This playbook is an in-depth guide of how to manage peaks in Dialpad WFM.
Without proper preparation, peak time can be very hard on a contact centre. Dialpad WFM offers a variety of tools designed to help you better forecast, schedule and prepare your team to handle these busy periods.
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Contents:
Stage 1: Preparing your forecast
In a contact centre, everything starts with a forecast.
Forecasts are at the heart of workforce management, and their role becomes even more important during peak times, like Black Friday, as your inflow patterns and contact volumes change.
Step 1: Look at your historical data
Look at your actual contact volumes from a relevant period in the past, e.g. the dates Black Friday fell on last year, or the last time you had a big sale.
As a whole and at a per queue level, how much did your volumes increase compared to the previous week or month?
Take note of the % increase or decrease; you can do this by comparing the total contacts received in the selected relevant period vs the previous month.
Here’s a worked example:
In 2023, Black Friday weekend fell on Fri 24 Nov. In the forecast page, I select Mon 20 Nov - Sun 3 Dec 23, so I can catch the build up and tail end of the peak. I then select ‘compare to same period’ so I can view our actual contacts.
In this period, we received 1000 contacts. 300 calls, 500 chats and 200 emails.
I then move to the previous period, Mon 30 Oct - Sun 19 Nov 23, so I can get an idea of our ‘business as usual’ volume.
In this period, we received 700 contacts. 250 calls, 250 chats and 200 emails.
I can see that we had a 30% overall increase in contact volumes and that chat volume increased by 100%, calls increased by 20% and emails stayed the same.
Now I have a general idea of how volumes may change across our channels.
Step 2: Understand other external factors
Next, if you haven’t already, it’s a good time to liaise with the marketing and finance department to understand any additional factors that could alter your contact volumes.
Is the marketing budget much higher than last year? Is our promotion higher or across more items than last year? What is the projected success for this peak compared to last year?
Using our worked example…
In 2023, we had a limited budget and only advertised our Black Friday sale to current customers via our email.
For 2024, we’re planning a large marketing campaign across social media, aimed at attracting new customers. Finance expect a 25% increase in sales over last year. We assume that this means we’ll receive 25% more contacts.
Now, I can add this additional layer on to our historical data.
Step 3: Work out your composite growth rate
To work out the adjustment needed, you need to combine the historical growth pattern and our expected sales increase. This would give you a composite growth rate for each channel.
Using our worked example…
I now know how much our volumes changed last year (30% overall increase in contact volumes and that chat volume increased by 100%, calls increased by 20% and emails stayed the same) and, that we’re expecting sales to increase by 25% this year too.
Chat
Historical increase: +100%
Sales increase: +25%
The combined effect for 2024 would be: 1.25 x (1 + 100%) = 2.5 x 2023 chat volume
2024 forecast = 150% increase over the regular period (before Black Friday).
Calls
Historical increase: +20%
Sales increase: +25%
The combined effect for calls would be: 1.25 x (1 + 20%) = 1.5 x 2023 call volume
2024 forecast = 50% increase over the regular period.
Emails
Historical increase: 0% (no change)
Sales increase: +25%
The combined effect for emails would be: 1.25 x 1 = 1.25 x 2023 email volume
2024 forecast = 25% increase over the regular period.
Step 4: Apply a forecast adjustment
Now, you need to use this data to adjust your forecast to represent this change.
You can choose to apply an overall adjustment to the whole period, or apply specific adjustments per day, depending on your situation.
Some teams choose to apply 1 adjustment to cover the main peak period, e.g. Black Friday - Cyber Monday, and then apply an additional, lower adjustment for the ‘tail end’ or post-peak period to represent any other changes. For example, you may find that you get an additional peak a week after Black Friday as customers orders start to arrive, or don’t arrive on time.
Using our worked example…
I go to the Forecast page and add a new adjustment. I select the Black Friday weekend and apply the composite growth rate I worked out before to each queue:
Chat: Increase by 150%
Calls: Increase by 50%
Emails: Increase by 25%
I now have my forecast prepared for Black Friday 2024!
Step 5: Review agent productivity
Now we have a forecast that best represents our expected contact volumes, we need to ensure the staffing side is accurate.
Using performance data, you can refine the inputs in your queues to represent how your team actually work:
Average Conversation Time (ACT): update your queues to use the latest ACT from your performance page. We recommend using the last 30 days for the most accurate number. Learn more
Shrinkage: Review the average time-on-task for each activity and use the inverse for your shrinkage, e.g. if time-on-task is usually 90% then, shrinkage should be 10%.
Concurrency: If you use auto-routing with a concurrency limit, e.g. never assign more than 4 conversations to one agent at once, then make sure your queue accounts for that.
SLAs: Revisit the SLA you’re going to aim for during peak time. Some teams choose to lower their threshold for first responses, or increase the first response time, to allow them to better cope with higher contact volumes.
You can use our scenario planning tool to understand the impact that changing SLAs can have on your staffing requirements.
Stage 2: Capacity planning
Now we have a refined forecast and staffing requirement, we can ensure we have enough staff available to match supply and demand. In Dialpad WFM, if you update your forecast, this is also reflected in the coverage bars in the shift and activity schedules.
Step 1: Proactively manage time off
If you’re planning far enough in advance, getting a hold of your time off shrinkage can help planning further down the line.
In Dialpad WFM you can publish any period of the schedule, allowing you to publish peak periods way ahead of time, allowing you to collect time off requests as early as possible. Some teams choose to implement ‘black out’ periods, where they reduce the number of agents who can be on vacation at any given time, or ban time off all together.
You can use the Insights page to monitor your planned capacity, time off and non-service shrinkage at any time. Or, use the ‘shift tally’ tool in the shift schedule to count time off bookings per day.
Step 2: Review your shift plans or schedules
Apply your usual shift plan to the schedule and review your actual staffing vs required staffing using the coverage bar.
If you find that you’re understaffed at certain periods you may be able to make adjustments:
Are you able to move some shifts? Try moving some shifts from quieter days to your peak days, e.g. move shifts from Thursday to Friday.
Are you able to change hours? Try reducing shift hours to increase online time on peak days, e.g. reduce shifts by 1 or 2hrs earlier in the week, and schedule longer shifts on peak day (we strongly recommend adding additional breaks in these cases)
Are you able to offer overtime? Ask agents to submit their working availability in Dialpad WFM so you can assign them overtime shifts.
Are you able to bring in temporary, freelance or BPO staff? Use our auto-schedule shifts tool to easily schedule the perfect shift providing the best coverage while staying compliant.
Step 3: Reprioritise your activity plans
It’s likely that demand may be higher than your team’s capacity during peak times. As a result, its best to revaluate your priorities to ensure you’re getting the most out of your team when it matters most.
We recommend that you duplicate your team’s standard activity plan to give you a starting point, without overwriting your set-up.
Prioritise busy channels
Move all of your top priority activity rules to the top of the list (by right clicking on the rule and selecting ‘move up). This ensures these tasks will be scheduled first, optimising the amount of coverage you will receive. Learn how to edit priorities.
Deprioritising non-service work
In your activity plan, you may want to deprioritise non-service activities (by moving them further down the list) to ensure you have the most staff possible on your live channels. If you can afford to, moving admin or training tasks to before or after the peak can help out a lot. Learn how to edit priorities.
Reducing the amount of meetings agents are engaged in will also help, although stand-ups and check-ins can be good for support and morale.
Caring for your team
You should also consider the impact that peaks can have on your agents. As volumes increase, agents may become burnt out faster, which could lead to low morale or increased sickness. Adding additional short breaks or reducing session length on busy channels can help to protect the wellness of your team.
Assign top performers
Another option is to change the assignment of your activity rules to put agents on their strongest channels. When reviewing performance data, you may notice that some agent excel at phones, while others are better at written communication.
To prioritise your ‘a-team’, add a filter to your activity rules to only schedule your top performers on their strongest channels.
Stage 3: Team preparation
As well as preparing your forecast and schedules, it’s important to prepare your team. One of the most effective ways to improve productivity is through better training and resources.
Identify weak points using performance data
Look at performance per activity for teams or individual agents. If some agents are lower than average on specific activities, then they should be a good candidate for training. Either create your own tailored training plans, or ask more experienced agents to share their learnings or workflows too.
Learn more about performance
You can schedule training in your calendars, and sync it into Dialpad WFM via the GCal integration, or by using block@teamsurfboard.com. If you want to plan a more comprehensive round of training, you can also use an activity rule to do that, e.g. 3hrs of training in 1hr sessions, spread out over the week.
Reduce the systems agents need to do their job
On average, agents use 8 different tabs or tools to do their job. Flipping between tools is inefficient and can become overwhelming. Take advantage of Dialpad WFM's integrations to bring your agent’s schedules to the tools they already use.
Integrate Dialpad WFM with their Google Calendar, to automatically sync their schedules and calendar events. How to integrate with GCal
Install the Dialpad WFM for Slack App, to send agents updates whenever their schedule changes and reminders of when to switch tasks or take a well earned break. How to set-up Slack
Consider implementing clocking in and out
During peak times, agent attendance can have a big impact on queues and live channels. You may want to consider implementing clocking in and out in order to not only track agent’s start times, but also to account for any unplanned overtime agents may incur.
Learn more about time reporting
Stage 4: Real-time management
You can plan as best as possible, but the reality is that humans are unpredictable, and anything can happen on the day. This is where real-time management comes in.
The real-time management dashboard is your central hub for managing on-the-day operations. Not only can you view how your resources are spread across each activity but you can also view live agent behaviour.
Adapt to sickness
If multiple agents call in sick, often the best course of action is to reapply your activity plan. This allows you to re-optimise your schedule based on your actual capacity.
When applied to the current day, the system will not overwrite any ‘in-flight’ activities to prevent disruption to the team. Once published, agents will be notified of their updated schedule via Slack or in their GCal.
Check whose in, out or late
Agent’s clock in times show clearly in the dashboard, giving you full visibility if an agent is running late or even a no-show. Dialpad WFM also shows the 1st tracked interaction of each agent from your linked systems, validating their presence.
Keep agents on-task
From the real-time dashboard, you can view the current time-on-task status of every agent, giving you full visibility of their behaviour.
If agent’s are inactive, or working on the wrong activity, you can send them a nudge via Slack to remind them of their scheduled activity. You’ll then be able to see their status change as they get back online. How to nudge agents in Slack
Overcome unexpected peaks
If you experience an unexpected peak, you can quickly and easily move agents over to the related activity using the find and replace tool.
From the real-time dashboard: Click ‘adjust staffing’ in the top-right corner From the schedule: click ‘tools’ > ‘find and replace’
Select the activities you want to move agents off of, e.g. Emails
Select the activity you want agent’s to move to, e.g. Phones
Enter how long agents should be moved for
Select the group of agents you want to move. Select all if you want to completely deprioritise an activity.
Click ‘replace’ - the relevant agent’s schedules will now be updated and published.
Stage 5: Daily reviews
If your peak will span multiple days, it’s best practice to continuously review and update your plans.
Review your agent’s productivity each day
Do you still have the best agent’s scheduled on each task? If not, update your activity plan
Has your Average Conversation Time or shrinkage increased? If so, update your queues settings
Review your forecast vs actuals each day
Are the expected volumes close to our actual volumes? If not, edit your forecast adjustment
Review your capacity each day (using the Insights page)
Do we have enough agents to cover our forecasted demand? If not, use the coverage heat map to identify room for improvement, or deprioritise more non-service tasks in your queues.
We hope this guide helps you to better prepare and cope with peak time. For more advise, speak to your Customer Success Manager.