Raphael Bohne
Research expert covering professional services
Artificial intelligence (AI) use at contact centers worldwide - statistics & facts
The increasing uses and importance of artificial intelligence (AI) in professional services has been undeniable over the last few years. The user rate of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) in the workplace globally in 2024 was noticeably high, with more predicted growth still to come. The actual uses of AI at contact centers worldwide in 2024 varied, with voice authentication and process automation featuring at the top of the list. The top current uses of analytics applications at contact centers worldwide in 2024 went from marketing analytics to sentiment analytics. This implies that AI has already been a broad church in terms of its uses and implementations at contact centers, with its full effects and potential still yet to be seen.
With these points considered, it would seem that fully automated contact centers are not too far away in the distant future. A lack of AI maturity/governance, however, has still remained as one of the biggest challenges to generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) investment. Time will tell as to how successful these rollouts will be, but what is almost certain to continue are the widespread interest and financial investments in the technology.
Human tone and emotion already being monitored in the workplace
Besides potential job losses, one of the biggest areas of controversy surrounding AI use in the workplace and beyond has been monitoring. According to a survey of contact center workers, the frequency of AI workspace monitoring uses at contact centers in the United States was already significant. 65 percent stated their voice was constantly being recorded, whereas almost half said the same about their tone and emotion. The arbitrariness of when to discipline an employee owing to them using a perceived incorrect facial movement or change in tone of their voice is almost certainly up for debate, as it has not yet been clear what the consequences of this monitoring might be. From the employee perspective, the impact of AI on workspace monitoring at contact centers in the United States was an increase in stressful work, with few agreeing this made them work faster or improved customer service.The future of the contact center?
As things have stood, AI use at contact centers is still yet to meet its potential when it has come to customer service and improving employee efficiency. The top customer frustrations with virtual agent channels at contact centers worldwide in 2024 were the inability for the bot to understand the customer and poor error recovery. With this came slow resolution times and an inability to resolve issues quickly. Conversational AI was, however, one of the most anticipated uses of AI at contact centers in the next two years worldwide, with process automation topping the list.With these points considered, it would seem that fully automated contact centers are not too far away in the distant future. A lack of AI maturity/governance, however, has still remained as one of the biggest challenges to generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) investment. Time will tell as to how successful these rollouts will be, but what is almost certain to continue are the widespread interest and financial investments in the technology.
