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How to Meet Your Service Level Needs
While Controlling Costs
SEVEN TIPS TO PROVIDING GOOD WORKFORCE MANAGEMENT
Do you lay awake at night wondering why the cost for your customer contact center is out of
control and yet your customers are not happy with your Service Level (SL) performance? The
place to look for the answer is within your workforce management processes, data collection,
forecasting, implementation and communication.
COPC Inc. provides performance improvement consulting services for customer contact
operations throughout the world, and we find that workforce management is one of the least
understood areas of the industry. This whitepaper presents seven common problems within
customer contact organizations that can impede your ability to meet Service Level objectives,
and provides specific recommendations about how to address each issue.
1. TECHNOLOGY WON’T SOLVE ALL YOUR PROBLEMS
Many customer contact organizations believe that the solution to all their workforce management
woes relies on the purchase of workforce management software. While we readily admit that
software is a worthwhile addition to a workforce management process, it is not a guarantee of
success for two main reasons.
First, an organization’s processes often lack significant rigor or effectiveness before the software
is purchased; thus the organization ends up using the tool to automate its existing poor practices.
Second, organizations often do not properly invest in training the staff who will interact with the
technology solution, spreading only a limited amount of “tribal knowledge.”
It is common to have staff who do not understand how to customize the tool’s default settings for
their own work environment. An expensive software tool is purchased and installed, yet the staff
is not fully utilizing the features that would actually improve operational performance.
The COPC Inc. Workforce Management Tip:
Start by developing processes that are well designed and executed in
a manner independent of technology. We have seen high performance
organizations that were able to conduct their workforce management
functions using nothing other than Microsoft® Excel. Once you become
efficient at achieving accurate results, you can then apply those
techniques to your automated workforce management technology.
© 1996-2012 COPC Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary information of COPC Inc.
WHITEPAPER: How to Meet Your Service Level Needs While Controlling Costs
2. KNOW THE LEVEL OF SERVICE YOUR CUSTOMERS DEMAND
Customer contact centers often set a target for Service Level based upon a perceived notion of
what comprises “a good Service Level.” This practice involves basing Service Level upon informal
conversations, rather than the actual expectations of the customer. Having a higher target than
your customer demands increases the cost of delivery.
The chart below shows our findings from a COPC Inc. client engagement where the actual queue
time (or speed of answer) did not impact customer satisfaction until it exceeded about four
minutes. Understanding the specific threshold that your customers will tolerate will help you make
better decisions that will ensure you manage both your costs and customer satisfaction.
Setting an SL target involves understanding a complex relationship between the value of the service
that you provide, the other choices the customer has to receive that service, and how loyal your
customer is to your organization. Think about the difference in tolerance levels between calling for a
cab and calling a tech support line for a product under warranty.
© 1996-2012 COPC Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary information of COPC Inc.
WHITEPAPER: How to Meet Your Service Level Needs While Controlling Costs
The COPC Inc. Workforce Management Tip: Don’t start by setting an SL
target. Instead first ask yourself, “What Abandonment Rate is acceptable?”
As we all know, the higher the SL, the lower the Abandonment Rate.
In the example above the correlation between Abandonment Rates and
Service Levels were used to determine the appropriate Service Level
based on Abandonment Rates. From these findings, if 4% is the desired
Abandonment Rate, then Service Level for this organization should be
established at about 75%. If a 3% abandonment rate is desired, then the
Service Level target should be 80%.
3. DON’T FOCUS ON MONTHLY SERVICE LEVEL TARGETS
The goal of most customer-focused contact centers is to achieve consistent SL delivery to its
customers. An SL that is too high is not cost effective, while an SL that is too low leads to customer
dissatisfaction. Many workforce management departments try to achieve a consistent monthly
Service Level target. Often this goal has been established by the company, or in the case of
outsourced contact centers, by their client.
COPC Inc. has found that when organizations focus on a monthly number, they often end up being
dramatically overstaffed. When queried about this, two reasons are repeatedly given. “We need to
over deliver now to hit our SL target because we had some bad days earlier in the month.” Or, “We
always over deliver SL early in the month, in case we run into trouble later.”
© 1996-2012 COPC Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary information of COPC Inc.
WHITEPAPER: How to Meet Your Service Level Needs While Controlling Costs
We also come across workforce management departments that are totally fixated on ensuring they
“make the service level,” because this is the only metric for which they are held accountable. But
these departments have little visibility into the actual cost for that over-delivery. The chart above
shows an example of a workforce management program that was managing to a daily Service Level
instead of managing to a performance band or interval level. As you can see, SL varied greatly
throughout the day. While this organization may have achieved their service level for the full day,
many intervals were overstaffed and underutilized.
The COPC Inc. Workforce Management Tip: Move away entirely from
monthly Service Level targets, and instead measure the percentage of
intervals that are within an acceptable range around your target. For
example, if your service level target is 80% of calls in 40 seconds or
less, you would set a target such as “75% of the intervals in the month
need to be between 78% and 84% of calls in 40 seconds or less.”
With this approach, the incentive to over deliver in one interval to compensate for poor delivery in
another interval is eliminated. Instead, the focus is to provide consistent Service Level delivery that
is balanced by cost considerations. Sometimes high-performing companies will even set a second
measurement range specifically for prime intervals (where they receive the largest percentage of
their call volume).
© 1996-2012 COPC Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary information of COPC Inc.
WHITEPAPER: How to Meet Your Service Level Needs While Controlling Costs
4. AVOID GARBAGE IN, GARBAGE OUT (GIGO)
Workforce management organizations have to constantly fight the GIGO battle to ensure that the
numbers used in their planning are accurate and relevant to their Service Level needs. We see three
major areas that consistently have GIGO issues: inclusion of meaningless variation, inaccurately
calculating Average Handle Time (AHT), and the failure to remove anomalies.
One of the least understood areas in workforce management is statistical variation. We all are
accustomed to dealing with averages in contact centers, for example AHT. Averages are comprised
of the sum of the values over a time period divided by the number of observations in that time
period.
When applied to workforce management, forecasts often use too few weeks of data to predict
the future. This can lead to an uneven arrival pattern, caused by fluctuations that are the result of
variation. Then the workforce management department attempts to schedule to this uneven pattern
by moving start and end times, breaks, lunches, and other offline activities. The resulting schedule is
based on statistical variation rather than meaningful fluctuations in either arrival patterns or AHT.
As an example, see the chart below. Attempting to forecast AHT at the interval level requires extra
effort that often does not pay off. Unless there is some compelling reason to believe that AHT
follows a trend by time of the day, it is easier to calculate a flat AHT for all intervals. In this example,
the forecast varied by interval. The flat-line forecasted AHT was 326 seconds, which is much easier
to calculate and just as accurate.
© 1996-2012 COPC Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary information of COPC Inc.
WHITEPAPER: How to Meet Your Service Level Needs While Controlling Costs
The second GIGO concern for workforce management organizations is inaccurately calculating
AHT either too high or too low. In our performance improvement consulting work, we often see
organizations that direct agents to complete their after-call work in the time available between
calls. This happens in organizations when Service Levels are running high. The result is a reported
AHT that is lower than the actual time needed to service the customer. The workforce management
department then uses this incorrect data to predict the future, attempting to balance staffing
requirements to predicted demand to bring Service Level to the targeted performance. However,
when the proper Service Level is achieved, agents no longer have available time between calls and
need to go into after-call work. Reported AHT then climbs to match the true time required to service
the customer, but this is much higher than the AHT that was used in the workforce management
predictions. The net result is that not enough staff was scheduled to meet the “higher” AHT and
Service Levels are missed.
The third GIGO problem in the workforce management organization is the failure to remove
anomalies from data. For example, you may have a call spike, a high AHT caused by a system issue,
or increased volume on the day after a public holiday. These anomalies need to be removed from
the historical data, or they will affect future predictions. In the chart below, you will notice two
anomalies in call volume related to two U.S. holidays, one on July 5th and one on Memorial Day.
These two days should be removed from the data or they will unnecessarily skew the forecast.
The COPC Inc. Workforce Management Tip: To avoid GIGO issues,
employ techniques such as statistical smoothing of arrival patterns,
or using a flat number for AHT across an entire day rather than
varying by interval. Ensure that AHT is properly calculated and
accurately recorded. Also make sure to remove anomalies from
past data so future predictions are not tainted.
© 1996-2012 COPC Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary information of COPC Inc.
WHITEPAPER: How to Meet Your Service Level Needs While Controlling Costs
5. TAKE THE TIME TO REVIEW AGENT SCHEDULING
In contact center operations, one of the most significant issues in workforce management is that
no one reviews the “output” of its scheduling activities. Instead, forecasts are plugged into the
workforce management software tool and agent schedules are instantly produced. Little time is
given to review these schedules to ensure a balance between “overs and unders” before being
released to the agents. The following over/under chart is from a COPC Inc. client engagement
and is an example of what should routinely be reviewed.
>10 over
Available Vs Forecast table
Available
Vs Forecast table
Over 1-9 FTE
Over 10+ FTE
1-9 under
Under
1-9 FTE >10 under
1-9 over
Under 10+ FTE
Date
31-Mar
1-Apr
2-Apr
7.00
7.30
8.00
8.30
9.00
9.30
10.00
10.30
11.00
11.30
12.00
12.30
13.00
13.30
14.00
14.30
15.00
15.30
Mo
Tu
We
0
0
-3
-2
-7
-3
-5
-1
4
3
-1
-3
-2
-1
3
3
-1
-4
0
0
-1
1
-4
-5
-5
-2
-1
4
0
2
0
1
0
0
-3
-7
0
0
1
6
5
5
3
4
9
6
5
8
4
8
5
5
3
1
3-Apr
4-Apr
7-Apr
8-Apr
Th
Fr
Mo
Tu
0
0
3
2
4
5
5
5
9
9
5
7
-1
5
2
1
1
1
0
0
4
1
-1
-3
-2
0
1
2
-1
0
0
1
4
2
2
-1
0
0
-2
-5
-4
0
-2
2
8
8
5
5
1
4
8
7
5
2
0
0
2
9
9
8
1
7
4
5
8
9
7
8
8
6
7
4
9-Apr
10-Apr
11-Apr
14-Apr
15-Apr
16-Apr
17-Apr
18-Apr
21-Apr
22-Apr
23-Apr
24-Apr
25-Apr
Totals
We
Th
Fr
Mo
Tu
We
Th
Fr
Mo
Tu
We
Th
Fr
0
0
3
9
6
8
4
7
10
13
11
10
10
13
13
13
10
6
0
0
3
8
8
8
8
9
9
8
9
7
8
11
10
8
4
3
0
0
2
8
8
11
6
9
10
11
5
6
5
8
13
11
8
5
0
0
2
9
5
7
5
5
11
10
8
6
5
14
12
12
12
9
0
0
4
7
2
4
2
3
2
5
3
6
1
6
5
6
4
1
0
0
4
10
7
10
5
8
9
8
9
8
6
13
9
8
11
7
0
0
5
11
15
16
14
14
17
17
14
13
12
16
18
14
7
9
0
0
6
8
10
9
7
10
11
11
5
5
6
8
11
10
9
3
0
0
-2
-5
-9
-1
-5
-3
4
5
0
2
2
3
6
5
3
3
0
0
-2
-1
-5
-4
-10
-4
-7
-4
-3
-2
-3
1
-1
-6
-5
-13
0
0
3
5
6
8
4
4
6
8
7
5
4
10
6
7
5
2
0
0
2
3
7
7
4
8
5
6
7
7
6
10
8
3
3
4
0
0
0
1
9
12
7
10
8
13
7
3
2
11
13
13
13
2
0
0
34
85
71
102
46
95
129
148
103
104
73
150
153
128
98
37
An “over” is when too many staff is scheduled for a specific interval, creating unnecessary cost
to the business. Conversely, an “under” is when too few agents are in place, causing poor service
level delivery and an increased number of abandoned calls.
The COPC Inc. Workforce Management Tip: Establish scheduling rules
that define the acceptable range of over/under for each program or
queue. Then, the workforce management department must develop
schedules to fit within these rules. Finally, management should review
the expected performance of each of the queues and make any
necessary changes before the schedules are released to the agents.
© 1996-2012 COPC Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary information of COPC Inc.
WHITEPAPER: How to Meet Your Service Level Needs While Controlling Costs
6. BALANCE EMPLOYEE SATISFACTION AND ATTRITION
Many excellent workforce management organizations know exactly how to develop and implement
a staffing schedule to meet predicted consumer demand, but they don’t do it. In an effort to meet
employee satisfaction and reduce attrition, some organizations resist changing agent scheduling.
This work environment can slowly develop in many ways, such as promising agents guaranteed
shifts at recruitment, or allowing a long-standing practice of shift “preferences” to become
“restrictions,” which limits the workforce management organization’s ability to efficiently schedule
agents to meet their customer needs.
Companies also will run into issues when “shift bids” or “rotations” are done infrequently. Over time,
it is possible for agent schedules to become misaligned with the needs of the customers—especially
if consumer patterns are in flux.
The COPC Inc. Workforce Management Tip: Balance the needs of
your customers and the needs of your employees. Make sure your
agents understand that the organization needs to be flexible in order
to serve the customer, so agents will not always have the same shift.
However when shift changes are required, do them in a manner that
will not create radical change in the personal lives of your staff.
7. FOSTER INTER-DEPARTMENT COMMUNICATIONS
In any multi-faceted organization, the parts need to work together in order to run smoothly and
efficiently. The interaction between workforce management and the other parts of a customer
contact operation is no different.
In particular, a fundamental relationship exists between Workforce Management and Operations,
an interaction which often has communication issues. For example, schedules may be produced,
but agent adherence to these schedules is poor because Operations does not manage this activity.
Or, Operations may feel that they “know when the customers will call,” and will schedule training,
coaching or meetings without consulting the Workforce Management team.
Another important relationship is between the Marketing department and the Workforce
Management group. Sometimes, Marketing fails to notify center operations about a new sales
promotion or web site change that could drive increases in customer contacts or AHT. Often the
contact center doesn’t find out about these activities until after the calls start arriving, which is too
late to plan appropriately.
© 1996-2012 COPC Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary information of COPC Inc.
WHITEPAPER: How to Meet Your Service Level Needs While Controlling Costs
The COPC Inc. Workforce Management Tip: Take a proactive
approach to ensure that interdepartmental meetings are held with
Marketing and Operations, which will help to “break down the walls”
between departments. With regular meetings, your Workforce
Management group has a greater opportunity of being kept up-todate about upcoming events, as well as the day-to-day requirements
of operations.
The goal of workforce management to consistently achieving Service Level while balancing costs
is not something that happens by accident. This work requires the analysis of accurate information,
an understanding of how to make use of that information, careful coordination among departments,
and a thoughtful approach that gives appropriate consideration to all of your variables.
Start by knowing what level of service your customers want. Follow by getting the accurate
information necessary for you to understand what is required to balance your supply of labor
to the demand. And finally, review your performance regularly and eliminate any practices that
create unreasonable barriers in matching supply to demand.
ABOUT COPC INC.
COPC Inc. provides consulting services and training to help companies improve revenue, reduce
costs, and increase customer satisfaction in operations that support the customer experience.
COPC Inc.’s main offering is performance improvement services for customer contact centers,
including both in-house and outsourced, as well as vendor management organizations.
The foundation of all COPC Inc. work is the COPC® Family of Standards, a collection of the most
prestigious and rigorous performance management systems for the customer contact industry.
Since 1996, COPC Inc. has completed nearly 1,500 assessments of customer contact centers
in 70 countries. COPC Inc. is privately held with headquarters in Winter Park, Florida, USA, and
with operations in Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, India and Japan.
For more information about COPC Inc., go to www.copc.com or contact:
info@copc.com
+1 512-225-0544
© 1996-2012 COPC Inc. All rights reserved.
Confidential and proprietary information of COPC Inc.