Call Recording Featured Article

In call center culture, workforce optimization (WFO) is a common denominator across the board, encompassing all the necessary functionalities as an integrated contact center tool: call recording, quality monitoring, speech analytics, desktop analytics, an agent portal for e-learning as well as workforce management. Call centers need to properly forecast and schedule their staff while maintaining service levels and keeping costs in check. WFO, for its part, has come a long way with cloud computing technology now one of the biggest movers in the space.

WFO solutions in the cloud go beyond traditional workforce management solutions by being easily integrated without having to deploy extra software. Coordinated Systems recently announced its “Workforce Optimization as a Service” for contact centers. According to the company’s blog post on the announcement, the cloud service was developed with an Amazon Web Services infrastructure and services built on Microsoft (News - Alert) .NET standards.

WFO gives organizations the tools to better strategize priorities and objectives with their human resources. The benefits of workforce management are realized in cost and time efficiencies, as overstaffing and understaffing both result in time and cost inefficiencies. When staffing levels accurately meet the work projections, organizations save money and have a happier workforce both of which result in better quality and service to its customers.

Irrespective of the size of the contact center, workforce management is a challenge. In addition to making the right technology decision to help manage a workforce, it's also important to understand and address the most basic of workforce issues.

Combined with the cloud, Virtual Observer WFO-as-a-service gives customers with the ability to score calls or send targeted training material to staff.

“The call recording and call scoring is really where the fun just begins, as you can begin to manage your center’s schedules and forecasts, run advanced query searches against indexed audio to isolate trends, and bring your agents into the quality monitoring process with their own login and the ability to respond to evaluations,” said Richard Marcia, marketing director for CSI (News - Alert).

A good workforce optimization solution can provide insight into your customers’ wants and needs - insight that could help you make better, more strategic decisions about your products and services, staffing, and competitors to better serve a new generation of customers.