System and method for automated and customizable agent availability and task assignment management

A system comprising:

• a blending engine coupled to a plurality of media switches each media switch being media specific such that the blending engine receives task data from the plurality of media switches sent to the blending engine by each respective media switch in response to the respective media switch unsuccessfully attempting to assign the task to a blended agent;
• a plurality of agent workstations coupled to the blending engine such that the agent workstation provide agent data to the blending engine, and the blending engine provides a plurality of task assignments to the agent workstations;
• a blending database coupled to the blending engine such that the blending engine and the blending database exchange the agent data and the task data;
• and
• a workflow manager coupled to the blending database and the blending engine such that the workflow manager:
• accesses the blending database,
• executes workflows,
• communicates the plurality of task assignments to the blending engine, wherein the blending engine receives status messages from the plurality of agents, each status message providing agent availability data;
• determines a system overloaded condition, and
• reassigns a first agent from a first task to a second task responsive to the system overloaded condition.

A machine readable medium having stored thereon instructions which when executed by a processor cause the machine to perform operations comprising:

• receiving task data indicating a plurality of tasks, each task comprising a customer contact, and agent data indicating a plurality of agents;
• storing the task data and the agent data in a database system;
• assigning respective tasks of the plurality of tasks to at least one of the agents according to workflows after unsuccessfully attempting to assign the respective tasks to respective non-blended agents via media specific switches;
• determining a system overloaded condition;
• and
• reassigning a first agent from a first task currently being handled by the first agent by interrupting the first agent and instructing the first agent to abandon the task currently being handled and switching the first agent to a second task responsive to the determining the system overloaded condition, the receiving of the agent data including receiving status messages from the plurality of agents, each status message provides agent availability data.