Workforce Management Featured Article
Will Workforce Management Finally Go Mobile This Year?
These days, many – if not most – enterprise solutions have added mobile elements to accommodate employees logging in remotely or using mobile devices either in the office or on the road. It makes sense: in an era of “bring your own device,” it’s critical that employees have anytime and anywhere access to solutions and that information can be updated regularly and knowledge, shared in real time. Otherwise, efforts are duplicated, knowledge is lost and companies are making decisions based on incorrect or old information.
The mobile element has been a little slower to come to the contact center. While contact centers are becoming used to operating virtually, technology innovators have concentrated on making call center applications available on a hosted basis or through the cloud. Less emphasis has been placed on creating mobile versions of solutions. One of the most significant stragglers has been workforce management solutions, or workforce optimization. While vendors have been offering mobile features with the solutions, the uptake among contact centers has been slow.
According to a recent blog post by Axsium’s Bob Clements, there are two primary reasons for this.
“First, many employers are nervous about giving their hourly employees access to WFM via their personal mobile phones,” said Clements. “”They worry that time spent looking at their schedules or requesting time off during off-hours will be considered work and that employees will need paid for this time.”
Companies already looking to trim costs envision adding an extra half-hour, potentially of overtime, to all employees’ time cards, particularly if the solution is “buggy” and needs to be regularly tweaked in consultation with the IT department. But a broader problem is a lack of available equipment and poor integration.
“Second, company-provided tablets and mobile phones have not been widely available on the sales floor, shop floor or hospital unit, limiting their use as a productivity device,” notes Clements. “Moreover, where they are available, companies are often not on a version of the WFM software that supports mobile capabilities. This year that will change.”
It will have to. Without a mobile feature, workforce optimization solutions are continuing to tie managers and supervisors to desks, unable to monitor schedules and forecasts remotely. Outside sales teams that travel cannot be effectively included as part of the broader workforce and employees will continue to pressure their employers to allow them to access schedules and vacation requests from their mobile devices.
Edited by Stefania Viscusi