The Challenge
A Fortune 500 global financial services and insurance company needed to modernize workforce management for more than 2,600 employees across phone-facing and back-office teams. Manual schedule exceptions, an ineffective shift-bidding process, and fragmented Outlook and SharePoint calendars created administrative work, limited visibility, and frustrated employees.
The Solution
The company expanded its use of Aspect Workforce and moved to Aspect Cloud Workforce. The team automated schedule-exception processing, introduced preference-based scheduling, and centralized back-office scheduling and time-off management using established business rules and intraday performance data.
The Impact
- Fewer schedule exceptions: Monthly exceptions fell from more than 10,000 for 1,200 employees to 4,000 for 2,600 employees.
- Higher schedule satisfaction: The percentage of employees working their ideal schedule increased from 46.5% to 83.37%.
- Lower administrative workload: Real-time data and automated workflows significantly reduced manual exception processing.
- Fairer back-office scheduling: Centralized time-off management replaced disconnected calendars with a consistent, rules-based process.
The organization
A Fortune 500 global financial services and insurance company helps individuals and businesses around the world access the financial tools, resources, and information they need to achieve their goals.
Its workforce management system—known internally as Engagement Center WFM—supports more than 2,600 employees across five locations, 18 phone-facing business units, and 12 back-office groups. The WFM team also includes two data analysts and two technology analysts.
The company has been an Aspect customer since 2005. Over that time, its WFM team has continued to find new ways to use technology to improve operational efficiency, employee satisfaction, and customer service.
Motivation for change
As the organization grew, three workforce management challenges became increasingly difficult to sustain.
1. Manual schedule-exception processing
In the early days, nearly any deviation of more than five minutes—from a call running into lunch to a meeting ending late—had to be manually added to an employee’s schedule.
At one point, the WFM team was processing more than 10,000 schedule exceptions each month for approximately 1,200 employees.
The team initially built its own tool to export real-time adherence data from Aspect Workforce. Raw data was loaded into a separate database and queried to identify exceptions. For example, if an employee’s lunch was scheduled for noon but a work segment continued for another 12 minutes, the team could move the lunch to 12:12 p.m.
Although this improved the process, it still required significant manual work and relied on systems outside Aspect.
2. Low confidence in shift bidding
The company also wanted to improve employee satisfaction with assigned schedules. Under its traditional shift-bidding process, employees could bid on newly available schedules—but doing so would return their current schedules to the bidding pool.
Employees who were unhappy with their schedules often chose not to participate because they feared receiving something even less desirable. As a result, many remained in schedules that did not meet their preferences.
3. Fragmented back-office scheduling
Approximately 400 back-office employees managed scheduling and time-off requests through Outlook and SharePoint calendars. Employees were assigned to different calendars based on the type of work they performed.
When an employee moved to another work type, previously approved time off could remain associated with an old calendar—or even a calendar that no longer existed. This made it difficult to understand how much time off had already been awarded.
The approval process could also feel inconsistent. A later request might be reviewed before an earlier one simply because one employee’s leader was available and another’s was out of the office.
This created several challenges:
- Thousands of schedule exceptions requiring manual processing
- Heavy reliance on custom reports, databases, and queries
- Low employee confidence in traditional shift bidding
- Limited visibility across back-office schedules and time-off requests
- Inconsistent approval experiences for employees
- Significant administrative work for WFM teams and operational leaders
Why Aspect
The company continued to invest in Aspect because the platform supported its goal of becoming more proactive and less reactive.
Rather than simply forecasting demand and creating schedules, the WFM team wanted to automate repetitive work, respond to intraday conditions, give employees more control, and help operational leaders make better-informed decisions.
With Aspect Cloud Workforce, real-time data became available directly within the database. This allowed the company to move beyond its custom reporting process and automate more of its schedule-exception workflow.
The team’s goals were to:
- Automate schedule-exception processing
- Reduce reliance on external reports, databases, and queries
- Give employees schedules that better reflected their preferences
- Centralize back-office scheduling and time-off management
- Create a fairer approval process based on consistent business rules
- Use real-time information to make more proactive workforce decisions
“We went from processing over 10,000 schedule exceptions manually for 1,200 employees to 4,000 schedule exceptions with 2,600 employees.” — Assistant Director, Engagement Center WFM
The Results
Reduced monthly schedule exceptions by 60%
With Aspect Cloud Workforce, real-time adherence data became available directly within the database, eliminating the need to manually run and export RTA reports.
The automated workflow can collect real-time data, push it into the database, load exception information into the Aspect segment worksheet, and save the updates with one click.
- Monthly exceptions fell from more than 10,000 to 4,000
- The reduction was achieved while the supported workforce grew from 1,200 to 2,600 employees
- The team reduced manual processing despite supporting more than twice as many people
Increased ideal-schedule attainment to 83.37%
Traditional shift bidding discouraged employees from pursuing better schedules because participating meant giving up their existing schedules without certainty that the replacement would be more desirable. The company addressed this by introducing preference-based scheduling within Aspect Workforce.
- Under traditional shift bidding, 46.5% of employees said they worked their ideal schedule
- After adopting preference-based scheduling, that figure rose to 83.37%
- Employees gained a clearer path to schedules that better matched their needs and preferences
“With traditional shift bidding, 46.5% of employees said they were working their ideal schedule. After really encouraging employees to use preference-based schedules, 83.37% said they were working their ideal schedule.” — Assistant Director, Engagement Center WFM
Created a fairer back-office scheduling process
Using the Aspect Workforce back-office performance capabilities, leaders no longer have to manage schedules and time-off requests through disconnected Outlook and SharePoint calendars.
The centralized system provides greater visibility and applies established business rules more consistently. Leaders can also use intraday performance information to evaluate requests based on expected workloads.
For example, time-off requests may be more limited during high-volume morning review periods and more flexible during lighter afternoon processing periods.
- Replaced fragmented Outlook and SharePoint calendars
- Improved visibility into previously approved time off
- Enabled workload-informed approval decisions
- Established a more consistent and equitable process
- Reduced frustration for employees and operational leaders
What stood out
Substantial automation at scale
The team reduced schedule exceptions while more than doubling the number of employees supported.
Measurable improvement in employee satisfaction
Preference-based scheduling increased ideal-schedule attainment by nearly 37 percentage points.
More proactive workforce management
Real-time data allowed the WFM team to spend less time reacting to exceptions.
Fairer, more consistent decisions
Established business rules replaced fragmented and potentially inconsistent approval processes.
Better support for back-office operations
Intraday performance data helped leaders align time-off decisions with actual workload patterns.
Looking ahead
With a more automated and centralized workforce management foundation, the company can continue exploring ways to make work easier for employees, operational leaders, and WFM teams.
Its proactive approach extends beyond forecasting and scheduling. The organization continues to look for new ways to use Aspect technology to improve efficiency, strengthen employee satisfaction, and provide better experiences for customers around the world.
Next areas of focus include:
- Expanding automation across workforce management processes
- Continuing to improve schedule flexibility and employee choice
- Using real-time data to support faster operational decisions
- Identifying additional opportunities to reduce manual work
- Extending consistent, rules-based processes across the organization
Key learnings
- Automating high-volume exceptions can deliver significant efficiency gains—even as the workforce grows.
- Preference-based scheduling can improve employee satisfaction more effectively than traditional shift bidding.
- Centralizing scheduling and time-off management creates greater visibility and consistency.
- Real-time performance data helps leaders balance employee needs with operational demand.
- Established business rules can make workforce processes feel fairer and more transparent.
- A proactive approach to WFM improves both operational efficiency and the employee experience.
“The biggest shift was moving from manual, reactive processes to a more proactive approach. With Aspect, we can support more employees, give them greater control over their schedules, and help leaders make more informed decisions.” — Assistant Director, Engagement Center WFM
