FAQs: Workforce management

A Forecast Snapshot is a saved version of the automatically generated continuous forecast captured on a specific day. These forecasts are updated nightly with refreshed predicted values, and snapshots allow you to view what the forecast looked like at a particular point in time. This makes it possible to compare past versions of the forecast with the current one and evaluate how predictions have changed over time. Forecast Snapshots reflect only system-predicted values and do not include any manual modifications. For example, if you view a snapshot from one week ago, it shows the forecast exactly as it was generated then. While snapshots cannot be used for scheduling or capacity planning, they are valuable for comparing with historical actuals to assess accuracy and forecast trends. You can also customize the color of each snapshot line on the chart by clicking the colored circle next to the snapshot name and selecting a new color from the palette.

During a rerun when there are already published occurrences:

• There will be no changes in already suggested occurrence or sessions on rerun.
• Only unscheduled or new attendees can be included in an already suggested session (if the minimum or maximum group size configuration permits) or a new session could be suggested based on the configuration of an activity plan (maximum number of sessions).
• Future occurrences are suggested based on the recurrence end configuration for recurring activity.

Activity plans can be run ad hoc or as per schedule. For ad hoc runs, Genesys Cloud considers all the published schedules on the Schedules page. For scheduled generation, Genesys Cloud looks for sessions from the next full week in the future.

Start date is inclusive and end date is exclusive. For example, for an occurrence of every one week, if the initial schedule start date is April 22, 2024 and the end date is April 28, 2024:

• The first occurrence is from April 22, 2024 to April 29, 2024. Sessions are suggested within April 22-28, 2024.
• The second occurrence is from April 29, 2024 to May 5, 2024. Sessions are suggested within April 29-May 04, 2024.

Occurrence date range is the potential range where sessions can occur.

Sessions cannot be applied over a non-interruptible activity except for an existing On queue activity in the schedule. Sessions can still be suggested irrespective of its interruptibility flag.

The initial schedule period and the recurrence period should be the same. For example, if a 1:1 meeting is set with a recurrence window of four weeks, the system looks for the first session within the four-week window of the initial schedule period and then repeats the reoccurrence window of four weeks. Each occurrence in the future will be for four weeks.

Yes, you can delete management units associated to the activity plans. On doing this, the activity plan becomes inactive and the management unit selection in the Permission field of the General tab changes to the All Management Units option.

Activity plans are applied when generating new schedules. Any existing occurrences from published schedules that extend beyond the schedule window are updated with the latest generated schedule and its corresponding planned sessions.

For occurrences that are aligned with or are inside the schedule window, a new occurrence is generated. If the latest generated schedule and the occurrence are preferred, the existing published schedule can be unpublished so that the latest generated schedule can be published.

For activity plans with recurrences longer than one week that is every two to six weeks, when you generate new schedules in which the plan is to be applied, those schedules should match the same number of weeks as the recurrence. If not, Genesys Cloud plans all the sessions inside the new schedule, and then no more sessions can be planned until that plan occurs next.

For example, for a three-week recurring rule, ensure to generate schedules that are three weeks or longer. When you generate three one-week schedules instead, it results in all the sessions being planned in the first week.

When you move a Management Unit to a different Business Unit, all agents in that Management Unit are also moved. For more information, see Agents schedule and history if they move business units. Any historical adherence information for the agent, prior to the business unit move, will no longer be visible as the historical adherence data displayed is only for current business unit members. To view the historical data, you have to move the agent back to the original business unit.

When you move an agent from one business unit to another, the schedule and adherence information remains with the original business unit. This process allows the supervisor to view the agent in the same spot on the schedule before they moved business units, for historical purposes. After the agent moves to another business unit, any new schedule and adherence information exist under the new business unit.

If an agent moves between management units in the same business unit, adherence and schedule information will still be accessible.

If an entire management unit moves to a new business unit, it has the same effect as moving all of those agents to a new business unit. A read-only copy of schedules and adherence are kept with the old business unit, any new schedule and adherence information exist under the new management unit.

Time-off requests, however, move with the agent to the new management unit. Time-off requests are specific to agents, not management units, and should follow the agent with the move.

Workforce management can predict a higher or lower than expected staffing requirements for various reasons. See the following possible causes.

Higher than expected staffing requirement

1. Over forecast volume.
2. Over forecast average handle time.
3. Schedule adherence is historically abysmal.
4. The configured service goals (SL/SLO, ASA, Abandonment rate) are more vigorous than what historically was achieved. Also, workforce management tries to meet the service goal at every interval and not at a less granular period; for example, a day or week.
5. Some agents may not belong to the selected business unit, but do handle some of that business unit’s volume. These agents are not directly known and therefore largely ignored for consideration on staffing requirement impact.
6. Deferred work (for example, email) exists, and the maximum occupancy for deferred work is set to a value that is significantly lower than the default setting of 95%. For example, a low maximum occupancy value means less time to work on deferred work.
7. Queues, media types, languages, and skills configurations that end in many low volume route paths can drive up staffing requirements. You can achieve greater economies of scale with lower optimal staffing when the interaction requirements and agent capabilities are more homogenous. If either or both of these requirements and capabilities are more heterogenous, then the issue of small numbers arises to a greater and greater degree. The more extreme that your configurations are, the greater the likelihood of non-optimal staffing requirements.

Lower than expected staffing requirement

1. Under forecast volume.
2. Under forecast average handle time.
3. The configured service goals (SL/SLO, ASA, Abandonment rate) are less vigorous than what historically was achieved.
4. Some agents in the selected business unit may handle another business unit’s volume. The loss of productivity is not directly known and therefore largely ignored for consideration on staffing requirement impact.
5. Deferred work (for example, emails) exists, and the maximum occupancy for deferred work is set to an unrealistic value that is higher than the default of 95%.

To modify the reporting structure as it appears in the Hierarchy Tree view, update the user’s profile.

The information in the Relationships section determines the reporting structure.

You can find a list of FAQs for Genesys Tempo for iOS here.

You can find a list of FAQs for Genesys Tempo for Android here.

Currently, Genesys Tempo does not support the ability to create time-off requests with non-continuous dates. You can use the web app to create a time-off request with non-continuous dates.

You can use Genesys Tempo to view time-off requests with non-sequential dates.

No, when you log into Collaborate, you also log into Tempo.

Tap Settings, and then tap Logout.

If actuals appear low in the intraday monitoring view, it could be due to planning group configuration.  Key items to remember when configuring planning groups:

• The <none> option for languages and skills specifically means that the interaction has either no language or no skill. It does not mean “any” language or “any” skill.
• When configuring skills in a planning group, selecting more than one skill means that the planning group is make up of interactions with all the skills selected, not any of skills listed.

Intraday scheduled agents are based on the agent’s current capabilities and whether they can handle all the route paths in the selected planning group.  Intraday monitoring uses the planning groups that were used to create the forecast that is linked with the published schedule for that day. For agents to count as “Actual Agents,” the agent’s current capabilities need to match the planning group configuration at the time the forecast was generated. 

To view agents that cannot handle planning groups, go to Configuration > Agents. Select the appropriate business unit in the upper right corner of the screen, and then sort by the Planning Groups column. Agents with no Planning Groups displayed cannot handle any planning groups. 

Key items to remember when configuring planning groups:

• The <none> option for languages and skills specifically means that the interaction has either no language or no skill. The setting does not mean “any” language or “any” skill.
• When you configure skills in a planning group, selecting more than one skill means that the planning group is made up of interactions with all the skills selected, not any of the listed skills.

For more information, see View agents in a planning group.

This setting has two options when enabled for the shift: Next Day Off and Previous Day Off.  If the Next Day Off option is selected then if agents have this shift, they get the next day off. If Previous Day Off is selected, then if agents have this shift they get the previous day off. One example of where this might be a valuable rule to add is when you have a shift with fewer days but longer hours. In this case, you may want to ensure a day off after a long shift.

This feature is used to set a minimum block of time, once per week, sometimes referred to as a rest period or days off, that should be enforced when building a schedule so that agents get a minimum consecutive amount of days or partial days off each week. This feature can be particularly useful if you have shifts configured with optional days that may result in fragmented rest time for the agent. For example, if you would like your agents to have two full days off in a row each week, this setting should be set at 48 hours. 

Planning period is an optional feature and should be used when you want to build a schedule that spans multiple weeks and you have constraints that need to apply across those weeks. For example, you need to ensure that employees are only scheduled to work 2 consecutive weekends in a row.

These constraints are optional and are used only when you need to ensure schedules are built with these specific items in mind, typically to adhere to labor laws, union rules, worker council agreements, etc.  The more constrained the schedule is, the less optimized it becomes.

Unfortunately, no not at this time. A single schedule can be created from only one forecast at a time.  Because of this, schedules generated using weighted historical index forecasts are limited to one week in length. To take advantage of six-week scheduling, the automatic best method selection or import forecast creation methods are required. For more information, see Generate a schedule from a short-term forecast.

Workforce management automatically syncs changes every four hours.  If queue membership changes are more recent than that, this button allows for an immediate synch to display which agents are capable of handling a planning group.

The term Route Path refers to a combination of attributes on an interaction including the Queue, the Media Type, the Language and the Skillset.  Each individual unique combination of Queue, Media type, Language and Skillset is considered to be a route path. 

Service Goal Templates are a simple template configured at the Business Unit level in workforce management to indicate a service goal target that should be used when scheduling agents.  Service goal templates can be given unique names and can contain settings for service level, asa and abandon rate.  Service goal templates are assigned to planning groups to set the target service goal(s) for that planning group.

Planning Groups are a basic configuration used to determine what route paths or combination of route paths (Queue, Media, Language, Skillset) should be used for forecasting and scheduling in a given business unit.  Planning groups also allow for assignment of a service goal template.  While planning groups typically should be created for each route path, they can also contain groups of route paths.  Please note that it is important to consider which agents can handle a planning group before aggregating route paths.  If agents are not able to handle the entire route path, then the scheduling engine will not schedule the agent based on the planning group workload, but the agent will be given a schedule. 

Modifications for AHT components have been consolidated to the AHT level instead of the separate ATT and ACW levels previously. Any existing modifications to ATT and ACW will still be visible in existing forecasts but will be marked as legacy. While you can still add/modify modifications to the forecast for AHT and Volume, since legacy modifications cannot be changed, if it is necessary to change the legacy ACW and ATT modifications then a new forecast should be created and modifications should be made to the combined AHT metric.

The single week view is carried over from the previous version of workforce management but it now supports up to 6 weeks of data, depending on the creation method used to create the forecast.  Additional weeks can be viewed by selecting the right and left arrows on either side of the date range visible in the short-term forecast once it has been created.  Granularity can now be viewed at 15 min, 30 min and 60 min levels.  

The multi-week view shows the same data at a daily granularity level.  Over time, this multi-week view will be enhanced to support longer forecasts as they become available.  Modifications can be made on either view.

While both of these creation method options allow you to import a file, the functionality is completely different. 

• Weighted Historical Index with Source Data Import creation method allows you to import up to 8 weeks of historical data to be used to create a Weighted Historical Index forecast up to 1 week long. Note: This used to be called “Import data” in previous versions of workforce management.
• The Import Short-Term Interval Forecast creation method does not import historical data, it actually imports a final forecast that was created outside of workforce management that is from 1-6 weeks long. Please note that some users will generate a forecast using Automatic Best Method Selection in workforce management and then export it and edit it in another application like excel.  The Import Forecast option allows you to import this edited forecast as a new forecast in workforce management. 

The new Creation Method > Import Forecast feature in Workforce Management allows forecasters to import an actual forecast up to 6 weeks long that was created outside of workforce management.  This feature can also be used to import a forecast created in Workforce management that was exported and then edited in an external tool like excel. This is not a historical data import. The time zone for the file needs to be in UTC time zone. Please note that all data in the file should fall within the Forecast Duration date range displayed in the Add Short-Term Forecast screen. If the time zone is specified then there should only be one row of data for each Interval Start Date and Planning Group. If not, there should only be one row of data for each Interval Start UTC Date and Planning Group. If you need to import historical data in order to build a forecast you should use the Weighted Historical Index with Source Data Import creation method which allows for up to 8 weeks of historical data but can only generate a one week forecast at a time. 

Within the Add Short-Term Forecast user interface there are four Creation Method options.  To import historical data to use within a Weighted Historical Index forecast, utilize the third option on the list “Weighted Historical Index with Source Data Import”.  This option was renamed and used to be called “Import Data” but it still functions the same way as in the previous version of workforce management.  This option allows the user to import up to 8 weeks of historical source data to be used to create a weighted historical index forecast one week in length.

Depending on the Creation Method selected, short term forecasts can be from 1-6 weeks in length. 

Workforce management has four creation method options when creating a short-term forecast. Each option has specific uses, capabilities, and requirements.

Yes, you can modify or edit existing schedules just like you could before the migration. Many items in the Select Action list moved to the toolbar. For more information, see Navigate the schedule editor.

Yes, existing schedules are still in place but are now associated with a new business unit. The main differences in existing schedules is that many of the options in the Select Action list moved to the toolbar. For more information, see Manage the schedule from the toolbar and the Select Action list.

Genesys automatically migrates customers for each organization that use workforce management. The migration automatically adds the new configuration categories in workforce management with values based on each customer’s existing configuration. Immediately after the migration, the feature may look different, but nothing has been changed to impact how your current setup works. Genesys automatically makes the necessary configuration changes to enable the new features, while preserving the way your environment works today. As you learn and experiment with the new capabilities, you may eventually want to make some changes, but that is not necessary post migration. 

New features are generally available and automatically migrated on May 6, 2020.

Genesys automatically activated new features while retaining existing workforce management setup specific to each customer.  Users can create a new forecast and schedule, edit existing schedules and view intraday monitoring and adherence views immediately without making any changes to configuration. 

As part of the migration to the new features, some configuration items will look different.  For example, all existing management units, forecasts and schedules are still in place, but are now associated with a new Business Unit.  All existing service goals are still in place, but are now listed under the Service Goal Template and Planning Group menus.  The management unit picker menu at the top right corner of the screen will now be either management unit, business unit or both depending on the screen.  For a summary of the changes, see the auto-migration key concepts page.

Six new features were made generally available on May 6, 2020. 

• Business units
• Service goal templates
• Planning groups
• New work plan constraints for weekly, weekend, planning period and general time periods
• Multi-week forecasting: Forecasts can be created up to 6 weeks in length using Automatic Best Method and Import Forecast creation methods.
• Multi-week scheduling:
  • Blank schedules can be created up to 6 weeks in length. 
  • Generated schedules can be created up to the length of a single forecast, so 6 weeks in length provided that the forecast used for generation is 6 weeks long. 

When you move an agent from one business unit to another, the schedule and adherence information remains with the original business unit. This process allows the supervisor to view the agent in the same spot on the schedule before they moved business units, for historical purposes. After the agent moves to another business unit, any new schedule and adherence information exist under the new business unit.

If an agent moves between management units in the same business unit, adherence and schedule information will still be accessible.

If an entire management unit is moved to a new business unit, it has the same effect as moving all of those agents to a new business unit. A read only copy of schedules and adherence are kept with the old business unit, any new schedule and adherence information will exist under the new management unit.

Time off requests, however, move with the agent to the new management unit. Time off requests are specific to agents, not management units, and should follow the agent with the move.

Yes, this is possible, provided that the users have the appropriate permissions to use the feature.  For example, if you have 250 concurrent user licenses, you could schedule 500 total agents: 250 agents for the morning and 220 agents for the afternoon. For more information about the necessary permissions, see Workforce management permissions overview.

If your organization has concurrent licenses, your billable user count is based on the concurrent peak for the set of users who used WEM features (for example WFM schedules) at some point in a given billing month.

An activity with a flexible start time is represented by outlined increments that precede the current start time.

In the shift view, hover at the beginning or end of an activity. When the cursor changes to a two-sided arrow, click and drag to resize it, extending or reducing the activity length. For more information, see Set up shift activities.

When you set a shift’s start time, you can optionally allow for flexibility in the shift’s starting time. If you configure flexible start times, you can preview the shift at each incremental configured start time by clicking the left and right arrows under Preview shift at. For more information, see Set up shift activities.

The currency icon with a slash next to an activity indicates that it is an unpaid activity. For more information, see Set up shift activities.

The lock icon next to an activity indicates that the activity is marked “Not relative to shift start.” The activity is not dependent upon the shift’s start time. For more information, see Set up shift activities.