Workforce Optimization Suite

Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection

Interface Guide

Release 7.6
October 2005
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Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection Interface Guide
Table of Contents

Preface
Master the Complexities of Forecasting and Scheduling 5
Select Functionality that Meets Your Needs 6
Receive Guidance from World-Class Consultants 10
About This Guide 10
In This Section 11
Comments? 12
If You Need Help 12
Technical Support 13
Before You Contact Technical Support 13
Contacting Technical Support 14
Related Documents 14
Conventions 15
15

1 Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection Interface

Related Documents 17
Prerequisites 17
System Requirements 17
Hardware 17
Software 18
Overview 18
File Format 18
Configuration 20
Adding the Interface Package to the Integration Server 20
Configuring the Generic File Import Adapter Component 21
Configuring the Data Source 22
Monitoring the Interface 24
Viewing Time Records 24
Limitations 25

3
4
Preface

Welcome to the Witness Workforce Management Solution.

Witness Systems Workforce Management combines proven
Workforce Management functionality with insightful performance
management and actionable learning capabilities. Comprised of an
easy to use set of software and services, it simplifies the complex
task of forecasting and scheduling, enabling your contact center to
capitalize on the unique skills and proficiencies of each agent. As a
result, you can reduce costs by staffing appropriately to meet your
workload, drive business growth, and improve employee
effectiveness and retention.
With Witness Systems Workforce Optimization you can:
„ Create optimal schedules easily to reduce costs, while reflecting
each agent's unique skills, proficiencies and preferences
„ Increase forecasting accuracy by factoring in a variety of
methods and historical patterns
„ Heighten employee satisfaction, with online shift swapping,
optimal shift bidding, time-off requests, and more
„ Monitor adherence, intra-day trends, and other key contact
center metrics in real time
„ Schedule and manage single, multiple, and virtual contact center
sites across time zones

Master the Complexities of Forecasting and

5
Scheduling
In today's contact center, customer call volumes are moving
targets. And when you factor in multiple sites, expanded media
options, agent proficiencies and preferences, and customer
expectations, the task of forecasting and scheduling becomes
difficult to manage without sophisticated analysis.
That's why Witness Systems offers Workforce Management, a
proven, easy-to-use set of software and services that simplifies the
complex task of forecasting and scheduling while enabling contact
centers to capitalize on the unique skills and proficiencies of every
agent. With Witness Systems’ Workforce Management, you can
reduce costs by staffing appropriately to meet your workload, drive
business growth, and improve employee effectiveness and
turnover.
Workforce Management is part of a portfolio of solutions from
Witness Systems. Long recognized for our browser-based,
multimedia quality monitoring, customer interaction recording
and compliance functionality, Witness Systems now includes the
proven Workforce Management solutions of Blue Pumpkin, a
Witness Systems Company. Thousands of users around the world
rely on our solutions each day to help them optimize their
performance and capture customer intelligence.

Select Functionality that Meets Your Needs

To meet the needs of a broad spectrum of contact centers,
Workforce Management is available in packages that deliver
different levels of functionality. Whether you're an international
organization, a small- to medium-sized business, or something in
between, Witness Systems has foundation-level and strategic
offerings that can help you receive extended business value.
Depending on your business needs today and in the future, you can
invest in the full Operational Series Workforce Management
Package, which is comprised of functionality designed to optimize
agent performance, reduce risk, and automate quality assurance.
Our Advanced Series Workforce Management Package builds on
Operational Series functionality and focuses on optimizing contact
center performance through such business drivers as first call

6
resolution, up-selling, cross-selling, and contact center customer
satisfaction. Although the specific features of the Operational and
Advanced packages differ, they include some or all of the following:
„ Forecasting and Scheduling—Accurate forecasting is the
critical first step in managing your workforce. Witness Systems’
Workforce Management integrates with your ACD and uploads
historical data directly from your ACD's database. Since call
volumes vary depending on marketing campaigns, seasons,
holidays, and other events, Operational Workforce Management
allows you to select, combine, and alter historical data to predict
future call volume and handle time. You can also set up profiles
to model call volume behavior for different events and
circumstances.
Unlike other forecasting and scheduling applications, Workforce
Management's patented skills-based engine incorporates the
unique skills and proficiency levels of each agent. It produces
optimal schedules down to the quarter hour by balancing the
defined shift rules, work patterns, breaks, off-phone times,
agent preferences, agent skills, and targeted service level goals.
By matching the right agents with the right customers,
productivity increases–and so do agent and customer
satisfaction. And when your staffing levels precisely match your
contact volumes, costs go down. For example, you can:
– Schedule single, multiple, or virtual contact centers across all
time zones
– Accommodate a dedicated, blended, or task-switching work
environment
– Schedule meetings or training without impacting service levels
– Automate compliance with government and union regulations
through a comprehensive set of work rules
– Create schedules based on skill priorities that align with your
call routing strategy
– Evaluate different “what if” scenarios, such as full-time versus
part-time, to ensure that you have the right resources to meet
the expected demand
– Create and schedule teams as a unit to support training and
accommodate employee concerns, such as carpooling or
childcare arrangements

7
 „ Adherence—To help you manage and fine-tune your service
levels throughout the day, Operational Workforce Management
monitors adherence to schedule and shows you who's on the
phone and who's not, so you can take corrective action right
away. The intraday “Pulse” feature provides a real-time,
graphical view of forecasted, actual, and predicted call volume,
handle time, service level statistics, and other critical
information. You can configure alerts to notify users of
deviations from plan and use trends to reforecast, reschedule,
and proactively take appropriate staffing corrective actions.
Advanced Workforce Management goes a step further by
providing a complete view of adherence that shows all agent
activities, including front- and back-office tasks such as fax and
paper mail. Your supervisors receive instant alerts for out-of-
adherence states, enabling them to correct problems right away
while receiving a true picture of shrinkage in your contact
center.
„ Contact Center Monitoring and Management—No matter
how carefully you plan, change is a constant in the contact
center. To help you continuously fine-tune your operations,
Witness Systems Workforce Management’s intraday “Pulse”
feature provides a graphical view of contact volume, handle
times, service level statistics, agent adherence levels, and other
critical information. With Pulse, you can:
– Monitor key metrics that get updated with each fresh batch of
data from the ACD
– Track and compare actual, forecasted, and required statistics
by individual queue or combined queue
– View deviations of key contact center metrics in percentages or
absolute numbers
– View intraday trends and historical data
Our Advanced Workforce Management solutions provide a
complete view of all agent activities, including front- and back-
office tasks, such as handling faxes and traditional mail. Your
supervisors receive instant alerts for out-of-adherence states,
enabling them to correct problems right away while receiving a
true picture of shrinkage in your contact center. Better still,

8
 intraday management capabilities display trends, enabling you
to reforecast and reschedule for the remainder of the day.
Witness Systems’ Workforce Management includes role-
appropriate scorecards that display actual employee
performance metrics. Our advanced solutions include an
extensive set of predefined key performance indicators (KPIs),
enabling your contact center staff to see how they're performing
against their goals. This visibility into performance can motivate
your staff to improve while enabling managers to identify trends
and take the appropriate action.
„ Web-based Agent Self-Service—Witness Systems
Workforce Management lets agents easily manage and
contribute to their own schedules without impacting service
levels. By bringing Workforce Management to the agent
desktop, you can build agent morale and retention while
enabling your managers to focus on more critical areas, such as
coaching and performance-related tasks.
Using any Web browser, agents can securely:
– Request vacations and other types of time off, even down to
portions of a day. (This applies to centers that use seniority or
rank as part of their scheduling practices.)
– Set preferences for days off and start times. Agents indicate
their first, second, and third choices for start times for each
day of the week. The scheduling algorithm balances these
preferences and then develops a schedule that optimizes
center and agent requirements.
– Swap shifts. Agents can post, negotiate, and request shift
swaps via an online Swap Board. Swap requests are screened
by Workforce Management's conflict checker and forwarded
to managers for quick and easy processing.
– View schedule and time-off information. With just a glance,
agents can get a summary of their schedules for the week and
the status of their shift swap, time off, and vacation requests.
„ Actionable Learning—To help your agents develop their
skills and career paths, Witness Systems Workforce
Management enables you to produce your own library of best
practices from recorded customer interactions. By leveraging
your finest examples of customer service, you can help your

9
 agents learn valuable skills and procedures. A browser-based
interface allows agents to take training right at their desktops, in
a classroom, or remotely.
Supervisors select the appropriate training sessions from a
library of courseware, assign the training to agents, monitor
completion, and track the effectiveness of the training over time.
A flexible system of access rights enables supervisors to browse
through course completion reports and subsequent agent
performance records for individual students, teams, or contact
centers. This enables you to determine areas for individual or
group improvement and take action. It's an efficient, consistent
way to handle training across your entire enterprise.

Receive Guidance from World-Class

Consultants
The Witness Systems’ Workforce Management packages include
implementation services. We also offer business consulting
services that can help you get the most from your investment.
These services are delivered by Witness Systems’ seasoned
consultants, who have years of experience with contact centers of
all sizes, types and industries from around the globe. Our goal is to
partner with you and to provide world-class services that offer
measurable results and a rapid return on investment. From
implementation to consulting to technical support and training
services, you can be confident that Witness Systems services are
delivered by people who understand business practices and contact
center operations-and care about your success.

About This Guide

This guide is intended for use by Witness Workforce Optimization
Suite administrators. It guides you through the steps to configure
the Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection Interface
adapter.

10
 For information on installing any of the Workforce Optimization Suite
components discussed in this guide, please consult the online
documentation available through Witness Systems’s eSupport site:

http://www.witness.com/support

This guide is not intended to teach the basics of computer or

software operation or use, and does not contain tutorial
information. It is assumed that you are experienced in working
with contact center equipment and software applications as well as
PC workstation hardware and software.
Please note that this document is intended primarily for
viewing on-line. However, the format of the document is based
on that of a printed manual, to support customers who print all or
portions of the document. For similar reasons, entries in the Table
of Contents and cross references refer to page numbers. Those
same entries function as hyperlinks for ease of use when the
document is viewed electronically.

Colors may not print legibly on black and white printers. If you are using
a non-color printer, select the option to print colors as black.

In addition, please note that the screen shots used in this

guide are for illustrative purposes only. There may be some
differences between what you see in the product and these
screenshots, but those differences should not be significant or
affect the accuracy of the information contained in this guide.

In This Section
This section contains the following information:
„ How to send Witness Systems comments about this document.
See page 12.
„ How to get help. See page 12.
„ How to contact Witness Systems Technical Support. See page
14.
„ Related Documents. See page 14.
„ Conventions used in this manual. See page 15.

11
Comments?
Witness Systems, Inc. believes that the documentation for a
product is an integral part of the product itself. We know that the
quality of this document can affect the overall quality and usability
of the Witness Systems product which it documents. Therefore, we
are continuously looking for ways to improve our product
documentation. Your comments are valuable and will be carefully
considered before publishing the next release of this document. If
you find any errors, or have suggestions for improvements to this
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If You Need Help

Witness Systems is a strong believer in customer satisfaction. Our
products are designed to provide you with the best performance for

12
 your money and we want to make sure you get what you paid for.
One way of doing this is to provide you with the best support,
including the following resources:
Witness Systems, Inc.’s World-Wide-Web site: This facility
allows users world wide fast access to product information,
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solutions information.
Direct Internet FTP: This facility greatly speeds up transfer of
new and upgraded software to all Witness Systems customers.

Technical Support
Help from Technical Support is as near as your keyboard or your
telephone. However, before you contact us, please read the
following section. We can provide faster and better service if you
have certain information available when you contact us.

Before You Contact Technical Support

Many problems can be quickly solved with the information in the
on-line help system or in this manual. When running the product,
you can select the Help button in the upper right portion of the
window to get help for the active window or dialog box.
If you are unable to solve a problem by using the on-line help or
this manual and need help from Technical Support, please do the
following before you contact Technical Support:
1 Write down the exact problem and any details which may help
us solve the problem. If you can consistently reproduce the
problem, please list the steps to reproduce it.
2 Have at least the following information available when you
contact Technical Support.
– Product name and version number
– Server and client operating systems and service pack version
numbers
– Supporting files and screenshots (if available)
– ACD type and reporting package (for ACD related issues)

13
 – The wording of any error messages from the product and/or
operating system.
– Has this problem occurred previously? If it is new, did you
change your system configuration recently?
3 Log on to the Technical Support eSupport web page at
http//www.witness.com/support.

Contacting Technical Support

Witness Systems provides a range of support options:
„ Online via the eSupport web site, including e-mail contact.
„ Telephone support is available, based on your maintenance
contract.

If using telephone support, please call from a phone near your

computer. We may need you to access information or run the program
while you are on the phone.

Europe/Middle East/
Americas
Africa/Asia Pacific

http//www.witness.com/support
(If you are reading this manual on-line, click on the URL above to
activate your web browser and go to the eSupport page.

+1 800 4 WITNESS (USA toll-free) Europe/Middle East/Africa

+1 770 754 1870 +0800 496 1111
+44 (0)1372 869 570
Hong Kong/Asia Pacific
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Australia
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New Zealand
+61 2 8223 9493
Japan
+81 (0)3 5919 1875

Related Documents
For further information about the Witness Workforce
Optimization Suite, see the following Witness Systems document:

14
 „ Witness Workforce Optimization Suite Administration Guide

Conventions
The following table shows the conventions that are used in this
manual.
Convention How Used

blue Notes in this document are in blue and are indicated by the
following symbol:

Apart from notes, references to other sections and pages in

this document are also in blue. You can click on the blue text
to go to the referenced section or page.
bold Bold text in a sentence shows commands or menu choices
that you are to select, or text or commands that you are to
enter. It is also used to highlight the first use of a new term.
This term may be defined in the Glossary or described in the
text where the word is introduced.
gold Tips in this document are in gold and are indicated by the
following symbol:

italics Text in italics is used to call attention to important

information.
red Cautions and warnings in this document are in red. Cautions
are indicated by the following symbol:

Warnings are indicated by the following symbol:

user entry Bold text in an example shows text or commands that you
should enter. It also distinguishes software function terms and
commands, library names, file names, and directory path
names.
Example: Type a:\install.
user variable Italic and bold screen text shows a variable that you are to
replace with an actual value, such as a number or name.
Example: enter C:\<directory name>

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16
Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection
Interface

The Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection Interface is a

continuous process that extracts employee time records from a flat
file and inserts them into the database. The rate of import is
configurable with a minimum value of one second.

Related Documents
The following document contains information that may be helpful
when installing and/or using this interface.
„ Witness Workforce Optimization Suite Administration Guide

Prerequisites
This section contains information you should know and directions
you must follow before using the Generic – FTCI – File Import
Time Collection Interface software.

System Requirements
Hardware The system requirements for the Witness Integration Server Server
are adequate for the interface.

17
 Software Before you use the Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection
Interface, ensure that the following software applications are
already installed.
„ Witness Workforce Optimization Suite, version 7.6.0.
„ Witness Integration Server, version 7.6.0.

Overview
The interface reads a file containing time records in a specific
format and creates new time records. It only imports records that
are more recent than the current one.
For example, if an employee has a current time entry with date
2005-06-27 14:00:01, and the interface reads a record with a date
2005-06-27 10:00:01, the second record will be rejected since it is
older.

File Format
The format of the import file is as follows:
agent_identifier|event_mode|event_reason|
date_time_stamp

where:
The agent identifier is the value of the Agent ID field, as shown
in the graphic below:

18
 The event mode can be found in the Reason Code tab, as shown
in the graphic below:

The event reason can also be found on the Reason Code tab, but
is an optional field in the import file.
Sample records are shown below:
2570|10|1|2005-06-27 14:00:01
2570|20|1|2005-06-27 14:05:01

The records are separated by the | delimiter; the delimeter

character is configurable. The date/time format is also
configurable. Records need not be sorted; the interface takes care
of sorting the records based on the date.

19
 For the interface to work correctly, the agent identifier and reason codes
should be configured correctly; please refer to the Witness Workforce
Optimization Suite Administration Guide.

Configuration
The Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection Interface is
installed as an integral part of the Witness Integration Server
server installation, and is activated, if licensed, as described in the
Witness Workforce Optimization Suite Administration Guide.
To configure the Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection
Interface, you add the package to your Integration Server
configuration, and complete the tabs that are associated with its
components.

Adding the Interface Package to the Integration Server

To add the interface package to Witness Integration Server:
1 Log into the Suite as an administrator.
2 In the System module, go to the Integration tab.
3 Select the integration server and click Edit Configuration.
4 Select the topmost entry in the Integration Packages pane,
Integration Server (Root).

5 Click the Workflow tab.

6 Select the Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection
Interface package from the list of available packages and click
the arrow to move the package to the list of selected
packages.
7 Click Save.
The screen refreshes. You should now be able to see the Generic
– FTCI – File Import Time Collection Interface package listed in
the leftmost pane, Integration Packages.

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Configuring the Generic File Import Adapter Component
To configure the Generic File Import Adapter component of the
Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection Interface:
1 Select the Generic File Import Adapter component.

The following table lists the configuration parameters and gives a

brief description of each:
Parameter Description
Location Of Files To Import Path of the file to import.
If the path is not in UNC format, the
drive location is assumed to be on
the Witness Integration Server
server.
The user account running the
Witness Integration Server service
must have write privileges to this
path.
Time Interval Between Import (sec) The number of second the interface
“sleeps” before importing a file.

The interface also has a set of configuration parameters that are

related to performance and internal operations. These parameters
are available in the Advanced Configuration container, as shown
below:

21
 The following table describes the advanced configuration
parameters for this interface:
Parameter Description
DATE_TIME_FORMAT The date time format of the event. This is
specified using java.text.MessageFormat
The default is yyyy-MM-dd HH:mm:ss.
The interface always expects this format
when parsing the date/time field in the
input record. If the input format changes,
you need to change this value accordingly.
SEPARATOR_CHAR The character that separates two columns
in the record. By default, the | character
is the default separator.
ARCHIVE_DIRECTORY The input file that is parsed will be
archived in this directory. The file is
renamed with an extension .bak.
ARCHIVE_DURATION_IN_DAYS Number of days to keep the archived file.
Files past the expiration date are deleted.

Configuring the Data Source

Associating the data source with the integration is an important
step. To do this:
1 Select the Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection
Interface in the tree at the left side of the window.
2 Click its Data Source tab.
3 Choose the data source with which the events processed by this
package should be associated, as shown in the following graphic.

22
 The data source time zone should always have the same time
zone as that of the time record.
For example, let’s say the file contains the following record:
1|10|0|2005-06-22 14:00:01
The interface obtains the data source that was assigned and
assumes the record was created by a system residing in the
Pacific Time Zone. If this assumption is correct, the time records
will show up correctly. If not, there will be time differences.

Make sure the data source associated with the Generic – FTCI –
File Import Time Collection Interface is not used by any other
Time Collection interface, because this situation could
potentially invalidate the records imported by this interface. The
only way to make sure no other interface is using this data
source is by manually checking the Data Source tab of each Time
Collection interface that is configured for your system.

You can now use the Generic – FTCI – File Import Time Collection
Interface.

23
Monitoring the Interface
The number of events processed and the status of the interface can
be monitored from the package’s Monitor tab, as shown in the
following graphic:

Every time an event is parsed correctly by the interface, text within

brackets is displayed to the right of the label Last event
timestamp, consisting of the agent’s ID, the event mode, and the
event reason.

Viewing Time Records

To check if the interface has imported the data from the file
correctly:
1 Go to the Tracking module, Adherence section, and click the Day
Details tab.

2 Select the employee. The time records for that employee are
displayed, as shown below:

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Limitations
You need to take into account the following limitations of the
interface:
1 If the event time stamp of an event is ahead of that of the BPFX
server, the event is rejected. This can happen if the clock of the
system that generates the file is out of synchronization with the
Witness Integration Server server clock.
2 The interface cannot import historic events.
3 If the file contains records that are prior to the employee’s start
date, the records will be inserted but may cause some
unexpected behavior in the real time adherence module.

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26