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Customer self-service capabilities have been helping manage workload in contact centers for decades. IVRs have been automating self-service since the 1970s. Improvements in search engines have given customers direct access to knowledge base systems to conduct their own troubleshooting and problem-solving. These and other tools have been running alongside the contact center workforce for many years, giving the contact center a much-needed reprieve in headcount requirements. In today’s world, the newest self-service gadget is the “bot”.

When it comes to quality management, most contact centers today have what can be considered a basic program, with a lot of manual processes. At PSCU, the largest credit union service organization in the United States, a partnership with NiCE enabled the organization to fast-track its quality automation and mature its quality program in short order.

Imagine having a gold mine in your yard and never venturing out to dig up some nuggets.

There are thousands of inefficiencies across your business, ranging from process bottlenecks, execution gaps and error-prone manual tasks to systems latency and overreliance on the knowledge base. Yet identifying each of them and knowing which to focus on first in process automation and optimization efforts isn’t easy without access to the right data and insights.

Consumer demand for self-service has only intensified during the pandemic. Nearly two-thirds of CIOs (65%) have seen an increase in the use of self-service by customers or the general public, and 79% expect that usage to continue to grow, according to the Gartner CIO Agenda 2021. Already, some eight out of 10 enterprises today offer at least one self-service app, Forrester has found.

The events of the past couple of years took a strange, unexpected toll on the labor market. During the lockdown, unemployment was high, and workers clung to their jobs. However, now that things are getting (somewhat) back to normal, a significant percentage of American workers have decided not to go back to work.

Shawn Smith, a system analyst at nonprofit health care company Cambia Health Solutions, works mainly with customer service teams. When he stepped into his role more than two years ago, Cambia’s quality evaluations were completed via a recording application and then documented in Word, Excel and OneNote. The organization’s quality program became an immediate focus for Smith, he said.