Workforce Engagement Management

I am currently testing adding in our outbound dialing queue alongside our inbound queue. I have done so successfully, but wanted to set up a separate service goal template for that outbound dialing queue to match with our goals. In this creation, I set the interactions answered percent to 97% within 2 seconds with an ASA of 1 second. The outcome of this did have the desired effect to my delta's. However, it is now "requiring" agents to be staffed prior to when our day even starts and sometimes after we have already closed and have long finished outbound dialing. My question for the community is how does applying a service goal template dictate up to several required agents for a timeframe in which no volume has ever occurred historically. Has anyone had an issue where their forecast/schedule was requiring staffing before or after their open/close times? If so, what solutions are there for this?

#Forecasting
#Scheduling

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Cody Herr
Customer Care Unit Manager
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I don't think it is a problem with the service goals, but with the timing of connected calls.  An Outbound campaign can go on for quite a while before it connects to a caller and is able to transfer into the agents.  Remember, we don't have Outbound Campaign forecasting, but we can forecast on the calls that connect to agents, not the actual dials by the dialer.  I am guessing that the bulk of the connects happen in peaks and the staffing is required at those times to meet demand, but constraints such as contiguous time, activity times, and daily/weekly work time may be kicking in to make sure the agents have the hours they need, but those don't match up with your connect high marks.  

I don't think it is a timing issue with the service goals, but probably a combination of shifts and work constraints.  If you have an agent start when the calls actually start reaching your agents in bulk which is the case with a campaign that does not have a huge penetration rate, WFM would schedule around those high points, but your constraints for contiguous work and other parameters may require that agent to be on longer or come in earlier to meet those constraints.  Check those and see if there are any forcing a set number of hours or requiring specific activity time.  

@Cody Herr I think all the times I have seen it in my center, it was caused by calls that ended after hours or a callback that was left in queue all night getting sucked into the forecast.  

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Gina Palmer
Manager, Workforce Management
Papa, Inc.
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