No call center can hope to manage its calls and set up processes without having appropriate tools in place. These tools are absolutely critical to the smooth functioning of call centers. Call management tools help the call center manager to define the routing of calls, analyze their pattern, and monitor their progression till the calls are closed. In outbound calls, call management helps the call center manager to identify the best time to call customers, based on historical data and intelligent analysis.

In essence, call management comprises intelligent tools that help in predictive dialing, routing of calls, and providing detailed call patterns that can be utilized for performance enhancement.

There are three aspects to a call management tool. The first aspect involves customer interface tools, wherein there is intelligent routing of calls. This routing takes place at the ACD level in the case of inbound calls and the dialer level in the case of outbound calls. The second aspect involves tracking the progress of calls. This takes place at the IVR level and the re-routing of calls based on skill sets and availability of idle agents. Finally the integration of front-end tools with the backend, which takes places at the CTI level, so that agents are able to draw information and use it intelligently for enhancing customer experience.

The workforce management tool sits somewhere in between the ACD and CTI, in order to use the workforce optimally.

The tools capture information that managers need to examine operational efficiency besides giving managers real-time summary reports on a call center's operation. Call center managers can analyze calling patterns based on phone numbers or calling source like hotels, cellular phones, or pay phones; explore special call treatments (including malicious calls, service-observed calls, and audio problems), and call abandon patterns. In short, it provides cradle-to-grave reporting of calls with both local storage and external archives.

Optimizing Usage
Optimizing the deployment of such tools depend largely on how well the customization is done. Call routing, queuing, agent talk time, and hold time are all dependent on business logic.

For instance, it always makes better sense to route a routine inquiry call to an IVR system while a call that has been made to place an order can be directed to an agent. Calls made to register complaints can be queued on a priority line with very short holding time (assumption being that the customer is agitated).

Since the ultimate aim of any call center is to serve customers, it is important to configure the thresholds to minimize delays and divert calls to alternate queues. This would ensure that no caller has to wait for too long.

Similarly it is important to define the time agents can take to solve customers' problems, after which there should be automatic escalation of calls to a supervisor or a specialist.

Since all these are also tools that help in the enhancement of agents' performance, it is important to set metrics for agent performance.

By having performance information readily available, agents can themselves see how they are performing. While setting up metrics, it is important to focus on what to measure rather than how to measure. This takes the focus away from holding agents accountable for statistics, such as average handle time and number of calls answered per hour, to focus on the quality of transactions. The focus shifts to agents' knowledge levels, how they interact with members, and how well they navigate the existing systems.

However, such shifts in focus would need to be accompanied by a strategic shift internally wherein the agents' failure would need to be addressed from the management perspective-addressing questions like whether the agents require more training, more assistance, or whether a particular tool is slowing down agent performance.

Although TDM still rules the roost, the migration towards IP is inevitable and it shall happen sooner than later. Therefore, it is important to remember that all ACDs have a smooth migration path to IP systems.

Another often understated issue is the association of CTI with plain voice. While CTI by itself may be voice, its deployment in a call center environment can only be effective when it can be properly integrated its data network, i.e. the IVR has to be able to talk properly with the database at the back-end. Integrating the CTI with the back-end is a key challenge in successfully designing a call center architecture. Choosing the right integrator is as much the key as selecting the right portfolio of products.

Second with the increasing popularity of speech recognition systems, it is important to ensure that IVRs have that feature when selecting one. Speech based IVR are easier to use and are therefore increasingly more preferred than traditional IVRs.

Finally it is important to restrict the number of punches as much as possible when the customer is on the IVR. Punching endless number and waiting to hearing a human voice can be the most frustrating experience. This has been responsible in bringing a bad name to IVR as a productivity tool with many alleging that it has been overused and coming in the way of customer satisfaction.

The IVR should configure a threshold number of punches as well be able to recognize the urgency of a customer query based on the number of punches or dial-ins. At the same time it is important to ensure that IVR is intelligent enough to recognize the required input with minimal customer prompts otherwise it frustrates the customer.

SOME FAQs
While deploying call management tools it is important to ensure that the product is compatible with existing infrastructure and to size the server correctly in order to get the optimum performance from applications.

It is a good idea to run through the a list of FAQs when deciding to buy any call management tool. Some FAQs are listed below.

• How will the solution lower cost of ownership, supportability, and administrative burden associated with technology infrastructure and applications?
• How will the solution allow to minimize hold time, resulting in a lower cost per call?
• How can the business overhead be reduced by consolidating contact centers?
• What would be the recommended hardware configuration for running the applications?
• Ask for a description of the call control methodology used by the system that analyzes, routes, and queues calls based on each of the following criteria:

-ANI/DNIS
-Call volumes
-Performance criteria
-Priority queuing

• Can skillsets be networked across multiple call center locations?
• Does the solution provide call control based on the following criteria?

-Agent skills
-Customer preference
-Inbound and outbound call levels
-Multi-media

• Ask for a description of the capabilities for the system to reprioritize a contact (that has already been queued) and modify its routing (e.g., re-queue the contact to an alternate skillset).
• Ask for a description of the call routing scripting capability.

MARKET INFORMATION
The leading players are Avaya, Nortel, Cisco, Alcatel, Concerto, Siemens and Ericsson. Cisco is clearly the leader in IP-based contact center solutions while others are playing catch-up. Almost every vendor worth his name has an IP-offering and is gearing up for aggressive action.

There is hardly any player with offering the complete suite of call management tools. Concerto offers ACD (Rockwell) and dailer (Ensemble Pro) although it does not have pre-routing tool. Some of Concerto's SI partners in India include GTL, 3D, Network Solutions, Wipro, Bay TalkiTech, Ramco, Datacraft.

Avaya Global Connect has ACD, CTI and dialer with their acquisition of Mosaic. It is the exclusive integrator and does not have partnership with other SIs.

Cisco offers the ACD on its IPCC platform and pre-routing tool (GeoTel) and its integrators include Datacraft (Advanced Technology Partner), and Network Solutions.

Alcatel offers a pre and post routing tool (Genesys), ACD and dialer. GTL and ABSI are the two integrators of Alcatel.

Nortel offers CTI, ACD, pre-routing and post-routing and IVR. It does not have a dailer. Nortel's partners include GTL, 3D, Wipro, Ramco and Spanco.

Siemens offers ACD and CTI and the integration is done by SISL. Ericsson offers ACD and it is represented in India by HCL Infosystems. Servion and Parsec are smaller players, popular in the sub-100 seat space.