High schedule adherence brings a degree of predictability that is invaluable in a contact centre environment. You can anticipate productivity, accommodate call volumes, and plan for dips/spikes. While achieving perfect schedule adherence is difficult in a large contact centre, there are small steps that can help you improve this metric. For example, the switch to WFH successfully improved schedule adherence by 7.4% this year.
But before you aim for greater adherence to agent schedules, let us explore the precise meaning of this metric.
What is Schedule Adherence?
You can define schedule adherence as a percentage measure reflecting how closely an agent’s actual daily activities as reported by the contact centre logs match their pre-scheduled tasks as originally set for the day. The number may lie anywhere between 100% and 0% – a higher value indicating greater, more predictable productivity.
Here’s how you can calculate schedule adherence for individual agents at your contact centre:
((Agent total handling time including hold time, talk time, wrap-up + scheduled breaks + scheduled meetings) ÷ total agent login hours for the day) x 100
For example, let’s say an agent logs in at 9 AM and is scheduled to be available until 5 PM. that is a total login time of eight hours or 480 minutes. During this time, if they spend five hours on handling calls, half an hour in breaks, and half an hour in meetings, their schedule adherence will look like this:
((300 + 30 + 30) ÷ 480) x 100 = 83.33%
Do keep in mind that a higher schedule adherence KPI doesn’t necessarily mean that an agent is working longer hours or taking more calls. If they put in just four hours availability but are active for three and a half hours, they might be working less but are definitely more productive.
