Call Center Scheduling Featured Article
Tips for Improving Call Center Agent Scheduling
With all the talk of automation, artificial intelligence and machine learning in the “digitally transformed” landscape, you’d think there are no human contact center agents left. It’s not true. Digital transformation has opened new avenues of customer support for customers, but they still require humans to anchor them. Living, breathing agents are still the contact center’s greatest asset as well as its greatest expense.
That said, by improving scheduling in the contact center, you can save money, boost performance and ensure robust, high-quality customer support. Following are some good principles to follow when it’s time to improve scheduling.
Ditch Excel. Really. It seems obvious, but a surprisingly high number of contact centers are still using manual processes and Excel to create schedules. Today’s cloud-based scheduling solutions mean that even the smallest of contact centers can benefit from advanced scheduling capabilities. Today’s solutions are designed to be both sophisticated and easy to use, and can analyze and aggregate historical call levels, future demands and employee factors, and create more precise forecasts and schedules. They can also account for non-call channels such as email, text or social media.
Remember to account for shrinkage. Shrinkage is defined as the time for which agents are paid during which they’re not available to handle calls. There are many factors that can cause shrinkage – breaks, illness, overlong lunches, staff training sessions and other distractions. Before you build any schedules, be sure you understand how shrinkage is happening and include that data, so your staffing requirements are accurate.
Account for all non-call activities. Many contact centers run afoul of schedules when they forget to time-budget for non-call activities, such as training, motivational activities, coaching and meetings. Ensure the scheduling solution you choose helps you easily build time for these activities into the schedule, or you’ll find you’re forever struggling with adherence.
Build flexibility into the schedule. It can be hard to schedule accurately when most or all agents are locked into immovable schedules. You may find your call center overstaffed on some days and understaffed on others. Encourage more agents to be available on a flexible basis (able to log in from home, for example, if things get busy, or willing to accept shift swaps) and provide incentive for them to do so (overtime, paid meals, etc.). During slow periods, build in a voluntary time off program.
Keep standby help available. Extra help from outside the contact center is a good idea to fill gaps during busy times. This might involve keeping temps on standby for any times you may predict you’ll run short of your manpower requirements or engaging the occasional services of an outsourced teleservices provider.
Edited by Maurice Nagle