When generative AI was thrust into the tech limelight in late 2023, it was like meeting that hotshot new hire at the office—someone ready to shake things up at the workplace, and whom executive leadership couldn’t get enough of and wanted to integrate across seemingly all facets of the business.
The challenge with this new hotshot is that it also amplified that age-old threat of robots taking over the world–or, at the very least, job security. AI was essentially developed to provide solutions that replicate human thinking, learning, and decision-making, in order to implement more efficient processes–and dominated the world in terms of changing the way we now work. After all, who can imagine any organization today that doesn’t utilize computers and data in its day-to-day operations?
Still, the question of AI being friend or foe still lingers, especially in the call center industry. where, historically, human talent is a business’ best capital and value proposition. Agents can’t be blamed if they wonder about the possibility of AI replacing them in the next months or years. According to a Zendesk Insights report posted on Forbes on the “Agent of the future according to CX leaders & agents”, 82 percent of CX leaders are rethinking their customer experience because of the developments in AI, and 85 percent do expect the number of agents to decrease because of these technological advancements.
But, a silver lining: The same report, which surveyed 600 senior CX leaders and agents across the US in September 2023 about the state of CX and the evolving role of agents, states that 78 percent of these leaders and 69 percent of agents still agree that humans are irreplaceable in the customer service space. Research and consulting firm Gartner, in a recent article, outright warns contact centers from replacing human agents with AI, citing possible legislative changes such as the incorporation of a “right to talk to a human” clause in consumer protection laws in Europe, or the consequences of misinformation given by generative AI that could lead to a customer’s death.
Bleak predictions aside, Zendesk’s report shows that 80 percent of CX leaders see predictive customer service becoming the norm in their industry, and even more of them (84 percent) want their agents to be retrained on more complex skills so they can ride this AI wave and future-proof their career. Meanwhile, agents can also work alongside AI in the next few years by delegating its tasks and assigning it a role as their working relationship grows and matures.
The Roles AI Needs to Play
For example, in the next year, agents should be the troubleshooter–and AI, the “traffic cop.” Working side by side, AI fields simpler questions and gets them out of the agent’s way, allowing the latter to focus on customers that need support on more complicated issues. The agent also acts as the “human in the loop” that can assess the quality of AI responses, and monitor how it is working. During this time, human agents should also be undergoing training on how they can utilize AI in more ways across their workflows.
From traffic cop, AI should become an agent’s co-pilot after three years–and the human agent, by then, should be wearing the hat of product and data expert. AI by now would be handling more of the tickets and queries, while also providing the human agent with real-time data on their productivity and performance, so these can influence the areas they need to improve on. To further ensure that AI serves as an agent’s co-pilot, companies should also be hiring talent that have the ability to use AI-driven customer service tools, and then integrating AI into their training processes.
After five years, AI and agents are now work buddies that are highly familiar with how each one operates every day. The agent has become the conductor, orchestrating every step of an AI-driven customer service system.
From co-pilot, AI has moved into the driver’s seat in terms of customer interactions and addressing customer needs, while also streamlining workflows. Still, the human agent is there as AI’s check-and-balance–ensuring that the quality of interactions remain customized, personal, and empathetic. At this stage, there is also the possibility of using other innovative tools to further enhance an agent’s customer service skills through mixed reality, that would help in addressing more complex issues.
Empower and Assist Through AI
Seeing how AI can evolve alongside agents in the next one, three, and five years, there are things companies can do now that would already help agents welcome hotshot AI–especially generative AI–more easily into their daily processes, according to Gartner. It can start even before an agent decides to join the organization, as AI has the power to shorten the onboarding process, making it less tedious for new hires. The AI can even assign them simpler tasks or cases during this stage, so they can ease into their roles more smoothly.
Then, as an agent goes through his professional development, companies can utilize AI to create personalized performance management programs, based on employer behavior data. The success–or failure–of such programs can also be monitored using AI, so improvements and adjustments can continually be applied according to what the agent needs.
AI as an Agent’s Co-worker
AI may be the new office hotshot right now in customer service centers, but given the right strategy, agents can find this technology their bosom office pal in the next few years. Both AI and the human touch is here to stay–and it is a future that the customer service industry should be excited about.
