WHITEPAPER. Understanding the Genesys 8

Transcription

1 Understanding the Genesys 8

2 Understanding the Genesys 8 upgrade path: briefing with Keith Ward Interview - Keith Ward the CTO of PSS Help, recently spoke to Ken Carson, a Principal Technology Analyst with The Edenfield Group about the issues, challenges and business benefits associated with the migration from Genesys 7.x to Genesys 8.x. Latest research from IDC shows that 70% of annual IT budgets are still taken up maintaining and supporting existing infrastructure. Even if you had the budget to do all of the mandatory upgrades its unlikely you would have the people to do the work. Most companies would not accept so many concurrent version changes, enterprise wide, as it create tremendous instability. For this reason any mission critical infrastructure upgrade needs to be thought through based on the value of doing it. Genesys 8? I think one of the issues to consider is all of the interaction points that a holistic contact center solution IVR or a routing strategy. All of those things get tied together with a move to Genesys 8. It requires a re- desktop integrations, the routing integrations, the business intelligence on the back-end, the web services integrations and all of the technologies an enterprise had to achieve to build up their Genesys 7 environment. For example, if you decide there is significant business benefit that can be attained by using the new Genesys Workforce Management, you then have to consider As an IT leader you re always thinking about cost versus benefit. In this case the cost benefit analysis has to be quite extensive in terms of thinking about not only the new features in the software but all the touch points across the enterprise. the migration of your existing workforce management environment. The pain points are not in the software upgrade but rather in all of the systems that the upgrade touches. As an IT leader thinking about cost versus benefit. In this case the cost benefit analysis has to be quite extensive in terms of thinking about not only the new features in the software but all the touch points across the enterprise. upgrade path? Yes, one of the things Genesys is very good about is providing an interoperability matrix that allows us to understand what elements and components can work in the Genesys 7 environment and the migration path to Genesys 8. migration from 7 to 8 with very large customers with very large IT infrastructures. We can apply that experience with a new customer and quickly identify the pitfalls as well as the opportunities. We can look at what a customer has deployed and identify the low hanging fruit while taking into account the parts or pieces that give them the biggest impact. such as a new channel for the enterprise or delivering a new feature that drives better customer service. That is the most important part of the equation in terms of how and an upgrade path for an enterprise. forward, and to really gain a deep understanding of the of vendors will come in and present their technologies and their path forward and suggest to the customer that 1

3 their path is or should be the same path forward for the customer. One of the things we do very well is take a deep dive with a customer and gain a real understanding is what are we going to do and what are we going to The customer s roadmap is not a technical one, it s about business delivery. The issue is what are we going to do and what are we going to implement to achieve the customer s core goals? In other words, what is the strategic direction for the customer and how do we make sure they are headed have that in-depth understanding of roadmap and strategic direction, then we can apply our experience with these migrations in a high value, consultative fashion. understand the implementation and integration issues for this kind of migration. I believe it is simply wrong for Genesys or PSS or anyone else to impose any sort of opinion on the right strategy for any customer. There are customers who have 90% plus containment rates on their IVRs or customer effort scores that are through the roof. They are using the tools they have in their current environment very effectively. They are interacting well with their customers and there is no reason for them to upgrade. There are many customers out there who are driving tremendous value with the current environment they have. Genesys 7 is a fantastic environment and it does a lot of good things. Just because a new version comes out does not mean that every enterprise needs to upgrade. The customers who should be considering a move are those that see a benefit in Genesys 8 to drive better customer service and to reach their goals. Genesys 8? From a holistic perspective, there is a lot that is new in Genesys 8 and a lot that has been updated. There have been some fundamental changes. For example, there used to be two separate tools, one for routing called IRD and one for writing IVR applications called Composer. Those have been brought together, so the routing folks have a holistic new tool to learn and the IVR development folks have a newly updated tool to understand. represents a paradigm change in how the platform is managed. There is all new reporting, and the agent desktop has changed from GAD (Genesys Agent Desktop) to IWS (Interactive Work Space). With all of these significant changes there is a huge need for our customers to assess the real benefits of migration, and to engage with us to understand the process of moving to Genesys 8. I believe it is simply wrong for Genesys or PSS or anyone else to impose any sort of opinion on the right strategy for any customer. There are customers who have 90% plus containment rates on their IVRs, NPS scores that are through the roof. They are effectively using the tools they have in their current environment. They are interacting with their customers and there is no reason for them to upgrade. In the meantime, customers still have a business to run. The day to day matters of working out routing issues and application issues and all the other issues in the older environment can get in the way of learning the new technology. So PSS can come in and provide a level of services that allows the customer to focus on learning the new tools, the new environment and becoming Genesys 8 capable and therefore ready and integrated into the enterprise. The PSS approach means that we can provide a complete range of services, have to take their eyes off the prize of moving towards Genesys 8 from an informed perspective. Genesys 8 is really the birth of work force optimization built into Genesys. For smaller contact centers that may not have built out a work force optimization effort of 2

4 their own, if they have Genesys they can bring this capability in very quickly and build that into their process. For larger organizations that may be using a 3rd party tool, Genesys work force optimization may still add value. look at an integrated solution. Conversation Manager can take things to the next level. I think it s a very powerful and a major selling point for Genesys 8. Why would a high level executive, a CEO, a CIO be interested in Genesys 8? I think Conversation Manager is one of the answers. The other big thing in Genesys 8 is Conversation Manager, which I think can change the game for customer about tracking the conversation, from a technical perspective, maintaining the state of the customer interaction, across every means of communication within that enterprise. For example, suppose a customer has been on Twitter, FaceBook or the website asking questions about a product. They do discussion about buying a product. Now what the agent can see is a holistic view across all of those, previously When the agent answers the phone, instead of asking some questions on social media about the XYZ product, powerful way to come into a conversation instead of Conversation Manager takes things to the next level. Genesys 8. Why would a high level executive, a CEO, a CIO is one of the answers. risk mitigation in looking at all the pieces, making sure everything is going to integrate and interoperate together. For example, you need the technical experience to know that when you upgrade a particular component it will still be able to talk to the rest of the Genesys 7 environment. Those are some of the technical factors you have to work through. Then there is disruption which is a different kind of risk to enterprises. You need to evaluate that as part of the migration plan disruption and their customers are not going to be happy going through a disruptive period. You need to mitigate the technical risk but you also have to look at the disruption points and understand where and when they will occur. For some customers, you can look at a down time or slow period to minimize disruption. We need to look at those kinds of factors when determining when to schedule certain activities to minimize disruption. 1. Organizations will need to go through as assesment process in order to understand what is the right strategy for them. This decision will not the future requirements of customer experience in changing business conditions decision will be further investment in Genesys 7 while for others Genesys 8 is the obvious choice 3. Organizations must recognize that the new license cost is only a part of the overall investment needed. They will need clearly identify the additional cost and risk of upgrade as well as on the licensing costs. 4. As with any upgrade process it is important to deliver real benefits that deliver on strategic promises or are simply nice to have. I hope your readers have found this interview useful and I would like to say a little bit about how PSS Help would be an appropriate partner or advisor. heritage and my thinking has been shaped by my systems running and operating efficiently well beyond the can do that because it allows them to migrate and move forward on their own schedule It gives them time to make to get into that cycle of pressure worrying that something will go end of life and they will be forced to upgrade 3

5 If an enterprise has an older system, even one that has gone end-of-life, we can support, maintain and even enhance and optimize any legacy system. That legacy system can be from any vendor and we will still be able to offer far better support at a lower cost. That forced upgrade cycle is expensive, it increases disruption and it requires IT resources, amongst other things. Knowing that PSS can maintain and persevere with these older systems gives customers a high level of confidence that they can take the necessary time to make good decisions and ensure that they can execute the migration correctly to meet their goals in their chosen timeframe. We provide a range of options from advice about making your decision through to complete managed services. PSS Managed Services is the overarching framework under systems are humming along, we can provide that. If they need routing strategies and upgrades we can do that and put it all under the umbrella of a Managed Services option and free the customer to fully focus on moving forward to Genesys 8. We can deploy PSS services precisely where the customer will achieve the greatest value. In terms of full upgrade service, we have certified experts across the entire Genesys 8 suite that can do everything from implementation, integration, hardware installation right up to tuning and support services post implementation. When that customer is ready to move to Genesys 8, PSS can provide the resources to help them plan, implement and optimize the environment to meet their business goals. We help in the upgrade process by allowing the customer they need to during the transition. This is particularly valuable if the customer is moving between vendors and the motivation of the incumbent vendor to continue providing quality service at a competitive price often drastically wanes. PSS routinely bridges that service gap. So whether you are considering an upgrade to Genesys 8 or have already committed to it, PSS can help you understand what this will mean for your business, and work with you to make sure you get the benefits you want from the migration. We can help reduce the cost and the pain of change, and keep older versions running for as long as you need. We can plan a migration path which maximises the benefits for you. Whatever stage of this transition you are Keith Ward is the Chief Technology Officer for PSS Help, Inc. He regularly consults with hundreds of large enterprise and Telco companies on their call center needs, next generation IVR, speech solutions and the web services infrastructures that will drive new customer and self-service applications. He is a highly respected commentator on social media and its deployment within the contact center. He has industry, including the text-based precursor to the World Wide Web and a ground breaking speech IVR deployment at Charles Schwab. PSS Help is an independent Specialist Systems Integrator and IVR Solution Provider that helps improve customer interactions. 24 hours a day 7 days a week all over the world from the and hundreds of companies use platforms designed and managed by PSS Help. We do everything from delivering their complete customer interactions and experiences to support individual website PSS provides competencies around Genesys, Aspect, technologies. From legacy support, through transition of existing architecture to innovation with the design and deployment of new solutions. To understand more about how PSS can help your business please contact us at: US: UK and Europe: info@psshelp.com W: 4