GTT CEO ‘on mission to getting it right’ 
GTT CEO, Damian Blackburn
GTT CEO, Damian Blackburn

ACKNOWLEDGING that the company “hasn’t always gotten it right” in addressing issues with its services, Guyana Telephone and Telegraph Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Damian Blackburn, said Guyanese can expect more transparency and better communication as the company tries to build a new image in Guyana’s new liberalised landscape. Speaking with the Guyana Chronicle in an exclusive interview, Blackburn, who took over the helm of the telecommunications company in May, said Guyanese can expect a new approach from the company as it rebrands its image going forward.   “I can’t speak of everything that went before but we are working hard externally to get the message out that there is a bit of a new start at GTT and we are going to be all about the customer,” Blackburn said.
The telecommunications company has had a monopoly on the sector since 1990. Over the years, customers have complained about issues ranging from lengthy response time to fix issues to not receiving the quality of service they paid for.

The company also faced public relations issues following data billing hiccups with its Blaze high speed Internet service in 2019. According to Blackburn, Guyanese will be seeing better from the company going forward.  “Have we got that right all the time? No. But what is important is under my new leadership, with myself and the executive team, we will acknowledge when we don’t get it right, and I think that’s a change. I am not promising dreams that are going to take years, I’m taking immediate action and maybe that’s a difference,” he noted. After years of stakeholders lobbying for an end to the monopoly, it finally came to an end in October last year. GTT must now hold its own in the new competitive era, working to make up for past flaws and building better relations with its customers. Blackburn’s appointment is part of the new image the company is looking to put forth.  With over 20 years of experience in the telecommunications industry, Blackburn, who hails from the United Kingdom, has worked with companies such as Virgin Mobile, and most recently in the Bahamas where a similar monopoly ended in 2014.

NEW UNITS
Apart from Blackburn’s appointment, the company has also recently expanded its staff capacity, particularly in the customer service department, and has launched four new business units to head the various sections of the company.
GTT provides cellular, Internet services and an electronic wallet service via Mobile Money Guyana (MMG).
Blackburn stressed that the company is heavy on its customer-centric focus and is looking at ways to deal with all the current issues at the company.
“I am standing as the CEO saying these things are not right and we are going to do this and this about it. At the moment what I’m doing is putting a long-term plan together so I can be more sure when I’m going to do things,” he explained.

LISTEN TO STAFF AND STAKEHOLDERS
Blackburn emphasised that the most important thing that he wants to do as CEO is listen to the customers, and change how the company handles feedback from customers.  “When I arrived in May, the first 100 days was a lot of listening. Listening to our team, listening to our customers, stakeholders and business. I spent a lot of time with my executive team and the wider management and got a lot of feedback from them,” he noted.  Blackburn also added that though things are moving fast, staff at the company haven’t always gotten everything they needed but have nonetheless “always tried their best to do what they need to do”.
“We just haven’t always gotten that right in terms of the speed of action that we were able to solve things in. It’s not the fault of the team, but we need to do better and give them the resources they need,” he stressed.

Last year the company launched its “Together we rise” rebranding campaign with a new logo and slogans to welcome the new era just days after the government ended the company’s telecommunications monopoly. Blackburn explained that the slogan is about three distinct customer promises that the company wants to aspire to.
“The ‘together’ speaks to community, so our promise is to strengthen our community, the ‘we’ speaks to our customers and we want to reliably connect to our customers, thirdly ‘rise’ speaks to the country at this particular time, and what we want to do. We’ve worked hard internally to ensure everyone has bought into delivering these promises,” the CEO said. He added: “We also set a mission for the next 18 months to complement the vision we have in place, to pivot the business to become a 21st century customer-centric organisation in order to bring our vision alive of touching every home, business and person in Guyana with reliable connectivity.”

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