This guide is recommended for anyone who is responsible for workforce management (WFM) planning and volume forecasting, as well as the initial installation and organizational set-up of Zendesk WFM. Common roles include WFM planner, forecaster, admin, or manager.
Typically, planners take on an admin role in Zendesk WFM by setting up the system, importing Zendesk agents, and configuring basic settings.
Planning your implementation
Prior to setting up Zendesk WFM, you and your team should identify requirements and align on ownership of different workforce management workstreams. Some common considerations are outlined here.
Administrative planning and oversight:
- Zendesk WFM configuration and governance, including roles and permissions
- Forecasting, scheduling, reporting, and alignment around time-off reasons
- Organizational enablement and change management
Functional ownership and feature administration:
- Forecast and schedule generation and time-off management
- Daily schedule or intraday management
- Real-time monitoring and report analysis
For more information about the technical requirements for installation, see Planning staffing with forecast and schedule.
Establish your initial forecast of ticket volume
The past six months of ticket data is brought over upon installation and you can generate a forecast. However, even before you install Zendesk WFM, you can establish a reliable estimate of ticket volume with just a month’s worth of ticket data. This pre-work helps you determine workstream needs and shift assignments for your installation.
For more information on setting up forecasts, see Selecting the historical volume period.
Define roles and permissions
- Admins: Do you need additional admins to grant access as your workforce expands or contracts? Do you need help generating forecasts, schedules or setting up dashboards?
- Managers: Will all managers schedule and monitor day-to-day activity, or will you divide those responsibilities? Do you need someone to focus on intraday scheduling?
- Agents: Do you need to give some agents monitoring or team lead responsibilities?
You can also create Zendesk WFM roles so that you can distribute the work of managing your workforce as outlined above.
For more information, see About agent permissions.
Installing Zendesk WFM
To activate Zendesk WFM, see Buying Zendesk workforce engagement management add-ons (Zendesk WFM, Zendesk QA, and WEM bundle) or contact our sales team.
) appears in two places in your Zendesk Support account:
- The top menu bar where agents start and end their day
- The left sidebar where agents access their schedule and time-off requests.
What you'll see after installation
) in the navigation bar, then selecting Agent permissions. You’ll see the following data in your agent’s Zendesk profile:
- Name
- Role in Zendesk
- Group(s) membership in Zendesk
What agents see after installation
Agents interact with Zendesk WFM minimally in their Zendesk ticketing interface — in the left sidebar where they’ll access their schedules, as icons above their ticket list, and in the navigation bar to clock in or out of general tasks or ticketing work.
Setting up your organization structure
To configure Zendesk WFM, you’ll first set up your organization structure.
In the Zendesk WFM web app, hover over the admin icon (
) in the navigation bar, then select Organization structure.
Locations
Within locations, you’ll create shifts and decide where and when work gets done. You group agents by geographic location or office designation and define operational rules for work hours. Shifts can be automatic, where your forecast determines shift start time, or fixed, the more common selection, where managers determine when shifts start and what occurs within them.
A pre-configured location displays by default and includes the location name, hours, and shift requirements. You’ll add, edit, or delete new locations from the admin panel.
For more information about adding shifts, different types of shifts, and shift intraday variants, see Setting up locations and shifts in Zendesk WFM.
Workstreams
Workstreams segment work by organizing your team's work around Zendesk channels and other properties. Workstreams are a foundational component of WFM because they determine forecasts and daily schedules.
You can think of workstreams as ticket queues. By default, Zendesk WFM creates Tickets, Chat, and Voice workstreams to get you started. You can edit these workstreams and create others as well.
When you create a workstream:
- First, configure the Settings. This includes the workstream name, description, and color for visual identification in your forecast and team’s calendar.
- Next, define Conditions to select criteria for automatically assigning tickets to the workstream. Workstream conditions work similarly to the conditions in Zendesk business rules and determine which tickets go into the workstream.
- Finally, assign workstreams to your agents by group, team, or location.
Workstreams can also be combined. For example, if you have a workstream for Tier 1 customers and one for Chat tickets, you could create a single workstream that assigns all Tier 1 chats and emails to one team for consistency.
For more information about creating, configuring, and combining workstreams, see About Zendesk WFM workstreams.
Teams
For more information about how to create a team, see Setting up teams in Zendesk WFM.
Time off reasons
For more information about categorizing time off, see Creating time off reasons for agents.
Managing users and access
You can define roles and permissions to suit your organization’s needs. In the Zendesk WFM web app, hover over the admin icon () in the navigation bar, then select Roles and permissions.
Roles and permissions
In Zendesk WFM, you’ll set up and manage agent roles and permissions in three places:
- At installation, you can allow or restrict access in a way that reflects your organization's structure and access management system.
Restrict access to Zendesk WFM so that only agents in the groups or roles you list have access. For example, you can allow only a subset of agents, such as admins or a specific Zendesk group, to use the app. It's recommended to give all agents access though.
- From the Agent Permissions page, click an individual agent’s profile to review their permissions. You can also change the agent's role here.
- On the Roles and permissions page, create custom WFM roles to give agents modified permissions.
Roles
Create custom WFM roles that reflect the unique positions on your team, such as administrator, manager, team lead, or agent (of different types). You can create new roles as well as edit the existing, default roles.
- Admins: Depending on the size of your organization, you’ll need to determine whether you’ll have one or multiple admins. Grant admin access carefully and establish clear rules to follow.
- Managers: In Zendesk WFM, managers manage teams of agents. You may want to grant managers admin access so that they have the ability to view agent status up close, create schedules, and track reporting.
- Agents: You’ll decide whether all of your agents can use Zendesk WFM or just a subset. You'll also determine whether to define any special agent roles.
For more information about WFM roles, see Creating and editing roles in Zendesk WFM.
Creating general tasks for non-ticketing work
General tasks are activities that happen outside of Zendesk, such as breaks, meetings, 1:1s, or training sessions. In Zendesk WFM, you or a manager can set up general tasks. Together with time spent on tickets, these define your staffing forecast and appear in both your agent activity timeline and your historical reports.
In the Zendesk WFM web app, hover over the admin icon () in the navigation bar, then select General tasks.
For more information about general tasks, see Creating Zendesk WFM general tasks.
Setting up timezones for 24/7 support
Choose the correct timezone and work week calendar in order for your shifts to align with your team’s availability, especially if you’ll leverage the auto-scheduling tool. Automations also key off of the set time. You can verify or change your preferred time zone by hovering over the admin icon () in the navigation bar, then selecting Time.
For more information, see Managing timezones in your Zendesk WFM account.
If you’ll also have a role in creating schedules, review the Getting started with Zendesk WFM: Manager guide.