What If Scenarios and Calabrio WFM

What are "What If" scenarios in Workforce Management? How does Calabrio WFM use What If scenarios? Everything you wanted to know and more!

Show Notes

Dave Hoekstra and Florian Garnier, Product Marketing Manger for WFM discuss how Calabrio WFM uses What If scenarios to assist analysts with their forecasting and scheduling needs.  They cover what "What If" scenarios are, how they are used, and examples of how scenarios can be applied in real world situations. 

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Dave Hoekstra: hello everyone.

And welcome to the next
edition of Calabrio shorts.

My name is Dave Hoekstra product
evangelist here at Calabrio.

And today we are going to be talking about
what if scenarios in Calabrio WFM and in

workforce management in general, joining
me today to give us his take on the

subject is the product marketing manager
for WFM here at Calabrio Florian Garnier.

We are super excited
to have Floria in here.

How are you Florian?

Florian Garnier: Thanks for
having me appreciate it.

Well,

Dave Hoekstra: no problem.

Always good to talk to a
friend and a colleague here,

so let's get right into it.

About what if scenarios, I suppose
the first question right off the

bat is what is a, what if scenario?

What, what, what do they do?

Florian Garnier: What is a,
what if, yeah, I like it.

So you know, pretty common in the
contact center industry to wonder what

if I had more agents to help me out.

What if I put more shifts in
the morning or at night time?

What if my forecast.

30% below what it's coming today.

What would it do overall to
to, to my contact center?

So the goal of what if scenarios is
to help you answer those questions, to

help you gauge different scenarios that
exist and and better plan essentially

based on, on the various scenarios.

It's, it's really cool functions.

Dave Hoekstra: So the general idea is.

I want to play around with something.

But I maybe don't want to mess with
my production information, right.

Because that, that can affect people's

Florian Garnier: lives.

That's right.

Yeah, no.

What if next year we have
30% increase in in volume.

How are we going to handle this
from a recruiting standpoint?

How are we going to plan our resources?

And yes, to your point, you don't want to
do that to in your production environment.

You have folks that are relying
on the data that currently

exists in your WFM tool.

So you, you don't play
around with that much.

You you want to be able to have those
alternate scenarios you can play with.

Dave Hoekstra: So how do, how do, what
if scenarios work in collaborative?

Yeah.

Florian Garnier: Well, it's pretty simple.

You w whenever you open a, both a
schedules module or the forecast module,

you are asked what scenario you want
to to schedule or forecast in it's.

Pretty consistent throughout the platform
asking you which scenarios you want

to open things in so that you so that
you can use yeah, multiple scenarios.

You can actually have an unlimited
number of scenarios you can run.

So let's say you open your forecast
module and yeah, you, you have 5, 10,

15 different scenarios you want to run.

You're able to do that.

You can export data.

From your, what if scenario to your
default scenario, which is a really

cool function, because it, maybe you
find a, what if scenarios that you

feel like is going to be reality very
soon or schedules that are perfect to

the requirements that you've laid out.

And you want to export those schedules
from your scenario over to your

default scenario, your production
environment, and you do that with

just a couple clicks of a button.

It's.

Dave Hoekstra: And I know you have a
fair amount of experience doing some

of these things in the real world as do
I w where have you maybe used these in

your past to help you make a decision?

Can you give us a specific example?

Florian Garnier: Yeah, absolutely.

Multiple occasions we've had, depending
on the holidays or operational goals

that that the, you know, an organization
gives you specifically for me, it

was you know, Asking, we need to hit
some cost goals over the next year.

What happens if we reduce our
volume of contacts coming in?

Or if our handle time we can drive down
our handle time through processes better

access to knowledge base for associates,
better tools maybe a simplified UI.

We can reduce our handle time.

In our, in our, maybe our, our
volume with folks reducing pains for

customers through a better UI also for
reaching out or self service options.

So can you please tell me in
order to reach this financial

goal by the end of next year?

What can I do?

And so I would provide multiple
scenarios of you know, handle

time reducing by 5, 10, 15, 20% of
volume, reducing by the same amount,

our same percentages, and then a.

I wouldn't be able to present options to
my executive leadership and saying, okay,

we don't have only one path that we need
to take to to to hit our financial goals.

We have multiple options
and let's land on the ones.

That's the most realistic that
you think you can achieve.

And using those scenarios, we
were able to to provide options

to our executive leaders.

So

Dave Hoekstra: maybe mentioned that
how collaborative your FM uses it.

Do you have a limit on how many scenarios
you can set up within the system?

Florian Garnier: Absolutely.

You don't have a limits.

You you can create as many
scenarios as your heart desires.

That's both in the scheduling or in
the forecasting world that allows

you to to be extremely flexible.

No matter how much you want to get
creative with the, the scenarios

you want to, you want to create.

What if all of my agents decide
that they need to take their

dog out at the same time.

And I have, you know, 95%
reduced staff for the afternoon

for the same 20 to 30 minutes.

No, there's all kinds of
crazy examples you can give.

And, and, and.

Unlimited number of scenarios.

Dave Hoekstra: Could you have imagined
five years ago that a scenario we

might be playing in our head is all
of our agents needed walk their dog

at the same time that that's a new

Florian Garnier: one, you know funny
enough I worked in an office where you

were allowed to bring your dogs in.

So yeah, that was actually part of our
shrinkage calculations is Well, that's

Dave Hoekstra: classic Florian.

Everyone always has a better story
ready to go then then, than I do now.

So I think just a brief recap.

What if scenarios are a way that a WFM
admin can essentially remove the planning

process from default and productive?

And work towards whatever
goal they might be.

It could be something as simple as what is
our FTE reduction look like if we reduce

our handle time by 30 seconds, or I need
to build an entire shift bid roster.

In a separate scenario and see how
it's going to affect, but I also

want to build this shift bid roster,
expecting a 20% increase in my forecast.

You don't want to go in and mess
around with your production forecast.

You definitely want to work with
something outside of what's going on.

And that's really what the whole
key to a, what if scenario is and

how they are used in Calabrio WFM.

So.

Basically, we wanted to give it just a
really good overview of what a, what if

scenario was and how they particularly
work inside collaborative WFM.

So Florian, this was great.

Anything you want to add
before we get outta here?

Florian Garnier: No, I think overall
I encourage Anybody who uses Calabrio

WFM or any other blood forms use?

What if scenarios?

It is a tremendous tool to help not only
the workforce management team, but your

executive teams and your team leaders
answer some fairly simple questions that

the you know, that keeps them up at night.

What if this happened?

What if you know, things that we
didn't really think about before the

pandemic And, you know, what if my
volume increases by a thousand percent,

because now we're all working remotely
and we have greater needs for online

businesses or whatever the case may be.

All those scenarios can be answered
and for staffing and scheduling

and resource blending purposes.

So, yeah, and I encourage
everybody out there to use.

All right.

Dave Hoekstra: Well, if you
have more questions, we are

[e-mail] and we are
happy to take those and maybe flooring.

And I could chat with you about your,
what if scenarios at some point.

So, thanks again, Floyd really appreciate
the time you joining us today and

thanks to thanks to all our listeners
out there and stay tuned for the

next episode of collaborator shorts.

Take care, everyone,
and we'll see you soon.