation. Current research includes the role of complaints as a stimulus of innovation in public services, work on how we can stimulate innovation in the labour market, and overseeing the Alliance for Useful Evidence, co-funded by Nesta, the ESRC and the Big Lottery. She also works closely with Nesta's investments team and practical programmes, scoping new areas of focus and embedding research and evaluation strategies into Nesta's work.

Jo has spent the last 13 years conducting research on welfare-to-work, employment and skills, disadvantaged groups in the labour market and work-life balance issues. Before joining Nesta in November 2011, Jo was Director of Research at the Centre for Economic and Social Inclusion for five years where she led the organisation's research work, conducting high-profile evaluations for central government on welfare-to-work programmes. Prior to that Jo was a Senior Researcher at the Institute for Employment Studies and a Researcher at the Centre for Economic and Social Inclusion.

Jo has a first class BA (Hons) from the University of Cambridge, a Master's from the University of London and a PhD from the University of Cambridge. Her PhD compared the Clinton welfare reforms in the US and the Labour Government's welfare reforms in the UK and their effects on work and poverty.

Jo tweets as @jocasebourne, and blogs at http://www.nesta.org.uk/blogs/policy_innovation_blog.

Presentation: Why grumbles, gripes and grievances are great for public services

Complaints are not often associated with innovation and creativity. When we think of complaints, we think of frustration, failure, and poor service. Receiving lots of complaints is seen as something to be wary of, not celebrated. But getting complaints show that people think it's worth complaining and that they will be listened to, and that they believe that they have power to influence the system. They are a good sign of democracy in action. But are complaints changing public services? Do they lead to innovation? To what extent do complaints help public services adapt to today's rising and complex demands? How can public services use complaints to listen, and engage with the public as co-producers of better outcomes? And how can public services make it easier for people to complain and encourage them to do so?

These are some of the questions we address in our report 'Grumbles, gripes and grievances: the role of complaints in transforming public services'. We're particularly interested in complaints because we think they can help to reshape the relationship between individuals and the public services they use.

Back to top of page

Moira Clark is Professor of Strategic Marketing at Henley Business School, Head of Marketing and Reputation as well as Director of the Henley Centre for Customer Management (a consortium of organisations who are interested in leading-edge best practice in customer management).

Moira is a leading expert in the area of strategic customer management. She has researched and published widely on the subject of relationship marketing, customer experience and service excellence. Publications include: the Academy of Marketing Science, the Journal of Retailing, International Journal of Management Reviews and the Journal of Relationship Marketing.

She serves as a consultant and advisor to major UK and international blue chip companies. Her main areas of research and consulting are customer management, customer experience, CRM, service excellence, social networking, customer retention and internal marketing. Moira is a frequent keynote speaker at public and in-company seminars and conferences around the world.

Presentation: Are we satisfied with our public services?

Research has shown that public satisfaction with services such as the NHS has dropped at a time when spending is being squeezed and controversy over large-scale reforms has grabbed the headlines. Are these surveys merely a blip or are they an important barometer that points to wider issues that need to be addressed around customer service, quality and standards of service delivery?

Back to top of page

Sarah Barrow is Head of Customer Services and Administration for Wokingham Borough Council, which includes responsibility for Wokingham Direct, the council's Customer Service Centre. With 30 years of public sector experience, Sarah's career has spanned from working as a Diplomat at the British Embassies in Paris and Costa Rica, Special Advisor to Sir Martin Laing and HRH the Duke of Kent and speechwriter to the Rt Hon Patricia Hewitt and Rt Hon Jacqui Smith in their roles as Ministers for Women. She moved to Wokingham Borough Council in 2005, as she wanted to make a difference within her own community.

Presentation: Good customer service in practice

Defining what excellent service delivery looks like in any given area of service is key to defining outcomes. How can we drive improvements in services, develop successful customer service initiatives that can deliver real benefits for service users and help reduce the cost to serve?

Back to top of page

Marty Beard is President and Chief Executive Officer of LiveOps and serves on its board of directors. Under his leadership, LiveOps is capitalising on the cloud, social and mobile revolutions to transform customer service interactions.

Prior to joining LiveOps, Marty was President of Sybase 365, the global leader in mobile messaging and mobile commerce services. As President, he grew the division 150% and helped solidify Sybase's enterprise mobility leadership - a major reason for SAP's $5.8bn purchase of the company in July 2010.

Prior to Sybase, Marty worked at Oracle where he was an early advocate of e-commerce services as Vice President of Oracle Online. In this role he was responsible for driving Oracle's e-business transformation, leveraging the web to improve customer sales and support.

He has served on the boards of directors for Harris Interactive and CTIA -The Wireless Association.


Back to top of page

Jo Causon is Chief Executive at the Institute of Customer Service. She previously worked for the Chartered Management Institute, where she had been Director of Marketing and Corporate Affairs since July 2005, and held director roles in brand and business consulting. Prior to that, she was both head of group marketing and strategic executive to the director-general at City & Guilds. Jo also has over 11 years' experience in the financial services sector.

Under Jo's leadership, the institute has worked in partnership with its members and other stakeholders in realising the increased return on investment that excellent customer service can deliver, and the role it can play as a motivator for those working within an organisation, enabling those organisations to keep their talent as well as their customers.

Jo believes that by working to develop customer service excellence, organisations will not only survive the current challenging economic conditions but will prosper and help to lift the UK out of recession earlier than would otherwise have been the case.

Presentation: In a time of constrained budgets and resources, why does customer service matter?

The 2013 UK Customer Satisfaction Index shows that public services buck the overall trend of steady improvement in satisfaction levels. As sectors such as retail continue to rise, customer satisfaction in local public services has fallen. Both local and national public services form the bulk of a small, below average group that has significantly lower satisfaction levels than higher performing sectors. Every day customers are making comparisons between services and they are finding that in the public sector, customer service comes up short. What can be done to make sure that expectations are met?

Back to top of page

Gill Bull is Assistant Director for Policy and Customer Services at the London Borough of Sutton. Along with her council-wide strategy and policy responsibilities, for the past three years she has developed and delivered the council's customer access strategy and has operational lead for the council's contact centre, reception and web services. She is passionate about improving public services and finding new ways to reach out, engage with, and empower citizens.

Before working at Sutton, Gill spent a short time in consultancy working with Shared Intelligence, and has held senior roles at the Greater London Authority, Charity Commission, National Consumer Council and the Housing Corporation. She began her career as a housing adviser in the voluntary and community sector.


Back to top of page

Hayley Lewis is a chartered psychologist, specialising in both organisational psychology and community psychology – with a particular focus on behavioural change; strategy development and implementation; and participation and engagement. She spent eight years at the BBC working as an in-house psychologist, supporting the organisational culture change programme. In 2005, she moved into local government and has held a variety of roles, the last two of which have focused on customer insight at Croydon Council.

Using in-depth analysis of information from complaints, resident surveys, public consultation and engagement activities, Hayley's team have helped services to target their improvements and transformation activities. The insight they provide has also helped elected members to make increasingly difficult decisions, and have confidence in those decisions.

As is the case for many organisations in the country, a big focus for Hayley and her team is to get more people and businesses to transact online.


Back to top of page