Genesys and Workforce Optimization

Genesys is best known as a provider of contact center management systems and has long provided computer/telephony integration (CTI) and single-queue call routing systems. Over the past few years it has had changes of ownership and now is a stand-alone company focused on providing systems to improve the customer experience. To do this its combines contact center infrastructure systems and a suite of workforce optimization applications. We included the suite in our 2015 Workforce Optimization Value Index, which evaluates workforce optimization vendors against the requirements of companies as found in our benchmark research into next-generation workforce optimization. Genesys is rated a Warm vendor in the Value Index as a consequence of not actively participating with our process forcing us to base the evaluation on publicly available information including product documentation, presentation and briefings, which although comprehensive does not address all aspects included in the Value Index. During a recent briefing I learned more about Genesys’ software and services that I can provide more depth on some key areas of their workforce optimization offering.

Its workforce optimization suite consists of five of the six components we assessed in the Value Index: interaction recording, quality management, workforce management, training and coaching (part of workforce management) and analytics. The missing component is agent compensation management; like many of the other vendors, Genesys provides no more than input for third-party systems. Each of the five components in the suite supports capabilities similar to those of most of the other vendors that took part in the Value Index, with a few notable exceptions. Interaction recording records both calls and the screens agents use to resolve interactions and supports random sampling and  quality monitoring driven by speech analytics. Companies can use it to score agents’ handling of interactions and to identify coaching needs. Quality monitoring includes a form builder that helps users evaluate performance in different types of interactions. It integrates with recording so that coaching sessions can be scheduled based on analysis of the forms. Workforce management works across all communication channels and forecasts agent schedules based on data from all channels and tasks. It tracks what agents actually do and compares that to their schedules, and it automates identification of training agents need based on their evaluations. Workforce management also schedules time for back-office workers to handle tasks related to resolving interactions. The fourth component, analytics, ingests data from multiple sources, including transaction and interaction data, to produce an analysis of the end-to-end interaction-handling process. It includes speech analytics that analyzes words and phrases used during interactions that can automatically trigger workflows to ensure action is taken based on actual conversations. The performance management component provides a real-time view of agent-related activities that is linked with customer feedback and business outcomes, and which drills down to root causes so actions can be taken anywhere across the organization.

Overall the workforce optimization suite thus includes the core applications and capabilities identified in my workforce optimization research. Our research finds plans to go beyond call recording and quality management and expand into other areas like coaching and learning systems where less than a fifth of organizations have indicated. I also learned three other key facts. There is close integration between the applications to support cross-functional processes; Genesys has been investing in a common user interface for all the applications; and the systems are available in the cloud, which the research shows is of growing importance to organizations.

As well as product capabilities Our Value Index evaluates Usability, Manageability, Reliability, Adaptability, Vendor Validation and TCO/ROI, none of which most vendors, including Genesys, cover on their websites; as noted, this held down Genesys’ scores. I was pleased to learn in the recent discussion that Genesys is investing in three innovation areas that Ventana Research sees as having great impact on users’ adoption of systems and use of modern technology. The first is usability. Genesys now offers a common look-and-feel across all applications and is moving the interface toward a task-oriented approach whereby users have single sign-on to all apps, role-based access control and point-and-click capabilities to activate task-oriented capabilities such as answering calls. The second area is mobility, in which apps run on any device so users can access systems and key information while on the move, including modern visualization of information and dashboards. The third area looks even further ahead by adding capabilities such as additional APIs to support wearable devices.

Genesys has also enhanced its support services, which our research and the Value Index find to be crucial. The company markets them as Genesys Guru. It is a portfolio of managed services designed to help customers realize the maximum benefit from investing in the company’s customer experience technology. Its planning services help companies identify problem areas and hidden costs so they can use the systems to maximum effect and thus concentrate on customers rather than the technology. Interaction analysis services help companies use speech and text analytics to best effect, especially to link customer feedback to quality monitoring and thus to improve agent performance. It also helps set up the system to deliver key analysis and metrics, supporting continuous improvement. Business performance services takes this one step further and provides services to collect, analyze and interpret all performance and workforce management data so it can recommend people, process and system improvements to improve the end-to-end customer journey. My research shows that organizations are relatively immature in their use of such technologies, so these services should help them gain benefits from their investments.

Taking this information into account, there are areas where Genesys could have scored higher but they need to be engaged into assessments like RFI/RFP can help them be considered further in workforce optimization. If the company continues developments in the seven categories by which we judge and win new clients it may well rank higher in our next Value Index assessment. I suspect its biggest challenge will be to convince potential customers that it can be successful over the long term as a stand-alone company. From a product point of view it will also need to convince the market it has moved on from being a CTI company and now has a broad portfolio that supports customer engagement. In this respect it has the advantage of being one of only a few vendors that combines communication channel management and workforce optimization products, both of which I believe are core to improving customer engagement. I therefore recommend that companies seeking to improve the end-to-end customer experience assess how Genesys can help in those efforts.

Regards,

Richard J. Snow

VP & Research Director