What is workforce engagement management (WEM)?

Workforce engagement management refers to the technology that companies use to increase engagement among their customer service employees.

This includes employee training tools, tools that monitor employee interactions with customers, and tools or strategies that motivate employees.

Just as dedicating time to honing the customer experience yields desirable results, the same is true of your workers’ experience. 

“Workforce engagement management improves the employee experience”

Workforce engagement management aims to do just that by focusing on employees’ needs. From recruitment and onboarding to training and staffing, workforce engagement management improves the employee experience, leading to more productive, content, and engaged employees.

It’s been said that the term “workforce engagement” is a product of today’s business culture, in which employees – like customers – expect more when it comes to how they’re treated. Employees want to know they’re valued and appreciated, and they want to understand how they fit into their employer’s overall strategy.

What does workforce engagement management (WEM) do?

Companies use workforce engagement management (WEM) tools for a variety of reasons, including:

  • Planning workforce needs and scheduling employee rosters.
  • Routing certain customer questions/requests to specific customer service representatives based on the level of expertise.
  • Recording customer service interactions for employee monitoring and training purposes.
  • Providing product knowledge training to customer service employees.
  • Tracking customer service employee performance and productivity.
  • Evaluating how satisfied customers are after a customer service interaction.

For some all-digital teams, employees can take advantage of internal messaging solutions to share information and product knowledge with one another while automating the routing of customer service assignments. 

Self-serve options and chatbots also help to reduce customer service teams’ workloads by assisting customers with common issues without the need for customer service representative involvement. 

This means customer service employees spend more of their time helping customers with unique needs and adding real value to the customer experience, which can help to reduce employee burnout.