Creating Zendesk WFM automations

Building a Zendesk WFM automation, and the two questions that decide whether the rule should exist at all.

Building a Zendesk WFM automation, and the two questions that decide whether the rule should exist at all.

Create one

1. Open the automations in Workforce Management.
2. Create a rule and name it for what it watches.
3. Set the condition.
4. Set what happens, and who is told.
5. Watch it for a month before adding another.

Question one: who acts?

Name the person. A rule with no named recipient produces a notification nobody owns, and those are ignored by design.

Question two: what do they do?

If the answer is "have a look", the rule is not ready. "Move somebody from email to chat" is an action, and that is what makes an alert worth receiving.

Set the threshold from your data

Look at the last three months before choosing a number. A threshold picked from a round figure either fires constantly or never, and both mean it gets ignored.

Start with one

Usually coverage falling below target for an upcoming period. It is the most useful single rule most teams can have, because nobody checks that far ahead by hand.

Watch what it fires on

For a month. If it fires most days, the threshold is wrong or the underlying problem is permanent, and a permanent problem needs fixing rather than announcing.

Do not automate anything about individuals

Adherence alerts naming a person arrive as an accusation from a system, and they land badly however they are worded. A lead having a conversation is the right mechanism.

Name it plainly

"Coverage below target, two weeks ahead" tells the next admin what it does. A rule nobody understands is one nobody dares to switch off.

See also

• What Zendesk WFM automations do
• Which Zendesk WFM numbers matter
• Creating auto-approval rules for time off