Towards the end of 2011, I was fortunate enough to have a conversation with Matthew Storm, director of Innovation and Strategy for NICE Systems (News - Alert) about how the company made improvements to its workforce optimization solutions over the year, as well as what it is looking forward to in the coming months. As it turns out, NICE is making inroads to exciting new ventures in the workforce optimization space.

Most importantly, Storm emphasized the intent of NICE to “mine the insights of customer intent” in order to best improve its existing solutions for its users. With new acquisitions (Fizzback for real time customer survey and Merced for closed-loop Performance Management) as well as new ideas in the chute, such as a mobile app, the company plans on staying grounded with what the customer wants, and helping its users to best address their customers’ needs.

Of course, with the developments 2012 will bring, it will also bring challenges. Storm noted, “From consumer-friendly processes and procedures to high-touch channel management and containment, customers are no longer easily impressed by the latest gimmick.   In tandem, blogging and social media are fueling customer revolution and are empowering consumers to publicize product reviews and publicly flog companies that deliver poor customer service.”

Fortunately, addressing these challenges is what NICE does best. In striving to create a “holistic view of the customer experience,” the company is helping to “facilitate contextual accuracy, guide customer-facing employees to make a personal touch, and do all of this in real time,” said Storm.  He continued, “Together, these key ingredients can create a superior customer experience that will steer our clients through these turbulent waters and provide this heightened level of service.”

It sounds as though NICE is pretty secure with its forward-looking endeavors, but what insight led it to these plans? Storm emphasized that the prediction of the breaking down of the “silos between departments such as sales, marketing and service delivery” will have an impact on the customer relationship. He also mentioned that the “mature” contact center will need to have top-notch solutions including “quality monitoring, workforce management, and desktop analytics” that “will connect the dots between the front office and the back.”

Stay tuned on the Workforce Optimization channel to keep up with NICE’s developments as the CRM and WFO space evolves in 2012!