NICE
CONTENTS
Executive Summary...3
Survey Methodology...4
Participants...4
Study Findings...5
1. Balancing operational efficiency
and employee engagement... 5
i. Scheduling for success
ii. Allowing for the unexpected
...7
...7
2. Trends and innovations...8
i. Mobile...8
ii. Cloud ...9
Conclusion...10
INTRODUCTION
Welcome to the NICE Systems Workforce Management benchmark report! As workforce management professionals, our success depends on knowing our
environment. Of course, it’s easy to become overly focused on our own day-to-day, so it’s important to grab opportunities to rise above the noise and see what’s happening around us. Our intention is that this report is one such opportunity—to highlight the issues
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The workforce management (WFM) market has been around for decades and there’s an assumption that it’s highly mature, even static. Of course for WFM professionals looking at it from the inside out, there is constant change and innovation—new capabilities and creative solutions applied to better help the
business meet its objectives. This study represents a snapshot of what your peers are doing to a) address their key challenges, and b) pursue growth and innovation. Correspondingly, we’ve organized our findings into two high-level themes.
1. Balancing operational efficiency and employee engagement Lowering costs while increasing customer satisfaction. This is the primary tension with which your peers are grappling—a service operation oxymoron. Lowering costs and improving customer satisfaction are supposed to be at odds. And yet, some organizations are finding new and different ways to move both needles at the same time.
How? The one prerequisite to lowering costs and improving
HOW DOES YOUR
WORKFORCE MANAGEMENT
What are your peers doing right? They are finding more ways to engage their employees in scheduling. 56% are using schedule bidding, another 37% are using preference-based scheduling, and 17% plan on giving their employees access to a rules-driven, “design my own schedule”, solution in the next 12 to 24 months. Ready for a fresh mantra for a new era of WFM Professionals? Engage employees to lower costs AND increase customer satisfaction AT THE SAME TIME.
2. Trends and innovation
WFM professionals are clearly hungry for new ideas and innovations, but our eyes are bigger than our
stomachs. Case in point is cloud. Many respondents cited cloud as the most compelling innovation in WFM, but only 14% of respondents have plans to migrate their on-premise solution to the cloud over the next 24 months. The dichotomy was similar for mobile. There was clear appetite for more mobile access and applications, but 89% of responding companies have fewer than 1 in 5 remote workers. In one breath we want to be
mobile-enabled, and in the next ‘open’ comment field we ask ‘Why would anyone need to access their schedule outside of the workplace?’
When there’s this kind of fuzziness, there’s also an opportunity to strike out and lead. The most forward-leaning organizations will be among the first to leap to the cloud and to enable a mobile workforce. This is where your operation can eat the competition’s lunch and (to connect the dots) better attract and retain engaged employees.
SURVEY METHODOLOGY
The goal of our Benchmark Study was to understand pain points, trends, and best practices in workforce management. We sent a survey invitation to individuals with “Workforce Management” in their title/area of responsibility. This included a mix of NICE customers and non-customers.
Our email invitations were sent on 2/14/2014 and the survey closed on 2/28/14. Individuals who completed the survey were offered advanced access to the report.
PARTICIPANTS
Participants from over 250 companies submitted responses, representing a wide range of
organizations; 67% of respondents were from Customer Service, while Technical Support and Sales comprised smaller segments. Company sizes spanned a spectrum from less than 500 (27%) to more than 5,000 (also 27%).
PARTICIPANTS’ OPERATION SIZE
21% 16% 15% 27% Less than 100 100-499 500-999 1,000-1,999 2,000-4,999 5,000 or more
Most participants had an on-premise WFM solution and came from organizations where a majority of employees worked on site.
TYPE OF WFM DEPLOYMENT
On-premise SaaS Hosted Other 68%
1%
PERCENTAGE OF REMOTE EMPLOYEES
80% 60% 40% 20% 0% 17% 13% 0% 1-20% 21-50% 50% or more 60% 45% 30% 15% 0% 9% 2% 47% 42%STUDY FINDINGS
When we crafted this research study, we wanted to understand where the bar was set for WFM programs, and what actions professionals were taking to raise that bar. We can summarize our findings according to two central ideas.
1. Balancing operational efficiency and employee engagement
Our questions explored forecasting, scheduling, change management and other current practices. Then we pushed into desired innovations. Whether we were exploring the present or the future, there was one common theme across responses—employee engagement.
WFM professionals realize that employee engagement is a key driver to meeting company goals. 91% of
respondents described employee engagement as ‘somewhat important’ or ‘very important’ to meeting company objectives. However, just 58% of respondents acknowledged their organization had an initiative to address employee satisfaction. These results are even a little more optimistic than third-party research. Bain & Company asked leaders across functions about employee engagement; 90% stated it was a ‘top priority’, but only 25% admitted they had a formal plan to better engage employees.
IMPORTANCE OF EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT TO MEETING COMPANY OBJECTIVES
31%INITIATIVES CURRENTLY BEING PURSUED BY COMPANIES
34%
10%
75%
58%
71%
64%
2%
13%
Green
reduce energy footprintVendor
Consolidation
reduce vendor countCost
reduce operating costEmployee
Satisfaction
reduce turnoverImproved
Service
at same or lower costImproved
Quality
better insight into interactionOther
All Listed
PERCEIVED LEVEL OF EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT
Very
Engaged
1%
10%
15%
58%
16%
Not At All
Engaged
Disengaged
Somewhat
Neither Engaged
Nor Disengaged
Somewhat
Engaged
Why is engagement a growing area of focus? Organizations, like people, tend to take an “if it’s not broke, don’t fix it” approach to business. In their 2012 Employee Engagement Index, Gallup found that 70% of service workers are disengaged. Each of those workers costs the organization as much as 46% of their pay in lost productivity. Employees with low engagement are four times more likely to quit their job than their highly engaged peers. And 88% of engaged employees feel empowered to solve customer problems (vs. 17% of disengaged employees). Employee engagement is broken and organizations that want to BOTH reduce costs and improve customer experience have one prerequisite—engaged employees.
Now, in contrast to Gallup’s 70% disengaged number, just 11% of our respondents admitted their employees were largely disengaged. Depending on your interpretation, that can mean that WFM professionals are (a) fortunate—to have well above-average results, (b) optimistic—understating the issue, or (c) disconnected— from the reality of engagement levels in their organization.
Addressing and improving employee satisfaction doesn’t have to be a choice between retention and efficiency. The survey results surfaced a few tensions between existing practices and best practices that will help increase employee engagement without sacrificing operational efficiency.
FREQUENCY OF REVISING SCHEDULES AND BIDS
2% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% Once per month More thanonce per week
Once per week Once per quarter Once per year Never Other 17% 17% 21% 26% 9% 9%
i. Scheduling for success
When employees are assigned schedules and performance goals without active participation, they lack accountability. Our customers and our survey respondents agree—command-and-control
communication is by far the biggest source of employee unhappiness in a service organization.
As a resolution, 31% of organizations use bidding as their sole approach to scheduling. The risk is that schedules locked in by a bidding system often sacrifice some multi-skill or multi-channel optimization in order to obey employee bids. You may have happier employees (and higher retention), but the wrong employees
scheduled at the wrong times (unhappy customers and missed SLAs). About 20% of respondents are using a hybrid approach to scheduling,
one that factors in employee preferences and employee skills. Preference-based scheduling, where an employee selects a certain amount of available hours, puts the power back in the employee’s hands. Does an employee prefer graveyard shifts or Saturday mornings? Do they have a Wednesday night bowling league they simply won’t miss, in exchange for working Friday nights? With this system the employee creates a schedule that meets both personal and staffing needs.
ii. Allowing for the unexpected
The (in)frequency at which most organizations generate new schedules—66% revise schedules once a quarter or less—makes it necessary, regardless of scheduling methodology, to use a WFM solution that facilitates schedule trades and time-off management.
i. Mobile
Only a few years ago, many WFM professionals might have seen a mobile solution as an unnecessary and possibly dangerous addition to their system. In the past, we heard feedback regarding a number of concerns: How would time spent accessing a mobile app be logged? Why do employees need access to their schedule when they aren’t at work?
Now mobile is not only considered a “nice to have”, it’s quickly becoming a “must have”. Different systems provide mobile functionality in a number of ways. Whether it’s a smartphone app, or a browser-based solution that can be accessed via a mobile device, employees need to be able to access their schedules, request time off, and manage PTO without a call or an email. More than half (53%) of the organizations we surveyed had some type of work-at-home program or remote options for employees. Mobile access to manage schedules empowers employees and cuts costs for call centers.
IMPORTANCE OF SCHEDULING CAPABILITIES
5 4 3 2 1
MEAN
QUESTION
4.09 4.44 4.46 4.22 3.93 3.30 3.33 4.30 4.58 Schedule optimally across multiple sites?Optimize use of employees’ multiple skills?
Apply multiple scheduling
methodologies?Account for employeeperformance in schedulecreation?
Include employee performance
in schedule assignment?Automate approvals of schedulechange and time-off requests?
Facilitate ease of editing and adjusting schedules?
Analyze and report on
schedule accuracy?Provide employees with self-service tools
to manage their schedules?
2. Trends and innovations
In our research, we specifically asked which innovations had captured the hearts and minds of WFM
professionals. We wanted to know what was influencing their agendas, and what specifically would change their day-to-day routines. While there were some clever one-off ideas, two broad technology trends were set forth as defining the evolving WFM landscape.
Mobile also promotes collaboration between teams and keeps supervisors informed throughout the day. Accessing WFM via a mobile device gives professionals and supervisors transparency into operations—for example, 43% of respondents were monitoring adherence in (or near) real-time. Or, they can send out a quick
ii. Cloud
When asked about the most interesting innovation in WFM in the past 12 to 24 months, our participants most often cited Cloud technology. Yet, when asked about their timeframe to move to the cloud, we saw something different—just 1 in 4 respondents will have a WFM solution in the cloud two years from now. Everyone’s talking about it, but few call centers are
taking the leap. What’s the hold up?
The historical immaturity of cloud-based solutions is a possible cause. In the past, WFM providers with cloud-based solutions were generally smaller, niche providers. They didn’t support the full functionality and scalability of enterprise software. The trade off required between functionality and flexibility was a sacrifice that didn’t make sense for large organizations with complex business requirements.
Or perhaps organizations don’t understand the business case for cloud. Often the total 3-year investment for a cloud-based solution is a bigger number than on-premise. But it’s shifting cost—no more hardware, operating systems, maintenance, facilities, and more. In our experience, a move to the cloud can reduce total cost of WFM solution ownership by as much as 40%.
TIMEFRAME ORGANIZATIONS
WILL MOVE TO CLOUD
40% 11% 4% 4% 6% 75%
RESPONSES
Already use hosted / cloud-based WFM system Less than 6 months
13-24 months 6-12 months
No plans to move to a hosted / cloud solution
0% 80%
It’s time for organizations to re-evaluate their timeline for moving WFM to the cloud. Enterprise solutions are now cloud-ready (and plenty of customers have already blazed the trail). The business case for cloud is becoming more accepted across organizations. Benefits of cloud-based solutions positively impact not only the WFM program, but also IT and Finance. Organizations moving to the cloud see clear competitive
advantages, particularly in mitigated risk through guaranteed system uptime, and the shift of costs from capital to operating expenses. 5 4 3 2
MEAN
TOP BENEFITS OF MOVING TO THE CLOUD
Guaranteed system
3.86
4.00
3.71
4.31
Reduced time to Shift of costs from Ability to
3.86 4.00 3.71 4.31
CONCLUSION
Remember our new mantra? Engage employees to lower cost AND increase customer satisfaction AT THE SAME TIME.
Employee engagement is no longer a fluffy concept pushed by Human Resources. It’s a real competitive differentiator; a way to attract, develop and retain top talent. That requires companies to take better advantage of scheduling methodologies that empower employees to express preferences, trade shifts and define availability. WFM solutions that automate these processes and ensure requirements are still met helps supervisors and administrators spend less time sifting through their inboxes and more time responding to critical business issues. By embracing processes and solutions that empower employees, you’ll find that lowering costs and increasing customer satisfaction isn’t an oxymoron anymore. In fact, it’s the only way to beat the competition in a service-driven, customer-is-king economy.
For those of you with an eye on innovation, mobile and cloud are the two biggest technology trends making waves amongst your peers. As more organizations embrace remote employees, mobile access to time management and schedule change capabilities is a must. Mobile keeps employees connected to peers and priorities while promoting
collaboration between supervisors and their teams. And, while interest in cloud is emerging, you can adopt early and start reaping cost and flexibility advantages now. Get ahead of the pack by partnering with IT to define a mutually beneficial business case.
Faced with so many opportunities for change, the real question now is:
How does your WFM program stack up?
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