Call Center Workforce Management Tutorial Series

Module 4 - Best Practices in Workforce Management

         Download a printable version of this tutorial in PDF format

We will now provide our weekly tutorials in a downloadable PDF format so you are able to view and print them as resources.  Depending on the topic of the tutorial, you might choose to provide it as a handout with your team, business leaders or employees. 

We will also continue to provide the tutorials in html format as found below.

The Call Center Learning Center is excited to announce a new tutorial series on workforce management in call centers. This tutorial series will pull from Prosci's research-based toolkits and best practices reports. Module 1 introduced the workforce management process.  Module 2 took a closer look at collecting personnel data and determining staffing level projections and agent schedules.  Module 3 focused on measuring schedule adherence and performance.   This module concludes the series with best practices in workforce management.

Prosci and the Call Center Learning Center gathered data from 240 companies from over 50 countries to determine what is working and what is not working in call center operations, management and technology.  This tutorial features select workforce management best practices that were collected in our latest study.

Top workforce management changes

Effective workforce management is an essential component to operating a productive and efficient call center.  Participants regularly cited hiring, staffing and forecasting as both short-term and long-term challenges they face in their call center.  Therefore, managers and supervisors are constantly looking to make improvement changes to workforce management practices in their call centers.

According to the latest best practices study, the top changes made to improve call center workforce management were:

1. Forecasting and planning more accurately by:

• using historical data to forecast future patterns including forecasting peak periods more accurately (see Module 1 for more information on historical data and forecasting)
   

• hiring more part-time staff to cover forecasted peak periods

2. Implementation of new software and automation, such as:

• off-the-shelf scheduling software
   

• adding ACD and IVR technology to provide customers with improved routing and automated services

3. Introducing performance-oriented reward systems, including:

• productivity measurement and real-time performance stats
   

• better tracking of schedule adherence (see Module 3 for more information on measuring schedule adherence and productivity)
   

• more frequent performance appraisals and feedback including managing by objectives (MBO)

Other popular changes for WFM improvement were:

• Scheduling breaks and lunches to ensure little or no overlap
   

• Changing work schedules to better fit personalities and people, including permanent work schedules that fit the CSR's needs (see Module 2 for more information on gathering personnel data)
   

• Increasing overall staffing and/or overtime
   

• Extending the hours of the call center or expanding service to serve customers better and stretch out peak calling times
   

• Introducing a set rotation of split shifts for equitable work distribution

As for changes in workforce management systems and technology, participants listed a number of changes that they plan to make to their workforce management tools in the future, including the following:

• Introduce a new workforce management application or upgrade to additional features
   
• Integrate the workforce management system with other programs and databases
   
• Implement real-time adherence tracking in the workforce management system
   
• Introduce better forecasting tools into the applications to optimize scheduling accuracy

How workforce management is conducted

Participants were also asked about their current workforce management processes and practices.  As shown in Figure 1, two-thirds of participating call centers currently perform workforce management manually or with spreadsheet tools such as Microsoft Excel.  Less than 30% use off-the-shelf workforce management applications.

              Figure 1 - How workforce management is conducted

While most call centers used the core features of scheduling, forecasting and reporting, only 40% used real-time schedule adherence features (see Figure 2, note that participants could choose more than one feature).

     Figure 2 - Workforce management features in use

Setting the scheduling priority is a common challenge for many call centers.  Scheduling priority refers to the decision-making process for which agents receive their preferred work times.

As shown in Figure 3, 40% of participants stated that they set scheduling priority based on performance, while only 35% set scheduling priority based on seniority.  The category of "other" in Figure 3 included responses for first-come, first-serve scheduling, associate or staff preferences, a combination of seniority and performance and a rotating point system where everyone is treated equally with a rotating schedule.

Figure 3 - Determining scheduling priority

Applying best practices in your call center

The goals of Prosci's best practices research are to:

1. Enable call center managers to uncover the most effective management practices, based on benchmarking research.
    

2. Identify operational and technological changes that are having the greatest impact on customer satisfaction and call center efficiency.
    

3. Share the most current performance objectives and results for call centers by industry.

The data presented in this tutorial can be used by your call center to ensure that it is moving in the right direction and benefiting from the lessons learned by other call centers.  The complete Call Center Best Practices Report also covers quality monitoring, training, outsourcing, performance benchmarking, cost data and other valuable data.