What is an Activity Plan?
An activity plan is a a group of rules that tells the system how your team's time should be scheduled.
Like shift plans, activity plans allow you to schedule your team in different ways throughout the year, for example, to prioritise queues in peak times, or schedule additional training and admin at quieter times of year.
Rules can be created to schedule breaks, to provide the required coverage for queues as as training and offline work, too. Once applied to the schedule, the system will use these rules to dynamically generate schedules for the available capacity of the team adapting to time off and calendar events.
We recommend creating one activity plan per team to provide the flexibility to adapt to the priorities and preferences of each team.
Step 1: Create a new Activity Plan
Open the app and navigate to the Schedule > Day
If the toolbar is not already open, click Toolbar in the top left corner of the schedule to open it. Click the Plans tab.
Click New activity plan
Once inside of the plan, the schedule will change to preview mode. We explain this in more detail in Step 2.
Enter a name. We recommend combining the name of the team or agents you're scheduling, and the period this plan will be used for (e.g. Tier 1 Q1 2024, or US team Black Friday)
Select the agents this activity plan is for. We recommend creating one activity plan per team, to make them easier to maintain.
Step 2: Using preview mode
When you are creating or editing an Activity Plan, the schedule will change to preview mode. This mode is kind of like a 'sandbox' environment, where you can preview how the rules you create will look in the schedule once applied.
Activity plans are dynamic and adapt to the available capacity and coverage required for each day. So if the forecast changes or shifts, time off or meetings change, the final result will look a little different.
The schedule preview will update whenever you add or change a rule. You cannot manually edit anything in the schedule while in preview mode. Read more about preview mode.
Step 3: Create break rules
What is a break rule?
A break rule determines how breaks should be schedule for different agents and shifts. A break rule consists of a length (e.g. 30 mins), a time window (e.g. 12pm - 2pm) and a set of constraints (e.g. agents on the early or mid shift).
How to create a break rule
If your team don't formally plan breaks, then skip to step 4.
Click Add break rule
Select the break you want to schedule from the dropdown, or click the + button to create a new type of break, e.g. Coffee break, Lunch break
If you are creating lots of break rules, you may find it helpful to label the break to identify it to yourself, e.g. German Lunch, UK lunch. To do this, check the box labelled set custom rule name.
Next, choose how long the break should be scheduled for. You can create a break of any length.
Choose when this break should be scheduled. You can choose between two options:
Time of day:
Select the days, time window and timezone to schedule the break. You can add additional windows if breaks happen at different times on different days, e.g. 12 - 2pm on weekdays and 12 - 1pm on weekends.
Time from start or end of shift
Specify how long from the start or end of agents shift the break should be scheduled. This option allows you to create one rule which applies to all agents despite different timezones or shift times.
Next, you can choose to stagger the start times of each agent's break. This is helpful to avoid all agents going offline at once to retain coverage. If you do not want to stagger breaks, set this to 0.
Finally, add filters to define who this break should be scheduled for. If no filters are applied, this rule will apply to all agents within the plan. You can filter with:
Agent (e.g. Ben and Sally)
Agent skill (e.g. Chat, Phones)
Scheduled activities (e.g. agents who are scheduled on Phones)
Shift (e.g. Early shift)
Shift length (e.g. shifts between 6 and 9 hours long)
When you're happy, click Save
You can repeat this process as many times as you need to cover all your team's breaks. We recommend using the shift length filter to provide the most flexibility.
Step 4: Creating activity rules
What is an activity rule?
Similar to break rules, activity rules determine how different activities should be scheduled for the team.
There are four different activity scheduling options available to use for different use cases:
Follow forecast - Schedule activity according to forecasted demand.
Fixed staffing - Manually specify the number of agents you need at certain times.
Allocate time - Specify the amount of time that should be spent on the activity.
Fill unscheduled time - Fill all unscheduled time in an agent's shift.
It is common to use multiple rule types to cover all the type of work agents do day to day, from queue time to training and admin.
Option 1: Follow forecast
When scheduling live queues you need ensure you have the right level of coverage to serve your customers and meet your SLAs. The best way to do this is to schedule activities according to the forecasted demand.
The Follow forecast option will adjust the level of staffing to match the forecasted requirement for each interval of every day.
View step-by-step guide
View step-by-step guide
Click 'add activity rule' from the toolbar on the left of your screen. You'll now be taken to the activity rule form.
Select the activity you want to schedule from the dropdown, or click the + button to create a new type of activity, e.g. Tier 1 Phones, Live Chat
When asked "How would you like to schedule it?", Select Follow forecast from the dropdown.
Once selected you will be shown the queues linked to this activity. If no queues are linked, select the relevant queue from the dropdown and click save.
Next, set the minimum coverage required for this activity.
The system will try to meet all minimum requirement for all activities in the first instance and then assign any remaining capacity until the total forecasted requirement has been met.
Be careful setting your minimum coverage too high as this could result in other activities not being scheduled.
Now, you can choose to set a session length to control how long agents will be scheduled on the activity in one go before moving onto another task.
This is helpful to prevent fatigue on high-intensity live channels.
You should consider how your agent's work best and tailor this to their needs.
Finally, add filters to define who this activity should be scheduled for. If no filters are applied, this rule will apply to all agents within the plan. You can filter with:
Agent (e.g. Ben and Sally)
Agent skill (e.g. Chat, Phones)
Scheduled activities (e.g. agents who are scheduled on Phones)
Shift (e.g. Early shift)
Shift length (e.g. shifts between 6 and 9 hours long)
When you're happy, click Save
Option 2: Fixed staffing
You may required specific staffing levels for activities that aren't linked directly to queues. For example if you needed 2 agents to check the status of today's deliveries at certain times of day.
The fixed staffing option allows you to manually specify the number of agents you need at certain times.
View step-by-step guide
View step-by-step guide
Click 'add activity rule' from the toolbar on the left of your screen. You'll now be taken to the activity rule form.
Select the activity you want to schedule from the dropdown, or click the + button to create a new type of activity, e.g. Delivery checks
When asked "How would you like to schedule it?", Select Fixed staffing from the dropdown.
Next, create windows to define the coverage you need and when. You can set coverage as granular or as broad as you need to, from every hour to all day long. You can add additional windows if your need different coverage on different days.
Now, you can choose to set a session length to control how long agents will be scheduled on the activity in one go before moving onto another task.
You should consider how your agent's work best and tailor this to their needs.
Finally, add filters to define who this activity should be scheduled for. If no filters are applied, this rule will apply to all agents within the plan. You can filter with:
Agent (e.g. Ben and Sally)
Agent skill (e.g. Chat, Phones)
Scheduled activities (e.g. agents who are scheduled on Phones)
Shift (e.g. Early shift)
Shift length (e.g. shifts between 6 and 9 hours long)
When you're happy, click Save
Option 3: Allocate time
Many activities have a specific time budget or allocation that's needed each day or week. For example:
20 hours working down the backlog each week
4 hours of admin each day
1 hour of training each week
The allocate time option allows you to set the time required per activity. You can choose to share this requirement across the team, or set it as an individual target.
View step-by-step guide
View step-by-step guide
Click 'add activity rule' from the toolbar on the left of your screen. You'll now be taken to the activity rule form.
Select the activity you want to schedule from the dropdown, or click the + button to create a new type of activity, e.g. Admin, Training
When asked "How would you like to schedule it?", Select Allocate time from the dropdown.
Next, set the time required. You can choose to set this allocation per agent, or to share the time across the team.
Now, you can choose to set a session length to control how long agents will be scheduled on the activity in one go before moving onto another task.
You should consider how much time agent's need to do this task.
You can choose to add schedule windows to define when this activity should be scheduled. If no window is applied, then the activity will be scheduled whenever time is available. The available options are:
at: allows you to choose a specific start time
at end of shift: the activity will be scheduled as the last activity in their shift
at start of shift: the activity will be scheduled as the first activity in their shift
between: allows you to set a window of time
Finally, add filters to define who this activity should be scheduled for. If no filters are applied, this rule will apply to all agents within the plan. You can filter with:
Agent (e.g. Ben and Sally)
Agent skill (e.g. Chat, Phones)
Scheduled activities (e.g. agents who are scheduled on Phones)
Shift (e.g. Early shift)
Shift length (e.g. shifts between 6 and 9 hours long)
When you're happy, click Save
Option 4: Fill unscheduled time
Often, teams may require that agents only work on one task all day, or they may have a default or 'fallback' activity that agents should work on if nothing else is required.
The fill unscheduled time option will fill all unscheduled time in an agent's shift.
View step-by-step guide
View step-by-step guide
Click 'add activity rule' from the toolbar on the left of your screen. You'll now be taken to the activity rule form.
Select the activity you want to schedule from the dropdown, or click the + button to create a new type of activity, e.g. On-call or backlog
When asked "How would you like to schedule it?", Select fill unscheduled time from the dropdown.
Next, choose if this should apply to all agents, or a specific number.
Finally, add filters to define who this activity should be scheduled for. If no filters are applied, this rule will apply to all agents within the plan. You can filter with:
Agent (e.g. Ben and Sally)
Agent skill (e.g. Chat, Phones)
Scheduled activities (e.g. agents who are scheduled on Phones)
Shift (e.g. Early shift)
Shift length (e.g. shifts between 6 and 9 hours long)
When you're happy, click Save
Not sure what scheduling method is best for you?
Read our guide on common scheduling use cases
Step 5: Prioritising activities
You’ve made your activities so now it’s time to add the finishing touches ✨
Rules are scheduled in priority order. The top of the list is the highest priority and the bottom of the list is the lowest priority.
Higher priority rules are most likely to met completely, whereas the requirements of lower priority activities may not be met if there is not enough capacity.
To change the priority of a rule, hover over it and click on the three-dot button (...). Select 'move up' or 'move down' to change the priority of the rule.
Notice how the schedule preview changes?
Order your activities in priority order to make sure your most important tasks always get done. We recommend putting live channels and time-sensitive activities at the top. If you want a fallback or ‘filler’ activity, you can put that at the bottom of the list to fill any free time.
Final step: Add your plan to the schedule
You’ve made your plan, now it’s time to generate a schedule.
When you add the plan to the schedule, you will leave preview mode and a draft activity schedule will be generated according to the rules you created.
When you’re happy with your activity plan you can add it to the schedule by clicking the 'add to schedule' button in the top right of your screen.
What happens when a plan is applied
Any existing schedules for for agents in this plan will be replaced by the breaks and activities from this plan (this includes any manual edits you may have made).
Activities will be added to the schedule in draft.
Activities will be fairly distributed across your team according to your rules.
Activities and breaks will be scheduled around any synced calendar events. (read more about synced events here)
The coverage bar for this activity plan will show at the top of the schedule. (read more about the coverage bar here).
Once a plan is applied you can then make ad-hoc tweaks and edits to schedules without disrupting the original plan. Read our guide to learn how to make edits in the schedule
💡 You need to publish the schedule to share your scheduled activities with your team. Even if you already published the shifts.
FAQs
Will the schedule automatically update when I update an activity plan?
No, to update the schedule you need to reapply the activity plan.
Will the schedule automatically update if the forecast changes?
No, if the activity plan will follow the forecast as it existed when you applied the plan. It's unlikely that your forecast would change drastically in the short-term, unless you apply a forecast adjustment.
If you do apply a forecast adjustment, then you'll need to reapply your activity plan for this period to adapt to the new requirement.
I've applied my activity plan and there's a mistake, what do I do?
If there is an issue with the activity plan, or you made a mistake, you can simply update your activity plan and reapply it to the schedule. Any previous schedules will be overwritten.
Can I edit shifts from the schedule?
You can also manually edit the schedule at any time by clicking on shifts or by clicking into empty space. This will not affect or update the Shift Plan though.
Can I edit activities or breaks from the schedule?
You can also manually edit the schedule at any time by clicking on activities or by clicking into empty space. This will not affect or update the original activity plan though.
How do I account for meetings?
When the activity plan is added to the schedule, it will apply breaks and activities around any existing synced calendar events.
If new meetings are added after this point, they will overwrite any previously scheduled activities or breaks
If meetings are cancelled or moved, you may end up with gaps in the schedule. You can make a manual edit to fill these.
What happens if someone calls in sick or goes on vacation?
If an agent books vacation or calls in sick, their schedule will be removed. Activities will not be automatically reassigned to other agents to cover this drop in coverage.
You can keep track of coverage using the coverage bar at the top of the schedule.