The contact center has always faced strong challenges – namely, high turnover rates and a constant need for hiring and thorough training.
But in recent years, these challenges have ballooned.
The modern contact center is coping with a growing skills gap, rising costs and limited resources. As a result, many organizations are turning to AI to try and fill the gaps in their workforce engagement management (WEM) strategies.
Frost & Sullivan's 2024 WEM Customer Perspectives global survey, conducted in collaboration with SuccessKPI, surveyed more than 300 contact center operators at commercial and government enterprises. The goal of the research was to gauge market demand for AI-powered WEM technology that impacts the entire customer experience (CX); not only on customer service calls in the contact center, but also across all customer experience workforce management motions.
The study found significant gaps in current WEM and the needs of the contact center. Only 30% of enterprises indicated that their WEM features included in contact center-as-a-service (CCaaS) platforms are best suited for their organizations because, as Frost & Sullivan reported, "70% of organizations have multiple CCaaS platforms in addition to blended operations with on-premise environments and those leveraging contact center outsourcing providers." This illustrates that CCaaS-specific WEM solutions are not the preferred model in the market, noted the analyst group.
The research also indicated that two-thirds of enterprises plan to integrate AI-powered WEM applications into their customer service operations. The top reasons for migrating WEM to the cloud are a.) the ability to scale customer interactions, b.) needing to manage costs better, c.) accommodating fluctuating workstyles which can impact workforce training, and d.) the overall readiness to adopt technologies that seamlessly connect remote or hybrid workers.
"Supervisors are the unsung heroes and they need to have the tools to really help agents with training, onboarding, career growth and career pathway," said Alpa Shah, Vice President of CX at Frost & Sullivan. "In terms of AI, (it) really helps better predict the agent's needs. AI is really helpful as it is more targeted and more personalized, which also is more humanizing. As an agent, I don't need to waste time on something I already know, but at the moment, I might need some training on a specific task. Clearly, that's why many businesses intend to move WEM to the cloud, focused on the supervisor helping their teams perform better."
Edited by
Alex Passett
