Contact center managers have many challenges that they face every day. There are reporting tools that will help the manager reduce these challenges. However which tool works best for the manager, supervisor and agents?

1. Desktops/Dashboards/LCD Screens:
Which works best in the contact center?
January 2014
When contact centers are looking to improve overall performance they typically look to these
applications. Each of these applications is a reporting tool that will display contact center
metrics. The difference between each of these is the target audience. So to answer the
question, which works best in the contact center, you will need to:
• State clearly the challenges that exist in the contact center;
• Identify the target audience;
• Define your goals for the reporting tools;
• Understand what each of the reporting tools can do for those that will use it.
Contact center challenges occur in every contact center. Each center is different but all of them
have challenges. Here is a brief list of 10 challenges: Agent turnover, complete awareness of
duties and responsibilities, customer expectations increasing, budget cuts, business productivity,
customer experience consequences, multi-channel data integration, brand knowledge, internal
communications, schedule adherence, etc. Finding a solution to these challenges is a key to a
successful contact center. Every contact center is segregated into multiple groups (queues) and
each group can have different challenges. The manager should have a group meeting with the
supervisors and define, in detail, the challenges that each group has that is affecting overall
performance. Some of the challenges will be duplicated and some very unique to a group. The
goal is to eliminate the critical challenges for each group.
The target audience for the reporting specifies the type of reporting tools the contact center will
need to have in place. If the audience crosses multiple groups and includes people outside of the
contact center the reporting tools need to vary. What if there is remote or at-home agent? Every
contact center has different audiences. Know the audience that will see the reporting
applications as this will affect the tools that should be used.
Defining the goals for the reporting tools is a requirement. Having a reporting tool with no goal
in mind will result in a tool that “is not working”. Review the challenges and adjust the goals to
help resolve those challenges.

2. Goals also need to be prioritized. Give each goal a level of importance but do not allow all goals
to have the same importance. Create a scorecard. Then review the goals for the target audiences
and determine which audience is most important to the business.
Reporting tools have different features, functions, benefits to the contact center. For this article
we are focusing on desktops, dashboards and LCD screens. There are other types of reporting
tools such as web based reporting, mobile reporting, email reporting and traditional LED
wallboards.
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Desktop reporting is for the agents desktop.
Dashboards are for the supervisors and managers.
LCD Screens target the contact center group and other that are mobile within the
contact center.
Desktops: If the challenges within the contact center are with some agents, but vary by agent, the
desktop reporting tool will help resolve the problems.

3. For most contact centers the agents desktop reporting tool is going to be used to notify the agent
of the current status of the group the agent works in. In a multi-channel contact center the agent
may be handling calls, emails, and chats. Productivity can be difficult at times however being
aware of the current status across all channels helps the agent perform. Displaying something as
simple as a Call InQueue and Longest Wait time can be a tremendous productivity improvement.
The desktop reporting can have agent specific information. This information can be confidential
or kept confidential to keep the agents morale at a higher level. Sharing agent productivity
information to the entire contact center can have a negative effect on the agents. This will
depend on the type of group the agent is within. A sales related agent can have all productivity
information shared.
Desktops also support messaging to and from the agents. Communications within the contact
center are needed but at times difficult to do at crucial times. Large contact centers makes it hard
to communicate simple messages without a desktop messaging tool. These tools can also
include real time metrics to congratulate an agent on improved performance.
LCD Screens: Challenges within the contact center can be group related. Some of the issues
might be product and service knowledge, group level performance issues, or for the smaller
contact centers current status metrics. Agent specific data is usually not displayed because of
the negative impact that can have with underperforming agents. It has been found that showing
agent specific information causes agent turnover.
Target audience is an important consideration with LCD screens. Knowing who will be seeing
the LCD screens can and should change the content on the screens. The challenges within the
group that few the screens on a regular basis will also change the content on the screens. As
problems within the call center change so should the content on the screens.

4. Some of the challenges that an LCD screen with appropriate content can resolve are:
• Poor customer experiences
• Lack of brand knowledge and awareness
• Internal communications
• Business obstacles
The content for LCD screens should change throughout the day. The information displayed is
multi-channel data (voice, email, chat), business product and service information, external
business content, messages, Live content and internal images.
To remain effective the LCD screens need to be continually updated and migrate as new business
challenges appear. Leaving the LCD screen with the same information turns the screen into
artwork.
Dashboards: Supervisors and Managers are not a problem for the contact center. The challenge
is getting a lot of data from multiple sources to managers so they are quickly able to see the
current and historical status and performance for the contact center.
Dashboards should be used to combine data from voice, email and chat sources. Managers also
have internal data that needs to be added to the dashboard. The goal is not to replace the
reporting that is available for these other source but rather to combine them. Dashboards give
east access to the summary data and drill down to detailed information. And when required the
manager is able to go back to the original source and see very specific details as to the overall
cause.
The dashboard can have multiple tabs of content. Typically dashboards begin with a summary
page and is followed up with tabs of specific data. As an example the summary page could be a

5. combination of voice, email and chat. Three additional tabs with voice, email and chat on
separate tabs provide details. Most managers have tabs for each group with columns for each
data source. Next managers are able to see details on each agent for each of these multi-channel
contacts the agents are responsible for. Below is an example of this type of dashboard.
A combined dashboard will save the manager a tremendous amount of time. By combining data
from multiple sources into one set of reports, the manager is able to see the cause and effect of
agent performance. Real time data of agent productivity and the historical results per agent
should be available through the dashboard.
Manager and supervisor dashboards that contain the right data are able to reduce and eliminate
some of the contact center challenges. The key to the successful dashboard is capturing and
combining critical data targeted at the challenges that exist within the contact center.
To minimize the problems that are occurring within your contact center focus on defining the
problems, determining the cause of the problems and define the goals for the contact center. The
reporting tool that works best for the contact center will be determined by the problems that
contact center is experiencing.
Spectrum is a leading provider of Unified Contact Center Reporting. Contact Spectrum today to
discuss your management level report. For more examples of reporting visit our website and the
products page. http://www.specorp.com/products

6. Follow Spectrum Corporation:
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Dan Boehm
VP Sales and Marketing
Spectrum
dboehm@specorp.com
+1 713 986 8839

7. Follow Spectrum Corporation:
•
•
SlideShare
LinkedIn
•
Blog
•
YouTube
Dan Boehm
VP Sales and Marketing
Spectrum
dboehm@specorp.com
+1 713 986 8839