As businesses adapt to a rapidly evolving digital landscape, workforce management (WFM) has become a critical element for achieving operational excellence. In 2025, organizations will continue to leverage emerging technologies and innovative strategies to streamline processes, enhance employee satisfaction, and improve customer experiences. Here are the top workforce management trends to watch this year:
1. AI-Powered Workforce Optimization
Artificial intelligence (AI) will play a pivotal role in optimizing workforce management processes. Advanced AI tools can predict staffing needs, analyze agent performance, and even forecast customer demand patterns. By automating repetitive tasks, AI empowers managers to focus on strategic initiatives and create more efficient workflows.
2. Personalized Employee Experiences
Employers are recognizing the importance of a personalized approach to employee management. Customizable dashboards, flexible scheduling options, and targeted training programs will help businesses cater to the unique needs of their workforce, boosting engagement and reducing turnover.
3. Integration of Remote and On-Site Teams
Hybrid work models are here to stay, requiring robust WFM solutions that seamlessly integrate remote and on-site team management. Tools that facilitate real-time communication, performance tracking, and workload distribution will be essential for maintaining productivity and collaboration.
4. Real-Time Analytics for Decision-Making
Access to real-time data analytics will continue to be a game-changer for workforce planning. Managers can use live dashboards to make data-driven decisions, quickly adapt to changes, and improve overall efficiency.
5. Focus on Employee Well-Being
Organizations are placing a greater emphasis on mental health and work-life balance. Offering wellness programs, flexible hours, and supportive resources will not only improve employee satisfaction but also enhance performance and retention.
By embracing these trends, businesses can stay competitive in a dynamic market while fostering a motivated and productive workforce.
As attendees engaged in conversations about engaging remote workforces and the importance of employee experience, the irony of discussing these topics at an in-person event was not lost. The consensus among participants was that flexible work arrangements, including hybrid in-office and work-from-home setups, are the future of contact centers.
As we get back to work for the start of 2023, we do so not only with familiar 2022 challenges still hanging around, but with the added prospect of economic downturn looming ahead. While a possible recession could have us asking if we can afford the very best contact center performance, we should be asking if we can afford not to make the contact center a top priority. Let’s look at the dawn of 2023 as an opportunity to face uncertainty and volatility with some resolutions to make the contact center thrive.
Resolution 1 – Fight the Recession with Great Customer Experience
The last few months have seen multiplying predictions of a slowing economy coming in 2023; but rather than waiting to react, it’s a chance to be proactive when it comes to Customer Experience. The competition for customer loyalty has been fierce enough even before we had the specter of a downturn. As consumers tighten their budgets, customer retention will be determined to an ever larger extent by the highest level of Customer Experience (CX).
Customers now demand to be met on the channel of their choice with an excellent, personalized experience. Great experiences build lasting customer relationships, while substandard experiences are now more likely than ever to not only end a relationship, they’re also more likely to be shared on social media. While personalization and omnichannel integration used to be nice-to-have items on many contact centers’ wish lists, 2023 customers will see them as must-haves.
Customers have become accustomed to algorithms anticipating their desired content and will hardly put up with unnecessarily long interactions where they aren’t recognized or have to repeat themselves over and over. They expect that their complex customer journeys are seamless from your website and across multiple contact channels.
The good news is that for contact centers, these journeys present not only a larger range of ways to reach your customers, but also a chance to track omnichannel interactions and gain insights into who your customers are and what they want. Mining this valuable data gives you the ability to create initiatives for even more personalized customer experiences.
A crucial part of that personalization is not just an omnichannel technical solution, but also successful, smart interactions on every channel– especially when an agent is required. The foundation of great Customer Experience is equally great Employee Experience, ensuring that agents are happy and fulfilled at work. Which brings us to our next resolution:
Resolution 2 – Invest in your Employees
Fully empowered employees at every level are the best pro-active way to ensure a positive customer experience
In 2022 we couldn’t get away from stories about the Great Resignation and Quiet Quitting; they really got the conversation going about Employee Experience. Will 2023 be the year that contact center employees are universally recognized as the critical assets they can be? Even with all the capabilities of a powerful omnichannel technological solution at your disposal, today’s customers aren’t satisfied by a live interaction with an agent who is disengaged, doesn’t have answers at their disposal, or conducts the entire interaction from a generic script. Fully empowered employees at every level are the best pro-active way to ensure a positive customer experience: happy agents create better experiences for customers, informed supervisors manage their teams to success, insightful WFM analysts generate the accurate forecasts and optimal schedules that enable the center to run efficiently.
However, they all must be recognized as value creators, critical to your ability to deliver great CX. Once this recognition becomes part of your culture from front line to C-suite, your organization can understand that your employees are the best place to invest– especially in times of economic turmoil. This means giving your employees the tools that enable them to perform at the highest level and meet your customers where they want to be met. Plus, customers want to be met with contextual information needed to create personalized experiences, and with the answers needed for real resolution.
And we’re not talking about agents only. The need for the right toolset includes all of your employees including agents, team leads, executives, and the WFM team. Agents can benefit from AI-assisted Knowledge Management that gives them the guidance they need when they need it. Team leads need Gamification/Performance Management that helps them coach effectively and reward top performers. And the WFM Team can take advantage of Workforce Management solutions that automate manual tasks, freeing the team to think strategically and focus on transformative processes like truly flexible scheduling.
Similar to the omnichannel routing solutions, technology can be a great thing, but to get the best Employee Experience, you must also invest in the human side of the equation. Without the right training to make the technology come to life, we can’t achieve the level of true transformational change needed for the coming year. And just as personalization is expected by customers, employees want an experience that fits their needs, such as customized expert training that can be delivered online on on-site where needed, digital training that is available online anytime employees need it, or AI-assisted training delivery systems that automatically send the module that an agent needs at the time that’s best for the agent and also protects service level.
But when it comes to transformation that makes a real difference and gets attention at the highest levels of your organization, you’ve got to aim for the right target:
Resolution 3 – Move from Optimization to Transformation
For CX and EX in the coming year, not only is there room for optimism—it’s a must. As the economic environment changes, we must have the resolve to change in substantive ways to meet the challenges that 2023 will bring. According to a BCG survey from November 2022, a majority of organizations plan to increase their investments in digital transformation in spite of the fact that they complain that they don’t receive help in prioritizing the steps of transformation. The first step has to be committing to transformation that creates a new level of EX and CX, not just reinforcing existing processes.
Investing in the best Workforce Management tools may give our WFM team the ability to game out new scheduling strategies, but without the will to actually implement the best of those scheduling strategies, there’s no transformative flexibility to improve employee engagement with better work/life balance. Having the best performance scorecards, fully connected to Quality Management and other important systems is a powerful achievement in itself, but without the commitment to act on those insights with coaching and meaningful recognition for top performers, there is no moving the needle on Customer Experience in a way that goes beyond business as usual.
Digital-based training is always there when needed, but if training isn’t aligned with the WFM team so that it’s delivered automatically at the best-possible time, there’s no transformative increase in employee experience coupled with the protection of customer experience. And beyond the inbound front office, just think of opportunities for efficiency and performance gains that might be achieved by extending the transformation strategies and WEM tools into the outbound and back office areas. Simply put, don’t just add technology without the right mindset for change. With the right cultural commitment to innovation, everyone can feel connected to the transformation effort, being fully aware of the key role they play in making the organization a great place to work and a trusted partner for its customers.
These are just three possible resolutions for new year. We’re already a week into 2023, and maybe not all of our resolutions are getting off to a great start, but one area where we can’t afford to fail is finding new levels of success in the contact center. There’s nothing inherently magical about the start of the new year, it simply gives us a convenient point to try something new. But we can make it special by committing to being proactive in preparing for whatever 2023 might have in store for us.
If you’re looking for ways to make your contact center even better this year, Call Design can help. We’ve got the tools and consulting skills to make your resolutions a reality, whether you’re looking to move from spreadsheets to an automatable Forecasting/Scheduling solution, searching for a CX platform that enables better customer experiences, or meaningful ways to improve agent engagement for better employee experience.
IVR’s…love them or hate them, they are an almost ubiquitous part of the contact centre industry and have been around for a very long time. In fact, according to Wikipedia, the first commercial IVR system was built to perform order entry and inventory control back in 1973, although the technology was certainly in its infancy, and considered expensive and difficult to implement.
New combined company will expand its global reach in the Customer Experience technology space
Westford, MA. May 10, 2021. Today, Aspect Software will merge with Noble Systems of Atlanta Georgia, to form Aspect™, (pronounced: ahl-vahr-ee-uh), a new global company delivering optimized customer experience and workforce engagement software and cloud services technology solutions.
The newly combined company will be led by Patrick Dennis, Aspect President and CEO.
“This merger will combine two of the leaders in the customer experience space into a major unified force for innovation and growth,” said Patrick Dennis, President & CEO of Aspect. “Our unified customer base represents the largest financial institutions, healthcare, online retail, and travel and transportation companies in the world. We are so excited to embark on this next stage of our corporate development.”
Abry Partners (“Abry”), a Boston-based private equity firm, spearheaded the merger and is now the majority owner of the combined company. Vector Capital, owner of Aspect, will continue as minority equity holder. The total value of the combined transaction is over $1 billion USD.
“We are impressed with the transformation of Aspect under the leadership of Patrick and the Vector team,” said Tomer Yosef-Or, partner at Abry, “and Noble Systems will be an excellent merger partner, making Aspect an even stronger competitor in the market.”
Andy Fishman, a Managing Director of Vector Capital, added, “We congratulate and thank Patrick and the entire Aspect organization for their incredible work. We are excited to partner with Abry as we bring together Aspect and Noble Systems as the new Aspect and look forward to supporting the new company through its next phase of growth.”
Jim Noble, founder and CEO of Noble Systems, will transition into a new role as an advisor to Abry and Aspect. “Jim has made a lasting impact in this marketplace,” continued Mr. Yosef-Or. “He has led Noble through 30 years of innovation and growth. This merger is a fitting exclamation point to his successful career.”
News of this merger was met with enthusiasm from key Industry Analysts. According to Nancy Jamison, Industry Director, Information and Communications Technologies at Frost and Sullivan, “Aspect plus Noble is a very strong match. Their combined technology stack and market presence, particularly in outbound contact management, will make Aspect an extremely formidable player in the space. This should be welcome news to enterprise customers worldwide.”
According to Mary Wardley, VP Customer Care and CRM research at IDC, “The Aspect/Noble merger will be a jolt of lightning to the Contact Center market for several reasons; first will be the surprise to the market, second will be the long-term opportunity these two companies and product lines bring. Large enterprise customers will especially see big benefits through innovations to come. This could spur more acquisitions as vendors vie for customers and market share.”
“We are launching Aspect with an aggressive schedule, beginning with the immediate introduction of our new corporate identity and website, www.alvaria.com, followed by merged operations,” said Michael Harris, Aspect Chief Product Officer and CMO. “Customers of Aspect Software and Noble Systems will continue to use the existing products and services they depend on now for delivering mission critical services, without interruption, followed by a seamless transition to the next generation of Aspect systems and services.”
Aspect Software and Vector Capital were advised by Jefferies LLC as their sole financial advisor, and Paul Hastings LLP as their legal counsel. Abry Partners was advised by TD Securities (USA) LLC as its financial advisor, and Kirkland & Ellis LLP as its legal counsel. Noble Systems was advised by Eversheds Sutherland as its legal counsel.
Aspect was founded through the merger of Aspect Software and Noble Systems, technology leaders in Customer Experience (CX) and Workforce Engagement solutions. Our name is derived from Latin for “hives” – nature’s perfect form for millions of years – bringing you solutions that are scalable, resilient and secure, with efficiency, speed and pinpoint accuracy. ALVARIA™. Reshaping Customer Experience™. For more information, please visit www.alvaria.com
About Abry Partners:
Abry is one of the most experienced and successful sector-focused private equity investment firms in North America. Since their founding in 1989, the firm has completed over $82.0 billion of leveraged transactions and other private equity or preferred equity placements. Currently, the firm manages over $5.0 billion of capital across their active funds. For more information on Abry, please visit www.Abry.com.
About Vector Capital:
Vector Capital is a leading global private equity firm specializing in transformational investments in established technology businesses. With more than $3 billion of capital under management, Vector actively partners with management teams to devise and execute new financial and business strategies that materially improve the competitive standing of businesses and enhance value for employees, customers, and all stakeholders. For more information, visit www.vectorcapital.com.
Since the beginning of 2020 and the inception of COVID-19, contact centers have had to make adjustments as to the way we work and employees’ daily lives. This shift in the workplace proved to be specifically challenging for contact centers and help desks. Agents were used to being in an office and not working virtually. The change to in-person and effectively assisting customers had to take place quickly and efficiently. On any given day, agents might experience more extended workdays due to higher call volume, handling of complicated subjects, and customer complaints, and aggravation.
Providing an excellent customer experience is hard work, but it’s essential to your business’s success. As the face of the customer service department, your contact center is an instrumental tool to address any problems with your customer’s satisfaction. Improving the customer experience is a multi-step process and will often require some retooling along the way. Below, we have four ways to improve your customer experience.
If you want to facilitate an environment for your contact centre agents to succeed, you need to start coaching. Coaching is a great way to encourage, enable, and empower your agents to not only want to be better at their jobs but perform better. Coaching is also a great opportunity for your agents to learn new skills, get feedback on the work they are doing, and resolve the problems they might be having with calls.
