# US 2015/0106145 A1 · System and Method of Work Assignment Management

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- Number: US 2015/0106145 A1
- Document ID: US20150106145A1
- Status: Published application
- Kind: A1
- Application number: 14/465,486
- Filed: 2014-08-21
- Published: 2015-04-16
- Earliest claimed: 2013-08-23
- Assignees: Verint Americas Inc.
- Applicants: Verint Americas Inc.
- Inventors: Edward Hamilton; Kaushik Deka; Geoffery Chappell; Michael R. Bourke; Jason Fama
- Web page: https://patentgrep.com/patent/US20150106145A1

## CPC

- G06Q 10/063: Operations research, analysis or management
- G06Q 10/063114: {Status monitoring or status determination for a person or group}
- G06Q 10/063112: {Skill-based matching of a person or a group to a task}
- G06Q: INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY [ICT] SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE, COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL OR SUPERVISORY PURPOSES; SYSTEMS OR METHODS SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR ADMINISTRATIVE, COMMERCIAL, FINANCIAL, MANAGERIAL OR SUPERVISORY PURPOSES, NOT OTHERWISE PROVIDED FOR

## Abstract

Methods of intelligent routing of work assignment includes indexing plurality of pending tasks and indexing a plurality of available employees. A first employee is retrieved from an index of available employees. A next available task assignable to the first employee is determined. A work item fro the next available task is assigned to the first employee from the available employee list. The assigned work item is removed from pending task list. The first employee is removed from the available employee list. The next employee is retrieved from the index of available employees.

## Claims

### Claim 1

A method of intelligent routing of work assignments, the method comprising:
indexing a plurality of pending tasks in a pending task list;
indexing a plurality of available employees in an available employee list;
retrieving a first employee from the index of available employees;
determining a next available task assignable to the first employee;
assigning a work item from the next available task to the first employee from the available employee list;
remove the assigned work item from the pending task list;
remove the first employee from the available employee list;
retrieve the next employee from the index of available employees.

### Claim 2 (depends on 1)

The method of claim 1, further comprising determining if the work item in the next available task exists.

### Claim 3 (depends on 1)

The method of claim 1, further comprising repeating the assignment of the work items until there are no pending tasks in the pending task list that are assignable to any of the employees remaining in the available employee list.

### Claim 4 (depends on 1)

The method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of pending tasks in the pending task list are indexed based upon a lateness of work items in a work item queue for each of the pending tasks.

### Claim 5 (depends on 4)

The method of claim 4 further comprising:
simulating a workflow based upon known employee schedules, known work items in a work item queue, workflow processes, and predicted new work items;
calculating an average queue wait time and an average handling time from the simulation;
calculating a predicted service time from the average queue wait time and the average handling time; and
calculating a predicted lateness as the difference between a predetermined service time goal and the predicted service time.

### Claim 6 (depends on 5)

The method of claim 5, further comprising:
presenting the predicted lateness for each of the plurality of work items in the work item queue in a table that identifies at least the work item and the predicted lateness;
wherein the predicted lateness is presented categorically based upon the predicted lateness for the work item and the predetermined service time goal for the work item.

### Claim 7 (depends on 1)

The method of claim 1, wherein the plurality of available employees are indexed in the available employee list based upon at least one employee skill.

### Claim 8 (depends on 7)

The method of claim 7, wherein the available employees on the available employee list are indexed with employees with the least number of employee skills indexed first.

### Claim 9 (depends on 7)

The method of claim 7, further comprising:
dividing a schedule of a plurality of employees into discrete time intervals, the plurality of employees each having at least one skill of a plurality of skills, each of the plurality of skills being associated with a specific work task; and
determining an allocation for each of the plurality of skills as a percentage of available employees with the skill assigned to the specific work task associated with the skill.

### Claim 10 (depends on 9)

The method of claim 9, wherein the work items are assigned among the plurality of employees, wherein a single work item is assigned to an employee per discrete time interval and the work items are assigned to employees based upon the allocation.

### Claim 11 (depends on 9)

The method of claim 9, further comprising receiving an allocation plan with at least a minimum allocation percentage goal and maximum allocation percentage goal for each skill, and the determining of the allocation for each of the plurality of skills is at least partly based upon the allocation plan.

### Claim 12 (depends on 1)

The method of claim 1, further comprising:
simulating a schedule of work item assignments for a discrete time interval based upon a plurality of workflows for processing work items for each pending task in the pending task list,
wherein the plurality of pending tasks in are indexed and the plurality of available employees are indexed based upon the simulation.

### Claim 13 (depends on 12)

A method of claim 12, wherein the simulation is further based upon, a schedule of available employees, each employee in the schedule comprising at least one skill from a plurality of skills, each skill in the plurality associated with a type of work item, and a plurality of work items.

### Claim 14 (depends on 13)

The method of claim 13, wherein simulating the schedule of work item assignments further comprises:
determining each type of work item for which there are pending work items;
calculating a comparative lateness of each of the pending work items;
determining a highest priority type of work item from the calculated comparative lateness of each of the pending work items; and
allocating each employee with the skill associated with the type of work item determined to be the highest priority to the pending work times of the highest priority type of work items;
wherein if a number of available employees is greater than the number of work items, all work items are allocated, and if the number of work items is greater than the number of available employees, any remaining unassigned work items are queued for a next sequential discrete time interval.

### Claim 15 (depends on 14)

The method of claim 14, further comprising estimating a process completion time for a work item of the plurality of work items by:
simulating a workflow based upon known employee schedules, known work items in a work item queue, workflow processes, and predicted new work items;
calculating an average lag time between each process in the workflow and an average handling time for each process in the workflow from the simulation; and
summing the remaining at least one average lag time and at least one average handling time for each process remaining for the work item in the workflow.

### Claim 16 (depends on 14)

The method of claim 14, wherein calculating the comparative lateness of each of the pending work items further comprises:
simulating a workflow based upon known employee schedules, known work items in a work item queue, workflow processes, and predicted new work items;
calculating an average queue wait time and an average handling time from the simulation;
calculating a predicted service time from the average queue wait time and the average handling time; and
calculating a predicted lateness as the difference between a predetermined service time goal and the predicted service time.

### Claim 17 (depends on 16)

The method of claim 16, further comprising:
calculating a just-in-time (JIT) score representative of an elapsed time for a work item compared to a desired service time for that work item;
wherein if the work item is not within a process, the JIT score is the lateness of the work item;
wherein if the work item is at the end of a process, the JIT score is an overall lateness of the process; and
wherein if the work item is within a process, the JIT score is a maximum lateness of any queue within the process.

### Claim 18 (depends on 1)

The method of claim 1, further comprising providing at least one hyperlink to the first employee, the hyperlink associated to a location on a network with data associated with the assigned work item.

### Claim 19

A method of comparatively determining the lateness of a work item in a work item queue, the method comprising:
simulating a workflow based upon known employee schedules, known work items in a work item queue, workflow processes, and predicted new work items;
calculating an average queue wait time and an average handling time from the simulation;
calculating a predicted service time from the average queue wait time and the average handling time; and
calculating a predicted lateness as the difference between a predetermined service time goal and the predicted service time.

### Claim 20 (depends on 18)

The method of claim 18, further comprising:
presenting the predicted lateness for each of the plurality of work items in the work item queue in a table that identifies at least the work item and the predicted lateness;
wherein the predicted lateness is presented categorically based upon the predicted lateness for the work item and the predetermined service time goal for the work item.