Esalettel, I can see why this would prompt you to make changes. This sounds like it would be frustrating. I have a few observations about the way the inbound clals are currently being handled:
-are all individuals int he company capable of answering the phone in the same way, do they all represent the company the way it should be (typically you don't have all roles in a company with equal strengths in speaking on the phone)
-are calls being accidentally misrouted and dropped because of the "anybody answers" method?
-are people in all areas of the company waiting to hear that 4th or 5th ring every time a call comes in - how well are they doing at their standard jobs, the ones they are there to focus on? Phones ringing no matter where you go...Do they get perturbed? Doesn't that place the CSRs under a spotlight on a routine basis?
-do others in the company sound like they are panting when they answer the ohone? Or maybe like they had their faces buried in an Excel document on their screen? Or distracted because they are in a meeting with a client or supplier or colleague?
-Does every role in the company have this kind of potential scrutiny as to whether anyone is missing a beat? That doesn't sound like a fair playing field. Common goals and larger teamwork is great, but each small group should have a chance to manage their own stuff and get a lending hand when there is is less manageable volume. I am not a stranger to the philosophy that all corners of a company have something to offer in terms of universal goals; but at the same time, I am pretty firm on the idea that small teams do need to be their OWN teams and have their own little culture, their own quest for success. 20 people is a large enough pool for there to be more than one team (dept), for sure.
-1 minute or less is pretty good to me. I think once you reach 5 minutes, you have somebody feeling like it has been 20 minutes (it really hasn't been that long, but that length of ime just seems outrageous when you're a customer calling in somewhere)
- what is the nature of the business that creates the need for a call to be picked up by a person within that window of time, so that it is worth the risk at getting quality that is not controlled by the manager of the group in place for the purpose of responding to customers?
-what if a customer is dissatisfied somehow out of the context that involves person X outside your team? How are you supposed to manage that? The response will probably be that this would be impossible since calls would be routed to a CSR anyway. Aside from my point about how it is not constructive for individuals outside the team to become call relayers, there may not be a guarantee that this is true (in fact, it's very likely that someone outside the team will take a crack at resolving something for a customer, either thorugh their own desire or through urgency conveyed by the caller. Then if the non-CSR fumbles, you are in rough shape that you could have avoided if only you had within your reach the opportunity to manage the territory of inbound calls and move toward maintaining a certain level of excellence within your own group.
-what about the call that is still being worked on, when new rings come in? It makes better sense for additional resources within the group on a part-time basis. (There are people that are motivated by the idea of being in a contact center environment on a part-time basis, and in learning the current ropes since the last time they were in at the office. It also adds to team morale to have good part-time employees return to the team when volumes are high. I don't think you get the same result from "anyone in the company" endeavoring to pick up the work from the CSRs.)
-are there ever specific topics that can be categorized and routed to this person or that person? That is where the ACD system would become handy. It's not doing much to route a topic anywhere, when you can channel a need straight to an expert instead.
-you can use the system for basic reporting on volumes over time, so that you can plan. And this can be geared toward actually lowering staff headcount at times rather than necessarily increasing it - all depends.
-does the "pick up by anybody, anywhere in the building, every time" still come out with more virtues to it than the method that allows for some cohesiveness for the CSR group, when all this and more has been analyzed? It's only one little piece of automation, it's not like an interactive thing (IVR) that makes you feel like you are a mere human and not worthy of digitally scripted respect.
If the system is in place, why was it purchased to begin with? | 
