Customers seem to hate them — and corporations love them. Like it or not, call centers are a fact of life. Viewed as a necessary evil rather than an opportunity to build relationships, businesses continually seek to slash service costs — which frequently results in more disgruntled customers. So wouldn’t it be great if there were a way to cut costs and increase customer satisfaction at the same time? That’s what Howard Lee thought. Building on several Microsoft ® products, and the Microsoft .NET Framework, his concept for HyperQuality, Inc., a web-based suite of quality assurance programs, is helping companies improve their customer experience — one agent at a time.