Call Center Scheduling Featured Article
In the Contact Center, Scheduling Solutions Pay for Themselves
While no one has a crystal ball to look into (not one that works, anyway), call center managers are often expected to successfully see the future. Forecasting call and contact volumes to build schedules that will hopefully meet (but not exceed) required customer traffic is a harder job than weather forecasting: call center managers can’t use satellites or ocean temperatures.
Excel Doesn’t Cut It Anymore
A surprisingly large number of contact centers are still using manual processes to create forecasts and schedules, and it’s often reflecting in the quality of their customer support. While few companies enjoy spending money, automated scheduling solutions can pay for themselves -- and then some -- very quickly, which makes them an easy sell to the people who control the software budgets.
Essentially, scheduling software helps speed the process of forecasting and makes it more accurate. It can examine factors that would be extremely time-consuming for human managers, including examining historical trends. It can drill down to specific days or day parts. Look for a software platform that’s easy to use, flexible, and incorporates historical data to further refine forecasting and future scheduling.
Efficiency Drives Cost-Effectiveness
Even in the short run, better utilization of contact center employees will more than offset the cost of an automated call center scheduling software solution. For starters, it can dramatically reduce the amount of time managers need to forecast and build schedules, which leaves them with more time to train, coach and motivate agents. Secondly, it eliminates understaffing, which can drive away customers and burn out agents, as well as overstaffing, which costs money.
Solutions such as Monet WFM automate forecasting and scheduling as well as agent communication and adherence, to optimize your contact center’s workforce resources. Service and efficiency can be enhanced when scheduling automation chooses the right numbers of agents with the necessary skills to service customer needs.
Real-Time Scheduling
Often, manual schedules are built days, weeks and even months in advance, which mean that they’re inflexible to real-time changes that might happen (storms, illness, a surprise marketing promotion). Call center scheduling solutions, on the other hand, can be changed on-the-fly with new information, leading to more accurate staffing and better service levels.
“When external conditions change, managers should be able to review the call center metrics, in real time, that will help the business get back on track,” according to Monet Software’s blog. “By reviewing forecast vs. actual call volume and agent adherence, managers can then re-run forecasting and scheduling based on what is happening in the call center at that very moment. Then, they can update the schedule based on current conditions, and adjust staffing as quickly as possible so customer service is restored to optimum level.”
Edited by Maurice Nagle