Desktop Analytics: The Key to a Better Back Office

Back-office operating areas employ hundreds and sometimes thousands of staff, whose contributions are essential, though often overlooked. While back-office activities and contributions are often invisible to customers, the quality of the output directly affects the reputation and performance of companies and government agencies. Just as importantly, back-office productivity and quality drives customer service and contact center inquiry volume; this is rarely discussed or addressed, however, as businesses do not have tools to properly measure the impact of back-office performance.

Desktop analytics (DA), a practical and powerful application, is designed to provide transparency and insights that can improve the performance and work quality of all employees who use desktop applications, whether they work in the back office or a contact center. For years, IT groups have used desktop analytics solutions to measure application performance and response time. In 2009, DMG identified DA as an emerging contact center application, due to its ability to “analyze the responsiveness of servicing applications and how well agents use them to address customer inquiries.” DMG has since enhanced its definition of desktop analytics to include an additional component. The measurement and assessment capabilities that were part of the original DA solutions now have the ability to trigger guidance and process flows for users.

DA solutions are now being used in back-office operating areas such as application approval, claims processing, order fulfillment, return authorization and account maintenance. DA solutions give managers a more detailed understanding of how their employees spend their time, which enables managers to identify training, process and system performance issues. These solutions also give employees real-time guidance to help them get their jobs done right the first time.