8x8 is expanding its contact center capabilities, announcing that it will roll out direct support for workforce management as a standard feature of its 8x8 Contact Center platform from mid-November. The company also now provides native support and direct sales for most widely used Mitel SIP desk phones, strengthening its position in enterprise communications.
By building workforce management into the 8x8 Platform for CX, the business communications platform provider aims to help small and midsize contact centers to forecast, schedule, and staff across voice and digital channels quickly without requiring professional services or complex configuration.
As customer interactions now span chat, email, and social media alongside traditional voice calls, managing staffing and service levels has become more complicated. Many organizations still rely on spreadsheets or standalone WFM tools that operate separately from the contact center, requiring business to manage multiple vendor contracts and teams to use extra logins, manual processes and fragmented data.
8x8’s platform brings together contact center, unified communications and communication APIs in one environment, helping businesses manage employee and customer interactions in real time.
By using AI throughout the system, the integration gives CX and IT leaders real-time visibility and control to adjust contact center staffing and respond faster to customer needs. They can manage demand across channels more efficiently while keeping service quality and operations on track.
Bringing in WFM functionality increases agent engagement and transparency, as they can view their schedules, track shift changes, and update their availability in one place, cutting down on admin tasks. Built-in forecasting, reusable shift templates, and easy-to-read dashboards take the place of spreadsheets, streamlining operations and making scheduling more strategic.
And as organizations grow, they can expand into more advanced capabilities or connect with partner solutions without disrupting their workflows.
“Contact centers today are being asked to do more with less – across more channels, with higher customer expectations,” said Hunter Middleton, Chief Product Officer at 8x8.