2016 AWARDS PROGRAM

2016 AWARDS 

PROGRAM 

Customer Service institute of Australia 

It has been 15 years since the inaugural Australian Service Excellence Awards (ASEA) recognised 

and rewarded the ingenuity and innovation of Australia's most outstanding customer service 

driven organisations and individuals. ASEA are Australia’s premier customer service awards, with 

over 650 attendees coming together each year to recognise best practice and innovation in 

customer service and highlighting their impoance in today’s business climate. Entrants see a 

range of benefits in paicipating in the ASEAs, including: 

• Recognising the organisation’s achievements in customer service, enhancing its 

reputation with customers and competitors. 

• Enhancing the customer service focus within the organisation, building both a greater 

confidence in working with customers and increased customer satisfaction levels. 

• Acknowledging and rewarding key team members for their contribution to the 

organisation. 

• Building the profile and legitimacy of customer service as a true profession. 

With each year passing the Awards have grown in both size and stature, and an Australian Service 

Excellence Award is now a recognised and sought-after symbol of both personal and business 

excellence. 

WHO CAN ENTER 

As Australia’s premier customer service organisation, CSIA is all about championing customer 

service in all organisations – whether it is a business of one or one thousand. The ASEA are open to 

all individuals and organisations servicing Australians. 

For more information about the Australian Service Excellence Awards program, contact us at 

awards@csia.com.au or call us on 1300 912 700

AWARD CATEGORIES 

The Australian Service Excellence Awards recognise individuals at all levels within organisations, as 

well as organisations from corporates through to small businesses. 

Following a complete review of the program last year, the ASEA categories are designed to 

ensure that any person or business working within the customer service space is eligible, so 

contact us if you’re unsure about which apply to you. If you are a regular ASEAs entrant, please 

note that some of categories, and their definitions, have changed. 

INDIVIDUALS 

Customer Service CEO of the Year 

This category targets business leaders and looks at their role in driving an 

organisation toward true customer centricity. The category is open to all 

business leaders, including CEOs, Managing Directors, General Managers 

and small business owners. 

Customer Service Executive of the Year 

Customer Service Executive of the Year is open to C-level executives with 

a direct responsibility for customer service as pa of their role, including 

Chief Operating Officers (COOs), Executive General Managers and Vice 

Presidents of Customer Service. Unlike Customer Service CEO of the Year, 

this is a category that targets c-suite roles that predominantly focus on 

customer service as pa of their role. 

Customer Service Manager of the Year 

Customer Service Manager of the Year suits those roles behind the 

frontline but below c-level, and can include Customer Service Managers 

and Customer Experience Managers. 

Customer Service Leader of the Year 

This category is aimed at team leaders managing a team that services 

internal or external clients. While they might also take a frontline role in 

working with customers, their role is predominantly around managing a 

team of frontline service professionals. 

Customer Service Professional of the Year 

This award champions the people who deliver customer service everyday… 

the frontline team members who work with internal or external clients. 

Customer Service Advocate of the Year 

Advocate of the Year is aimed at recognising customer champions at any 

level in a business, from the frontline to the c-suite. These people in an 

organisation are the ones that demonstrate true passion for customer 

service excellence in everything that they do, and infect those they work 

with this zeal and commitment. 



ORGANISATIONS 

Customer Service Project of the Year 

Project of the Year recognises specific and distinct projects that have been 

completed in the 12 months before the Awards and that demonstrate 

innovative problem solving that contributes to customer service excellence 

in the organisation. 

Customer Service Team of the Year 

This category targets the group of individuals in an organisation that have 

created customer service excellence in their organisation. Unlike the Project 

of the Year, this award is focussed on a team of individuals that, by working 

together, have created a benchmark for how customer service should be 

delivered by an organisation. 

Customer Service Organisation of the Year - Large Business 

This category recognises organisations that have championed customer 

service throughout the business in 2016, and is open to organisations with 

more than 500 full-time employees. 

Customer Service Organisation of the Year - Medium Business 

Like the Large Business category, this award recognises organisations that 

have championed customer service throughout the business in the past year, 

but targets businesses with between 90 and 500 full-time employees. 

Customer Service Organisation of the Year - Small Business 

Targeting businesses with fewer than 90 full-time employees, this award 

recognises smaller organisations in the Australian market. 

Customer Service Organisation of the Year - Government 

CSIA understands that there are specific legislative requirements and 

budget limitations for government organisations that mean customer 

service excellence needs to be delivered in a different (and often, creative) 

way. This category recognises government organisations – be they federal, 

state or local government – as a separate group so to acknowledge this 

difference. 

Customer Service Organisation of the Year - Not-for-profit 

While budget isn’t everything in customer service, we recognise that the 

structure of many not-for-profit organisations limit their abilities when it 

comes to customer service delivery. This category levels the playing field in 

providing a specific category for these vital organisations. 

Service Excellence in a Large Contact Centre 

This award recognises frontline teams in larger contact centres…those with 

more than 50 seats – for the critical role they play in customer service 

delivery. 

Service Excellence in a Medium Contact Centre 

This category targets frontline teams in mid-size contact centres…those with 

20-50 seats. 

Service Excellence in a Small Contact Centre 

This award recognises frontline teams in smaller contact centres, targeting 

those with fewer than 20 seats. 



THE ASEA PROCESS – NOMINATIONS AND JUDGING 

Organisations and individuals must nominate via the CSIA website. All 

nominations must be suppoed with a fully completed nomination form 

— you can download the relevant form (individual or organisation) from 

our website. For forms, and more information please visit csia.com.au. 

JUDGING CRITERIA 

The judging criteria are largely based on the International Customer 

Service Standard (ICSS:2015-2020), a framework of 27 specific measures 

that can be applied equally to government, not-for-profit and for-profit 

organisations of all sizes and across industry sectors. Using a balanced 

scorecard approach, these 27 measures can be grouped into four distinct 

perspectives: 

• A service perspective… how do you deliver a high quality of customer 

service in your organisation? 

• An operational perspective… how do you ensure consistency in the 

delivery of customer service? 

• A learning and growth perspective… how do you create a culture of 

customer service…what do you put into it? 

• A financial and governance perspective… how does customer service 

deliver to the peormance of the individual or organisation overall… what 

do you get out of it? 

As pa of your nomination submission, we want you to talk to these four 

perspectives, providing an overview of the individual, team, project, or 

organisation, and explaining their peormance in the last year in relation 

to the perspectives. For a copy of the ICSS, contact us at info@cisa.com.au. 



HELPFUL TIPS FOR COMPLETING YOUR NOMINATION SUBMISSION 

While the individual criteria for a becoming a finalist vary across the 

categories, successful nominations will: 

• Provide a clear explanation of the organisation, its customers and the 

customer service challenges it faces. 

• Demonstrate the passion for exceeding customer expectations and 

achieving customer service excellence within an organisation, a team or 

an individual, including an infectious impact on the way the rest of the 

organisation approaches customer service. 

• Provide an accurate description of the breadth and depth of activities / 

projects…how many customers are impacted? How large is the project 

within the business? 

• Show the effectiveness of people and programs… what results have been 

delivered by the nominee and their work? 

• Demonstrate continuous review and improvement in what they’re doing. 

You can include suppoing documentation as pa of your nomination, but 

be aware that there is a word limit of 2,500 words in all nomination 

submissions. Nomination forms can be downloaded from the CSIA website. 



JUDGING 

Judging for the ASEAs follows two distinct approaches: organisations, teams 

and projects are evaluated with an on-site visit, while individuals are 

evaluated with a structured telephone interview. 

To ensure rigour in the process, the judging is managed by an independent 

market research agency based on the judging criteria. Site visits are often 

attended by guest judges - fellows of the Customer Service Institute of 

Australia and invited customer service expes who work in non-competitive 

industries. 

How are organisations judged? 

Like nominations, the judging of finalists is based on a framework built from 

the International Customer Service Standard (ICSS 2015-20). While the 

individual measures vary from category to category, they include 

consideration of: 

• How well the organisation or individual recognises the impoance of a 

strategic relationship with customers, taking on board feedback and 

complaints, and using this insight to drive business improvement; 

• How the organisation or individual engages and communicates with 

stakeholders both inside and outside the organisation; 

• How customer service is used within the organisation or by an individual to 

improve the quality of processes, products and services of the 

organisation; 

• How technology and innovation is used by the organisation or individual to 

improve the quality of customers service; 

• How the organisation or individual drives organisational change toward 

customer service excellence. 

On-site visits – organisations 

One of the more impoant judging criteria for organisations is that of 

customer service passion – that there is an organisational enthusiasm for 

customer service excellence. This is something that cannot simply be 

evaluated by reading documents or by speaking to organisational 

representatives over the telephone. Our judges need to see this collective 

passion firsthand. For this reason, all of the organisational judging is 

conducted on-site, providing an oppounity for finalists to fuher 

demonstrate their commitment to the customer, as well as answer 

additional questions posed by the judging team. 

Site visits are usually two hours in length and should include a sho 

presentation to judges, as well as a Q&A session and walk-around. 

Judging for multiple nominations in an organisation is generally bundled 

together when they’re all on the one site (for example, if an organisation 

nominates for both Customer Service Organisation of the Year and Service 

Excellence in a Contact Centre). 



Telephone interviews – individuals 

With nominees for individual categories spread throughout Australia (and 

occasionally overseas), judging for individuals is conducted over the 

telephone to ensure a standardised approach. 

These interviews are scheduled to fit in with the finalist’s availability and work 

schedule, and normally take between 30 and 45 minutes. 

The interview is structured as a dynamic conversation, covering a range of 

topics with an emphasis on presenting case studies and examples. While no 

formal preparation is required on the pa of the individual finalist, we 

suggest individuals review the past year’s achievements in driving customer 

service excellence so that they have examples of their successes on hand to 

share with the judges. 

KEY DATES 

In 2016, we are again proud to host the presentation of the Awards in the grand Crown Palladium 

Ballroom in Melbourne, which has hosted prestigious events such as the Logies and the Brownlow 

Medal. The gala presentation dinner will be held on Wednesday, 26 October 2016. 

• 04 April ASEA nominations open 

• 22 July ASEA nominations close 

• 01 to 05 August Finalists are notified 

• August to September On-site interviews (for organisations, teams and 

projects) and telephone interviews (for individuals) 

are completed 

• 26 October Winners are announced at the ASEA gala presentation 

dinner to be held at the Crown Palladium Ballroom in 

Melbourne 

FEES 

As pa of the recent review of the ASEA program, we’ve restructured fees into a single amount 

for the entire judging process. These fees are as follows: 

• Members*: 

Individual-level nomination - $195 + GST 

Organisation-level nomination - $495 + GST 

• Non-Members: Individual-level nomination - $295 + GST 

Organisation-level nomination - $695 + GST 

*It’s important to note that individual CSIA member discounts only apply to the nominee, not the nominator. Further, individual CSIA 

members’ do not receive discounts for organisa?on-‐level (corporate) nomina?ons.

2016 AWARDS PROGRAM

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?