Workforce schedulers have a very difficult job. First, there are many people in the center who have a stake in the process, and it’s often the scheduler’s job to juggle all these requests and priorities. It’s also difficult from a sheer numbers perspective, with so many different possibilities and combinations of schedule options to be assembled to maximize coverage while minimizing cost. This article will address some of the challenges of scheduling, including what call center stakeholder perspectives need to be considered, and then how to define the building blocks of scheduling to get the right combinations in place.

Scheduling Perspectives

Not only are there countless possibilities for scheduling options, but juggling these and deciding on the right combination is very challenging because of all the people involved who have a stake in the process. The scheduling process is a difficult one because there are so many different people to keep happy. Let’s explore some of the various perspectives to keep in mind when creating schedules.

Customers. What customers want out of the scheduling process is good service. They want plenty of staff in place so that when they call, there is little to no wait time. They also want sufficient people with the right skill to handle their call so that the call gets resolved in the first contact with no transfers or second contact needed. They also like to call at all times of day, so scheduling may be necessary outside the standard workday in case they decide to call during the night or on weekends.

Senior Executives. The executive team is certainly looking out for customers too, wanting a good level of service and happy customers. However, this group is also very concerned about budget and the bottom line costs. From their perspective, it’s important to make scheduling as efficient as possible in order to maximize utilization of the very expensive personnel resource.

Frontline Staff. Contact center agents have personal needs that will need to be addressed during the scheduling process. Many will want to work the same schedule each week with same start times each day in order to make transportation and childcare arrangements. Most want a schedule that accommodates their personal needs for a work/life balance, and many would also like to have the same break times and lunches as their friends. They will also be concerned about how much work comes their way throughout their shifts. While they don’t want to sit idle, it will be a problem if occupancy is too high and there are too many calls to handle during some periods of the day.

Supervisors/Team Leaders. This group has a stake in the process and they usually want their team members’ schedules to mirror their own so there is overlap. Ideally, they would like team schedules with group start times that allow team meetings. And they would also like plenty of time built into the schedules to allow for off-phone time for coaching and training – some scheduled and some impromptu time off the phones.

HR Department. While not doing the work each day, the HR Department certainly has some wishes about the scheduling process too. It’s much easier for them to recruit new employees if they can guarantee a specific schedule, rather than one that is likely to change week to week or month to month. The HR Department will also be a fan of more standard schedules where no potential labor disputes are likely to happen. Happier staff mean fewer headaches and less work for this group.

Union. If your frontline staff are unionized, there will be a whole additional list of demands and rules to consider in the scheduling process. Collective work agreements generally define the scheduling rules such as time off between shifts/tours and rotation of weekends. Compliance with these rules is required to avoid unhappy associates and grievances.

Regulators: For some centers, particularly in the utility environment, there are laws and regulations about speed of answer, percent of calls answered in the same state as originated, limited busy signals, and rates of abandonment. There may be significant penalties for failure to comply with these rules.

Workforce Schedulers: The workforce team also has a stake in the process. The more often schedule bids are done, the more work for this group. The more rules and constraints, the harder it is to manipulate schedules to accommodate all the above perspectives. It’s a tough job!

Creating an optimal set of workforce schedules is difficult given the many different perspectives that need to be considered. Many of these stakeholder perspectives are often in conflict. For example, it may be difficult to balance senior management’s desire for high resource utilization with frontline staff’s need for lower occupancy and a more reasonable workload throughout the day. No matter what the conflict of these goals and perspectives, it is the job of the workforce scheduler to consider all these perspectives in the scheduling process.

Scheduling Philosophy

The biggest decision to make is which scheduling philosophy to follow. For many centers, customer needs come first and schedules are created with speed of service goals as the primary drivers. For other centers, the focus is on employee satisfaction and retention, so schedule preferences are honored as much as possible and workload distributed with fairness to the staff in mind. Union agreements may be a major factor in these centers. For other centers, cost is the major driver. Schedules are created to cover call workload, but in the most efficient way possible, not giving as much thought to employee needs and wants. Minimization of financial penalties from regulators may figure in to this thinking as well.

Scheduling must consider all of these perspectives. However, it can be highly beneficial to have a discussion with senior management and come to agreement about the priorities within these conflicting expectations. For example, in a choice between meeting staff expectations for schedule options and delivering a consistent speed of answer, which is more important to the company overall? Finding the balance between agent satisfaction (and turnover), customer satisfaction (and retention), and cost (budget constraints) is very difficult, especially when the priorities tend to shift over time.

Scheduling Decisions

After the stakeholder requirements have been prioritized and an overall scheduling philosophy in place, it’s important to answer these guiding questions:

1. What is the coverage objective?
2. What are the absolute rules and constraints?
3. What is the schedule horizon?

Coverage Objective

One of the critical decisions that must be made in creating workforce schedules is whether or not enough schedules will be defined to cover the work demand of every single half-hour of the day, or whether some half-hours will have to be understaffed. For example, in a shrinkage example with the peak load in the half-hour needing 23 base staff and 34 staff available for scheduling, how many would really be put in place?

If the call center chooses to have schedules that cover this peak half-hour, then the periods immediately prior to and after the peak will probably be overscheduled by several people since it is difficult to have people available to work just one half-hour.

Scheduling so that every single half-hour of the day is covered is called full coverage. But implementing schedules that meet peak demands will most likely result in periods (particularly immediately before and after) that will be overstaffed as a result. The downside of this approach is obvious – the call center will spend needless dollars for overstaffing and end up paying for staff when they’re not needed to handle calls.

On the other hand, there are some benefits to the full coverage approach. Scheduling to meet peaks ensures service goals will be met or exceeded every half-hour. This approach provides some room for error if the forecast is off slightly, and can provide some availability windows for staff to accomplish other work, such as paperwork or administrative tasks that may have backed up over the day.

A balance of overstaffing and understaffing is perhaps a more realistic approach and scheduling so that every half-hour is within a certain percentage of variation. In this case, the schedules tend to staff to the average requirement, not the peak. However, this can deliver inconsistent service to callers. The primary benefit is that it minimizes the labor cost.

When an outsourcing partner handles part of the load, the balanced staffing approach for the in-house staff may also be the most effective design. This sends the peak load during busy hours to the outsource partner. In addition, the partner may be the only staff during some low volume periods such as overnight so that the in-house staff does not have to cover these unattractive shifts. However, some partner arrangements send a guaranteed load of calls to the partner, leaving the peaks and valleys to be handled by in-house associates. It is important to know what the current agreement requires when scheduling in these environments.