CX Empowerment, Part 1: Cloud-Powered Contact Centers Do It Better

We all have a new normal right now—one bound to persist in some form even after we return to our regular lives. And that’s true for contact centers as well.

For nearly a year, customer service organizations have dealt with unexpected, increased demands for customer experience (CX) flexibility and agility. These temporary demands have evolved into a new, heightened level of customer service permanently expected by customers forced to sacrifice vendor loyalty for the fulfillment of short-term needs.

That’s why all that happened in 2020 changed the minds of many CX leaders who, pre-pandemic, were hesitant to embrace the cloud as the preferred deployment option for powering important contact center operations. Very quickly, it became apparent to them that companies with cloud-powered contact centers more quickly, nimbly adjusted to the sudden and unforeseen work-from-home and lockdown mandates thrust upon them. They could more easily, proactively motivate and engage remote workers balancing work shifts with childcare and distance learning responsibilities. Those companies did a much better job of preserving—even improving—their coveted CX during a time of uncertainty and upheaval.

All of that is also why we at Calabrio were inspired to alter our own stance on the cloud.

Before 2020, we positioned cloud alongside its on-prem deployment peer, as equals. Like many others, we were proud to call ourselves “cloud-agnostic.” We recognized that different companies have different technology needs and preferences. For some of them, on-prem remained the better choice.

But with all we’ve seen in the past year, we no longer believe cloud is an equal option to on-prem. We believe cloud is the better choice for all customer service organizations. The more strategic choice. The right choice.

That’s because cloud has come a long way in the last few years. And so have the workforce management (WFM) solutions powered by it. As a result:

• No longer can whatever effort is required to change systems stand in the way of companies wanting to provide the superior CX their customers expect. The sooner you move to cloud, the more work and money you’ll save down the line. With Calabrio ONE, you can even leave legacy apps on prem when you move your WFM to the cloud, and migrate those apps to the cloud when the time is right.
• And no longer do you have to give up any WFM features to move to the cloud. From the beginning, Calabrio ONE, was built to function in exactly the same way in the cloud as it does when deployed on-prem.

Cloud-powered WFM simply offers too many advantages to be denied.

That’s why I’m proud to refer to Calabrio as a “first-to-cloud and cloud-first” company.

Watch for upcoming blogs in this “CX Empowerment” series, where we’ll explore in more detail how cloud contact centers better empower CX leaders and agents than their on-prem counterparts, and how only the cloud can deliver the superior CX today’s weary customers have come to expect.

The new Calabrio ONE is powered by the cloud, with next-generation workforce management software at its center.

Scott Henderson