TOPdesk. Offering service management software that gets service departments working together, delivering exceeded customer service expectations, TOPdesk’s mission has been the same since its inception: helping organisations create spectacular customer experiences.

The company started over 25 years ago with a simple ticketing tool for IT help desks. Today, TOPdesk still makes great software for managing calls, and this has expanded to everything else its customers need for enterprise service management.

Whether it’s processing incoming tickets or collaborating with multiple service teams in one tool, whether ITSM and CAFM to ESM and more: TOPdesk has the flexibility and features to fit any organization. This means you can streamline your IT support with easy call registration, while enjoying effective resource planning and dynamic reporting options. You can also manage all your facilities services with clear overviews, personal to‑do lists and cleverly designed planners.

As with all great companies, TOPdesk’s people make the difference, and they’ve been helping organisations around the globe improve their service delivery for nearly three decades.

Now comes a new initiative, created by TOPdesk Australia, following an idea from its local marketing lead, Laura Domingo, which has evolved into allowing employees the choice to work from anywhere in the world for 60 days a year, which is also an important wellbeing initiative for employees, and absolutely worth celebrating in the midst of mental health awareness month, which happens every year in October.

The practice of working from abroad for an extended period was initially proposed and trialled by Domingo, who like many of us, was struggling with protracted COVID-induced separation from family overseas.

When new TOPdesk Australia General Manager Robert van der Gulik – himself an expat from the Netherlands – commenced in his role earlier this month, he immediately saw the benefits of extending this opportunity to others at the company.

“Our people come from many different countries. We have people with family in Europe, Asia and across Oceania. The past few years of separation have been hard. This policy is exactly what our people need right now – the ability to reconnect, in person, with loved ones far away,” van der Gulik said.

So, let’s hear from Robert and Laura in our great video interview below, after which there are more details, and a summary of the topics we spoke about, so please watch and read on!

So far, Robert van der Gulik reports two TOPDesk Australia employees have taken up the offer, and adds: “We know providing flexible workplaces, which allow people to integrate their work lives with their personal lives, create happier, more fulfilled team members. This can only be a good thing: for our people, our customers and our company.

“The ways in which many of us think about work have undergone a permanent shift. Companies have a great opportunity to consider how to bring out the best in their people.

“The flow-on effects of the pandemic include a recognition that continuing flexible work arrangements enable companies to leverage productivity gains achieved through remote working and achieve a competitive advantage in an increasingly tight job market.

“In the context of Australia’s large population born overseas (30%) and current labour shortage, policies aimed to facilitate remote work overseas have tremendous potential, allowing people to reconnect with family and broadening the pool of prospective talent.”

TOPdesk Australia’s office opened in Melbourne in 2019, with the local office having recently welcomed Robert van der Gulik as General Manager from TOPdesk Canada.

Here’s a summary of the topics we spoke about in the video interview above:

• I started by introducing Robert and Laura, welcoming them to the program, and asked Robert to explain what TOPdesk offers to its customers today, and what drew him to move to Australia to become TOPdesk’s country manager.
  
  
• I then asked Laura to tell us a bit more about her role, and her big idea to allow working from abroad, and why this was important to her.
  
  
• Laura explained she has already had the chance to travel to Spain twice, how remote working affected security and ease of communication with her local and global colleagues, and whether others in the company had followed her lead.
  
  
• Robert explained the reaction of other TOPDesk offices around the world and whether they have similar programs.
  
  
• Next, we learned more about TOPDesk Australia and its local customers, what a typical onboarding process looks like and the timeframe to see positive results, and anything else we needed to know about TOPdesk that we hadn’t already discussed.
  
  
• We finished by both Robert and Laura sharing their thoughts on how the company might evolve over the next couple of years, and what things might look like in the 2030s when the metaverse should be everywhere, followed by memories of their first computers, great advice received in life, and their final messages to iTWire viewers and readers, and to their current and future customers and partners.

So, to learn more about TOPdesk itself, to hear from Laura on the benefits of being able to work from abroad, to see how happy it has made her and more - please watch the video interview above!