The October 2013 Contact Center Report outlines various challenges faced by contact centers, including the need for effective agent performance tracking and the complexity of multi-channel data reporting. It discusses the importance of accurate data collection while emphasizing the risks of using screen scraping methods, which can compromise security and report integrity. The report concludes by highlighting the business value of comprehensive performance reporting for agents and management, ultimately leading to improved productivity and customer satisfaction.

1. October 2013
Contact Center Report Positioning
There are many challenges running an effective contact center. Justification to keep the center fully
operational at low budget numbers can be difficult, at best. Some of the challenges, solutions and value
of these solutions may not fit all contact centers however they are worth reviewing.
Contact Center Challenges:
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Being aware of agent and supervisor status and performance
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Multi channel data (Voice, email, chat) within the reports combined and segregated
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Reporting options from agents up to managers and senior management levels
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Real time and historical data within the reports when appropriate
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Changes can be made to the reports when needed or desired
Not being aware of overall status of the groups and agents within the group can be part of a
disappointing day. Managers that can quickly see how a group is performing for the day and see the
agent status are able to justify the changes that are being made to meet the needs of the group.
Managers are mobile and need to see how the contact center is performing while away. Reports on
tablets and smart phones provide managers with complete detailed information.
Managers need to be aware of voice, email and chat status and performance by the group and agents.
Multi channel data can be difficult to collect and combine together into a summary and detailed report.
However, with considerably more contacts with agents being made through email and chat a manager
must know how the agents are doing with all customer interactions. Reports must combine the data
together for an overall view of the group performance.
Contact Center Solutions:
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Data collection across channels and external to the ACD
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Reporting options for office, home, mobile and multiple position levels
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Summary, group, agent detail reports
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Secure and accurate data collection – no screen scraping

2. Capturing data to be utilized within call center reporting is the key to a successful report. There are
short cuts to save costs, screen scraping, but results in accuracy and security issues. Using screen
scraping, AKA data emulation will cause the reports to have inaccurate data, missing data and invalid
data. Also to be able to do screen scraping the collection must remain wide open which means security
issues.
Agents need status alerts across multiple channels (voice, email, chat, different groups they can log into,
etc.) Supervisors need to see data for their group of agents and themselves. Managers require
summaries, drill downs and historical data. Managers also need data that can go outside the norm of
typical ACD data. This data is available is just needs to be captured and made available to the right
people.
To cut costs some data is left out of the solution which diminishes the value of the report information.
Agent status and performance information will not be available if the data is not collected. Going
beyond voice, email and chat is the internal data or other call center application data. Data from
ticketing systems, WFM, CRM, and confidential databases can provide an overall view of the contact
center, groups and agents. Leaving some of the data out might reduce costs but also hide performance
gaps.
Proper and complete collections accumulate the data across the key contact center applications and
allows for reports that different levels of the organization can utilize.
Business Value:
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KPI Awareness at all level
Improved agent and supervisor productivity
Increased customer satisfaction
Reduced agent turnover
Agent efficiencies meet goals
Provide call center justifications to senior level management
Reports have tremendous business value when the right people receive reports appropriately for them.
Agents, that are aware of the status of customer contacts, are able to respond rapidly. They can also be
aware of their performance and adjust to meet their goals. Agents with reports that are accurate, real
time and complete can improve customer satisfactions and reduce their desires to leave the
organization.

3. Supervisors manage multiple agents and handle customer contacts as well. The supervisor reports need
to consolidate data for the agents in the group as well as their own status/performance. Due to the
workload supervisors improve their productivity by having immediate and up-to-date information about
agent status/performance. They are able to take calls, handle a chat or an email when they are aware of
agent workloads.
Managers require an overview of the entire contact center. The data must cover multiple sources:
Voice, Email, Chat, WFM, CRM, Internal confidential data, ticketing systems, CSat scores, FCR and other
sources affecting the contact center. The managers’ awareness of performance across multiple
channels allows for justifications of many aspects of the contact center.
Contact center reports will vary from agent level to manager and senior management levels. Having
accurate data, big data and appropriate data for each level result in reporting that will improve
performance and efficiencies and increase contact center awareness.
Spectrum is a leading provider of Unified Contact Center Reporting. Contact Spectrum today to
discuss your contact center report positioning. For more examples of reporting visit our website
and the products page. http://www.specorp.com/products
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Dan Boehm
VP Sales and Marketing
Spectrum
dboehm@specorp.com
+1 713 986 8839