At a Glance
Automatically blend agents to deal with inbound spikes
Balance all workloads, across all contact channels
Make best possible use of agent/ supervisor time
What is Dynamic Workforce Management?
Dynamic Workforce Management (WFM) is the automatic management of all agents and workloads to optimise performance across all contact channels in real-time during the working day.
Within Softdial Contact Center™ (SCC), this intraday workforce management is known as Sytel Real-Time Automation (SRA), which:
- reassigns agents automatically, even from outbound work, to where they are most needed during a shift, with no need for supervisor intervention
- balances service levels automatically across all inbound queues, even with agent shortages, call spikes, etc.
- assigns inbound contact sessions automatically according to queue service levels and agent skills/capacity.
To see SRA in action, watch these simulation videos >>
Within SRA, the engine that manages this workload balancing in real-time is the Automatic Session Distributor (ASD®).
What is The Automatic Session Distributor (ASD®)?
The ASD® is the multi-channel replacement for the traditional call center ACD.
The ASD automatically assigns contact sessions to agents with the most appropriate skillsets, or even previous interaction with the customer, and capacity within their personal workload to handle them.
For details on how workload balancing is achieved, see How SRA Makes Decisions >>
But doesn’t our WFM already do this?
Workforce Management (WFM) tools are very necessary in planning workloads and agent schedules day by day, but these tools simply cannot manage fluctuations in supply and demand on the day.
They may be able to assist with and advise on intraday agent and queue management but they still require manual intervention, either to take the required action or to monitor automatic actions that have been triggered. SRA does not.
SRA allows agents to come and go as scheduled, taking all fluctuations of supply and demand in its stride.
Revolutionize Your Contact Center Performance
SRA allows you to:
reduce the time any customer has to wait in a queue by automatically moving agents where possible to handle increased demand
minimise agent idle time automatically, with the scope for productivity improvements of 20% or more
balance any and all service level targets/SLAs automatically across all queues, protecting organisational reputation and keeping customers happy by not keeping them waiting
make the best use of supervisor time and skills. The supervisor simply ensures that the system knows what skills agents have, sets appropriate service levels per queue, and can focus on getting the best from their agents, not the technology
make ‘best-match’ decisions far more efficiently and accurately than any supervisor, so human error is minimised if not eliminated altogether
rethink your legacy WFM systems. SRA provides workforce planning outputs that allow you to plan staffing, but will also manage the media landscape in real time to ensure 100% occupancy, regardless of peaks and troughs in call, chat and email volumes
be more agile and flexible, adding channels and workflows without worrying about detrimental effects to existing work
To assess the impact of SRA in your own contact center, see The Business Case for SRA >>
Omnichannel Agent Blending
SRA automatically moves agents to cope with any spikes in inbound demand on any media channel, while minimising the impact on other workloads.
But wouldn’t taking agents off an outbound voice campaign cause a spike in abandoned calls?
No, because SCC’s dialing algorithm takes account of all campaign conditions including agent numbers. It automatically and instantaneously adjusts the dialing rate accordingly, so that outbound predictive dialing performance is not compromised.
During slack periods of inbound activity, agents can be kept busy with less time-critical work, e.g. email. At peak times, they can be moved up the value chain in response to demand, and back again when demand allows.
From Call Blending to Channel Blending
Back when ‘contact centers’ were ‘call centers’, and agents handled one voice call at a time, this balance was maintained by automated call blending – having agents do outbound work, moving them over to inbound when demand spiked, and moving them back again when demand decreased.
With the rise in expectation for contact across all media channels – voice, email, chat, social, etc – the software challenge is much more complex. The software must now balance across different media channels with very different performance measurement points.
This means, for example:
- bringing in chat agents to handle voice sessions during peak periods
- trade-offs between voice and chat SLAs
- balancing multiple queues across many different projects
- multi-disciplinary agents with different skills across lots of workloads
- some agents will be better than others at handling multiple sessions.
Explore more of SCC’s capabilities:
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What We Offer
Sytel Limited develops and supplies Softdial Contact Center® (SCC) – multimedia, multichannel, fully blended cloud contact center solutions.
Available by subscription as CCaaS, fully managed and supported by Sytel, or for quick and easy deployment by partners and enterprise users.
All Sytel cloud components are secure, resilient and scale seamlessly from 10 agents to 10,000+, whether local, mobile or remote.
Flexible Contact Center Software
Softdial Contact Center™ – rich functionality, all-in-one, designed to deliver at scale
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Contact Center as a Service (CCaaS)
CCaaS for subscribers – global service, with no upfront costs
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Contact Center Platform – CCaaS Partners
Build your own CCaaS business using the power and flexibility of Sytel software
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Contact Center Platform – Enterprise
High performance platform to drive contact center productivity – cloud, on-premise or hybrid
Blended Media Desktop
Fully customisable, multi-channel, multi-session workspace
Work Anywhere
Browser-based tools, no software installation required
Customise, Localise, White Label
Design all user interfaces to individual requirements
Integration via APIs
‘Swap out’ components and integrate with 3rd party apps
World Class Development
Continuous evolution pushing technical boundaries
Capabilities
Softdial Contact Center™ (SCC) is designed to be flexible, extensible and scalable, integrating with any legacy equipment, and meeting the most complex of requirements.
All Media Channels
Voice, chat, email, social, etc – fully integrated and blended
Agent Multi-Tasking
Work with multiple live contact sessions of any media channel
Dynamic Workforce Management
Optimise agent usage and balance workloads in real-time without human intervention, across all media channels
Predictive Dialing
Best-of-breed performance under compliance
Optimised Inbound Routing
Smart rules and ‘best-available’ decisions to drive great customer service
Agent Scripts
Help agents achieve and maintain excellence
Voice and Screen Recording
See and hear exactly how agents are interacting
Analytics and Data Feeds
Measure and evaluate performance at every level
IVR, Bots & Conversational AI
Design effective automated flows or integrate with 3rd party providers
Customer Journey Tracking
Stored customer contact history, to aid routing and add context to conversations
Modules
Drive operational efficiency, increase customer satisfaction & improve agent performance
Softdial One™
Highly flexible unified web UI for agents, supervisors and administrators
Softdial Scripter™
Create complex process flow scripts for agents, IVR, chatbots and other applications
Sytel AI Dialer™
Maximum predictive dialing performance, under any compliance rules
Softdial Pathfinder™
Precise routing rules for ‘best available’ connection
Softdial Media Server™
Core telephony functions to manage all inbound/outbound SIP calls
Softdial Reporter™ 5
Fully customisable performance stats, charts and reports, across all channels
Softdial Publisher™
Comprehensive data output to build your own reports
Softdial Recording Monitor™
Audio and screen recording of agent activity to ensure the highest standards
Softdial Campaign Manager™
Automation to optimise any outreach strategy
Softdial Repository™
Central storage and configuration of common resources
Sytel Global Compliance™
Flexible ‘no contact’ rules to protect contact center and consumer
Solutions
Performance and efficiency for a wide range of business applications
By Business Type
Enterprise
A full featured contact center software solution, designed for optimum performance at scale
Small/ Medium Business
Options for SMBs to subscribe to our full-featured cloud service managed and hosted by either one of our partners or by Sytel themselves
By Industry
Customer Service
Connect quickly to well equipped agents
Market Research
Best-of-breed predictive dialing with CATI integration
Debt Collection
Automated inbound/ outbound blending integrated with any debt management app
Sales & Telemarketing
Maximise agent productivity with best-of-breed predictive dialing
Healthcare
Secure, highly-configurable multichannel communications for excellence in patient care