With the impending shake up of the provision of legal services in the UK fast approaching (Legal Services Act October 2011), organisations are looking for innovative solutions to deal with the changes. The implications are far reaching and will force many traditional legal companies to re-examine the way they provide their services.

One example is the trial of legal services provision by Co-operative legal services through branches of  Britannia, making legal advice much more accessible to the public.

June’s Director magazine featured a comment piece criticising companies who outsource call centres to India. The article pointed out the reputational risk by offshoring B2C communications.

Currently, many large UK companies save a small amount of money by basing customer facing contact teams offshore. These people are frequently the only contact that consumers have with a brand; yet it shows a lack of respect to UK customers that the primary communication frequently is hampered by poor quality calls and potential mis-communication. Does that make you feel valued as a customer?

It can make sense to locate some functions offshore; for example where 24 x 7 support is required the time zone difference can ensure prompt service. I don’t think anyone minds speaking to an overseas call centre when their phone has been stolen at 3am. Also, many business to business customers understand that there is a global talent pool, and complex enquiries may be dealt with by an expert anywhere in the world.

Unfortunately, the practice of offshoring call centres gives the practice of outsourcing a poor reputation.

Top marks to the organisers of Web Mission 2011 who recently took 18 digital media companies to Silicon Valley to seek out opportunities and gave them a chance to pitch to US investors. There is no doubt that by taking part in this initiative the companies will find out something new about themselves and might well be rethinking the direction their business should be taking. The US is a great place to do business and the positive attitude Americans have towards entrepreneurs is refreshing. The various accounts I have read from those who have taken part are extremely positive and they all cite the importance of having a group of like-minded people around them, gaining access to networks, investors and companies they wouldn’t have otherwise met.

Business can be a lonely place when you are starting out and the more opportunities you have to share your experiences with others who have similar tales to tell the better. I’m sure many of the contacts they make will be critical friends in their next phase of business and I wish them all the very best of luck.

You may be surprised to learn that this is Indonesia, with 36m members, according to a recent report from Checkfacebook . But what is probably of even more interest is the fact that the majority connect through mobile devices, rather than PC’s. This obviously has huge repercussions for companies marketing and selling in Indonesia.

This was highlighted in a recent article for marketers. An additional factor which is different from the mature western markets is that very few of the users have standard bank accounts, which has lead to the creation of companies selling pre-paid cards to be used on mobile devices. I’m sure that many of the methods adopted to reach these consumers will be adapted and adopted in more developed countries to reach wider markets.