One step at a time: how world class contact centers are achieving their workforce optimization goals.Most contact centers today are researching--or have already implemented--a workforce optimization optimization Field of applied mathematics whose principles and methods are used to solve quantitative problems in disciplines including physics, biology, engineering, and economics. (WFO WFO Weather Forecast Office WFO Wirtschaftsförderung Osnabrück Gmbh WFO Western Field Ornithologists WFO Washington Field Office WFO Work for Others (USACE) WFO World Federation of Orthodontists WFO Wide Full Open ) solution. Satisfied with their call delivery infrastructures (PBXs, ACDs, etc.), contact centers of all shapes and sizes are now implementing software-centric workforce optimization solutions to tackle critical business issues, such as improving agent retention and effectiveness, increasing customer satisfaction and maximizing overall business performance and profitability. In fact, industry analyst Datamonitor Datamonitor is a provider of online database and analysis services. The company is based in the United Kingdom and also has offices in the United States, Japan, and other countries.[1] The Datamonitor team includes analysts and professional researchers. expects global revenue of investment in workforce optimization technologies to exceed $1 billion by the end of 2006. Workforce optimization goals vary enormously from one organization to the next. Factors such as the size of the contact center, business nature and infrastructure--not to mention the budget constraints A Budget Constraint represents the combinations of goods and services that a consumer can purchase given current prices and his income. Consumer theory uses the concepts of a budget constraint and a preference ordering to analyze consumer choices. that influence and frequently limit the scope of choice--make the purchase of expensive "one size fits all" suites of workforce optimization solutions impractical im·prac·ti·cal adj. 1. Unwise to implement or maintain in practice: Refloating the sunken ship proved impractical because of the great expense. 2. . Many organizations have been forced to do without, the alternative being to invest in applications for which they have no use and perform costly integrations or incur To become subject to and liable for; to have liabilities imposed by act or operation of law. Expenses are incurred, for example, when the legal obligation to pay them arises. An individual incurs a liability when a money judgment is rendered against him or her by a court. exorbitant professional services (job) professional services - A department of a supplier providing consultancy and programming manpower for the supplier's products. fees to implement the solutions they actually need. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] A New Modular, Best-of-Breed The best product of its type. Organizations often purchase software from different vendors in order to obtain the best-of-breed for each application area; for example, a human resources package from one vendor and an accounting package from another. Approach Times have changed with the emergence of new, modular suites that consist of the six components implemented for workforce optimization: call recording, quality monitoring, workforce management Workforce Management (WFM) encompasses all the responsibilities for maintaining a productive and happy workforce. Sometimes referred to as HRMS systems, or even the larger ERP systems (Oracle, PeopleSoft, SAP). There are many software vendors within this space. , performance management, speech analytics and agent coaching. This modular approach gives organizations the freedom to build their ideal workforce optimization solution at their own pace. You can select the best-of-breed solutions you really need, and then add additional applications as you grow and evolve. By implementing workforce optimization solutions one step at a time, organizations can benefit from rapid implementation and outstanding, more easily measurable return on investment (ROI (Return On Investment) The monetary benefits derived from having spent money on developing or revising a system. In the IT world, there are more ways to compute ROI than Carter has liver pills (and for those of you who never heard of that expression, it means a lot). )--both of which make for more attractive and effective initial purchase proposals to your budget committee. Laying The Groundwork By now, most successful contact centers already rely on workforce management and call recording solutions. They are the fundamental building blocks of any workforce optimization solution. A workforce management solution enables companies to balance work volume and resources to achieve efficient operations and a desired quality of service. It offers call centers comprehensive scheduling, forecasting and planning functionality for complete enterprisewide, multi-site contact center workforce management. A call recording solution enables companies to capture a goldmine of customer intelligence, and also helps protect organizations from compliance and liability issues, while enabling them to monitor agent-customer interactions for quality assurance purposes. Sadly, these essential technologies have, until recently, been severely limited in their effectiveness due to a general reluctance to invest in expensive integrations. There are significant benefits to be gained by implementing a workforce management and/or call recording solution designed to integrate seamlessly with an entire suite of workforce optimization solutions. For example, by integrating workforce management with real-time 1. real-time - Describes an application which requires a program to respond to stimuli within some small upper limit of response time (typically milli- or microseconds). Process control at a chemical plant is the classic example. performance management and automated au·to·mate v. au·to·mat·ed, au·to·mat·ing, au·to·mates v.tr. 1. To convert to automatic operation: automate a factory. 2. agent coaching solutions, companies can take advantage of real-time agent productivity tracking, multimedia agent training and agent performance reporting tools. In addition to optimizing agent scheduling, companies can improve agent productivity, effectiveness and accountability. The Next Level of Workforce Optimization Performance management, agent coaching and speech analytics applications are the latest additions to the workforce optimization family of solutions. These remarkable technologies have revolutionized the contact center. Performance management solutions enable contact centers to collect data and present real-time and historical performance information to agents, managers and executives within the call center environment. Agent coaching applications automatically intervene intervene v. to obtain the court's permission to enter into a lawsuit which has already started between other parties and to file a complaint stating the basis for a claim in the existing lawsuit. when agents are under-performing by delivering training content in the form of courses, educational tips, quizzes, training flashes, pre-shift announcements and bulletins. Managers can deliver multimedia coaching and training to agent desktops on a schedule- or rules-driven basis. With a speech analytics solution, organizations can extract business intelligence from their agent/customer call recordings. Speech recognition technologies mine conversations and identify call trends: a process that was too costly and time consuming to uncover using traditional, manual methods. Step-by-Step: The Key To Success Maybe your organization would benefit from implementing a workforce management or call recording solution only. Or, maybe agent coaching and performance management solutions would offer greater advantages. It depends upon the needs of your specific environment. The point is, as long as you purchase your solution or solutions of choice from an integrated suite of workforce optimization applications, you won't have to worry about interoperability The capability of two or more hardware devices or two or more software routines to work harmoniously together. For example, in an Ethernet network, display adapters, hubs, switches and routers from different vendors must conform to the Ethernet standard and interoperate with each other. issues that would otherwise limit your options and seriously stunt your workforce optimization goals. Bob Webb serves as VP of Sales for Pipkins Pipkins (originally Inigo Pipkin) was a British children's TV programme. Hartley Hare, Pig, Topov and the gang, were the stars of ATV's legendary pre-school series which ran from January 1973 to 29 December 1981. , Inc., a leading supplier of workforce management software and services to the contact center industry. Pipkins has partnered with Voice Print International and Syntora to develop Solution Made Easy, an integrated, modular suite of contact center solutions for call recording, quality monitoring, workforce management, performance management, speech analytics and agent coaching. Visit www.solutionmadeeasy.com or call 866-596-EASY for more information on Solution Made Easy, Your One Stop Workforce Optimization Shop. By Bob Webb, Pipkins, Inc. |
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