Contact Center Management
Short-Term Forecasting & Scheduling
Do You Have a Short-Term Game Plan?
JUST RELEASED!
Part II of The Northridge Group’s State of CX 2023 report reveals 93% of business leaders believe their companies make it easy for customers to resolve issues. Only 66% of customers agree.
Ensuring scheduling efficiencies while carefully considering the needs of associates is a difficult balancing act even for a sophisticated Workforce Management team.
When executed correctly, effective workforce staffing practices can have a long-term impact on a company’s competitiveness and sustainability.
Flexibility in staffing is crucial to ensure the right number of associates are available to handle customer contacts every half hour of the day, but it is also important to offer associates a consistent schedule. It’s essential to meet associate needs but not be too tight on the number of people scheduled.
Our Approach
The Northridge Group can help you ensure the right people are in the right place at the right time.
Every Contact Center needs a short-term game plan to operate efficiently. Short-term forecasting and scheduling should focus on daily and half-hourly staffing requirements to ensure the right number of associates are scheduled on any given day and hour to handle incoming contact volumes. It’s essential to plan for absenteeism, meeting and training requirements, offline time, and coaching sessions.
We can help you develop a monthly forecasting cadence that allows you to identify trends quickly and consistently and proactively adjust your hiring and scheduling plans to reflect current insights while developing an operational game plan to minimize risks. Short-term forecasting is essential for ensuring that the right people are in the right place at the right time. Creative scheduling can help balance customer needs with those of employees while improving employee engagement.
Our Solutions
The Northridge Group offers a broad spectrum of solutions that help Contact Centers optimize their forecasting and scheduling. Our services include:
Assessments
Creative scheduling ideas to improve employee engagement
Attainment of service level targets
Balancing efficiency with employee development goals
Design and implementation support for short-term forecasting and scheduling disciplines – including half-hourly optimization and improved accuracy
Northridge Success
Northridge Helps Large Credit Union Mitigate Risks and Reduce Costs with Data-Driven Workforce Management Models
Northridge was engaged by one of the nation’s largest credit unions to assess their current state customer service staffing and growth strategies to enable them to base future planning decisions on industry best practices. Northridge recommendations leveraged data-driven workforce management planning to mitigate performance risks and reduce the costs associated with contact center understaffing.
Northridge Perspectives
The Importance of Quality Monitoring for Government Agency Contact Centers
Quality Monitoring is an essential tool used by many businesses to improve customer experience in their contact centers. Quality Monitoring programs leverage call listening, screen monitoring, and advanced data analytics to identify issues faced by individual associates as well as overall operational issues. When Quality Monitoring processes identify specific behavioral issues in individual associates, the behaviors can usually be quickly corrected with monitoring, agent and call level reporting, insights, recommendations, training programs, and/or customized coaching.
The Crucial Connection Between CX Tech & Training
Customer Experience (CX) technology is evolving rapidly, leaving many businesses struggling to keep pace. Companies that focus on people, process, and technology have not only adapted but thrived.
Understanding the connection between technology and training is important for a successful contact center. This includes AI, cloud, and other technologies. It also involves investing in training, change management, and clear processes to support the technology.
Proper Contact Center Training Benefits Employee Experience
In the post-pandemic world, contact center leaders are prioritizing three interconnected objectives: employee productivity, retention, and satisfaction. By cultivating a positive working environment, leaders can optimize the employee experience to mitigate absenteeism...
Additional Contact Center Management Services
Let’s Talk About Your Organization
It takes strong analytical expertise and some creativity to develop schedules and coverage that meet the needs of the business, customers and associates. Northridge can help!
