Hi,

I am quite new to using the scheduling aspect of Genesys Cloud. Is creating a generic workplan for my LOB a best practice to allow Genesys to create schedules based on requirements? How do I set the workplan to create the same start and end time for all 4-6 weeks since our business requires agents to work the same schedules within a quarter?

Thank you.

Hi Carla,

I am trying to source a reply for you, please bear with us!

Without more details in the desires I will attempt to note a few options.

1. Define a specific work plan to have a specific start/end time and then have a planning period of up to 6w.
2. Use the work plan bidding feature where the work plans have the particular start/end times.
3. Use work plan rotations.
4. For flexible work plans where you want a consistent start time, then the following idea is relevant: https://genesyscloud.ideas.aha.io/ideas/WEM-I-363 

Carla, what I see a lot of orgs do is this: 

1. Create a work plan per unique need. This means that if all agents work 8-5, M-F with 2 breaks and a meal, you only need 1 work plan.  If you have several shifts, then you only need one work plan per shift, and assign the appropriate agents to that shift.
2. To the work plan, add only the breaks and meals. 
3. Make these breaks and meals "flexible' or "optimized." To do this, double click the activity code and check the box for "Flexible start time." Indicate the earliest and latest into the shift that the activity may be scheduled (lots of orgs do 1hr min, 3hr 45min max for first break).  Take these steps for each break and meals.

By taking the steps above, you can have several agents with the same set start/end times on the same work plan but with optimized breaks and meals based on forecasted volume.  I think this is as close to "general" that you can get. 

To take that 1 step further, if you build a work plan for each shift offering that you have, you can use the work plan bid to get an optimization on how many agents should be assigned to each work plan!

Another alternate is that you could add each shift to a single work plan with overlapping days of the week or add one shift with the appropriate days of the week and a flexible start time. This allows the system to decide the best shift time for the assigned agents.  By setting the maximum shift start variance under General Constraints, you can ensure they start at the same time every day of the same week; unfortunately this doesn't necessarily carry over to the remaining 3-5 weeks you mentioned.  Only limits within the same week. The next week may have a different start time (but will have the same start time every day of the week.)