Case Study: iQor

CUSTOMER PROFILE

THE GOAL

As a large and high-growth business process outsourcer delivering over one hundred million contacts annually, iQor’s needs evolve rapidly. iQor was managing a large percentage of its teams on a different workforce management solution but some employees could not easily be scheduled because of system limitations and scaling issues. iQor meanwhile was adding thousands of employees per year to its roster, increasing pressure on its WFM capabilities.

iQor was seeking greater centralization of reporting and workforce management. Many of iQor’s 50+ contact centers and work-at-home teams worldwide operated semi-autonomously. iQor recognized that to remain a global BPO leader capable of seamlessly serving multiple lines of business for the world’s largest companies, it would need to better manage occupancy and usage system-wide. The team model disruption of pandemic response, in which several thousand iQor employees suddenly became work-at-home employees, also put pressures on shrinkage, performance and culture.

iQor looked for a WFM solution that would address the obvious pain points of size and scale, while also providing a comprehensive mobile app interface and improved reporting for supervisors and managers. iQor also wanted to select a partner with a comprehensive umbrella of solutions to address today’s issues as well as tomorrow’s opportunities.

THE SOLUTION

iQor selected to move 21,000 of its global teams to NICE cloud solutions for workforce management, employee engagement, and robotic process automation. NICE IEX Workforce Management met iQor’s key priorities for a new WFM solution, including a mature cloud implementation, a full-function mobile app, and sophisticated automation which removes the need for manual intervention on several transactions including schedule trades.

iQor now has full visibility into intraday operations and management across this employee community, and the tools it needs to manage ongoing trend growth as well as seasonal variations. iQor achieved on- time rollout of NICE Workforce Management in late 2020 and took that momentum into its EEM deployment.

THE RESULTS

iQor has seen improvements in several KPIs, including higher occupancy and improved employee engagement. NICE’s real-time alert capabilities have improved adherence, and superior employee communication modules have made it easier to communicate overtime and voluntary time off opportunities as well.

Rolling out the solution to 50 plus contact centers, many of which were accustomed to more autonomy in their WFM practices, created adoption risk. iQor and NICE’s project teams worked closely to communicate the changes and benefits during the rollout, and to escalate and address pressing issues when needed.

The growing standardization on NICE puts iQor in position to communicate its value to enterprises as a partner with superior business practices built on a solid, scalable platform. Additionally, iQor deployed ‘WFM-as-a-Service’ powered by NICE to companies with internal call centers, who require the resources, WFM expertise and best practices an iQor and NICE partnership can offer their employees.

iQor has also been better able to absorb the disruption in previous standard operating practices stemming from the tenfold increase in employees working from home for the foreseeable future. The NICE Employee Engagement Module is meeting internal targets for employee interaction and workforce flexibility.

iQor uses the NEVA RPA platform to support employees where they need it most; creating great customer experiences. iQor invests in an internal RPA team to identify manual data tasks that can improve both agent and customer satisfaction.

THE NEXT STEPS

iQor is a people first company and knows that life happens. The company is focused on providing tools to empower agents to manage their own schedules by seeing their schedules in real time and request changes through an online portal powered by NICE. The company sees an immutable bond in employee and customer satisfaction.

iQor also sees more opportunity to adjust and adapt to a post-pandemic workforce which will be more work-from-home than pre-pandemic times. Shifting to a centrally-managed and globally scalable cloud solution will make it easier to test scenarios, automate business rules, and optimize operations even when prior-years data reflects a different workforce mix.