Viewing and managing forecast scenarios

Forecasting in Zendesk Workforce Management (WFM) estimates future contact volumes and staffing needs by analyzing historical data and applying advanced algorithms. This ensures the appropriate number of agents are scheduled at the right times, allowing you to optimize resources efficiency and consistently achieve service objectives.


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Verified AI summary ◀▼
Forecast scenarios, available in early access, let you create and manage multiple forecasts for different workstreams. Adjust forecasts for unique events like marketing campaigns or holidays to ensure accurate planning. You can test various algorithms and settings, activate scenarios, and manage historical data to optimize staffing and resource allocation. Admins and authorized team members can create, edit, and activate these scenarios.


Forecasting in Zendesk Workforce Management (WFM) estimates future contact volumes
and staffing needs by analyzing historical data and applying advanced algorithms. This ensures
the appropriate number of agents are scheduled at the right times, allowing you to optimize
resources efficiency and consistently achieve service objectives.
Some events, such as marketing campaigns, product launches, seasonal holidays, and
service issues, often cause significant, non-typical increases or decreases in expected
volumes. Forecasts can be adjusted to account for these unique events, ensuring accurate
planning and resource allocation.
To manage these variations, forecast scenarios allow admins and team members in custom roles with permission to create
and save multiple forecast versions for each workstream. You can test different algorithms and
settings to determine the ideal scenario for your needs before activating a forecast for a workstream.
Each workstream can have only one active system-created forecast scenario and one
active imported forecast scenario.
This article contains the following topics:

Viewing and managing forecast
scenarios
Creating new forecast
scenarios
Importing forecast scenarios
(EAP)
Duplicating forecast
scenarios
Activating forecast
scenarios
Renaming forecast
scenarios
Deleting forecast
scenarios

Related articles:

Viewing your active forecasts
Setting up WFM forecasting
Understanding WFM forecasting



Viewing and managing forecast scenarios

You must be a WFM admin or have permission to access the Forecast scenarios
page.
To view and manage forecast scenarios

In Workforce management, click
Forecasting in the navigation bar, then select Forecast scenarios.
Under Workstreams, use the drop-down menu to select a workstream.
Click the scenario you want to view. When a selected forecast is available,
it's displayed under Inbound volume.
Based on the forecast,
Zendesk WFM also calculates the staff count needed to handle the expected workload under
Required staffing.

By default, a table for your current week displays.
However, you can take any of the following actions:

Under View, use the drop-down menu to select daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly views
of the incoming workload and required staffing for the workstream scenario.
Under Date range, use the date picker to select a specific date or date
range.
Under Layout, select either a table or chart view.
Click the download icon ( ) to export your selected scenario
data to a CSV file.

Edit and manage your
forecast scenario settings.
Forecast settings trigger the calculation process automatically when
saved. However, if you want to consider additional historical data, you can force an
update by clicking Recalculate ( ).

Note: Recalculation is available only when the workstream's historical volume uses Zendesk data and
not imported data.


Click the reset icon ( ) to restore your settings to the default values.
Click the plus icon ( ) next to Forecast scenarios to create a new
forecast scenario.
Click the options menu ( ) next to a scenario to activate, rename,
duplicate, or delete it. Once you’ve created new forecast scenarios or duplicated existing ones, you can set a different scenario as active.
An active forecast scenario means that scheduling and reporting consider that forecast. A workstream’s default
scenario is set to active and is visible in the Active forecast page.
Use the forecast scenario panels on the right side to:

Set the historical volume for your
workstream. Decide which historical data you want to include or exclude
in your forecast calculation.

Choose a forecasting algorithm. The best
forecasting algorithm for each workstream is automatically selected by analyzing
your historical data and testing all algorithms. This is to determine which will
perform best for the specific workstream. However, you can overwrite the automatic
algorithm selection and choose any algorithm Zendesk WFM offers. See About WFM forecast algorithms to learn more.

Make volume adjustments to account for any
unique events that you expect will drive up the number of contacts you'll receive (for example, marketing campaigns or scheduled maintenance windows).

Exclude historical inbound volume outliers
to help make your forecast more precise.
Configure staffing parameters to calculate how many
agents you should expect to schedule to meet your staffing targets and
projections.








Creating new forecast scenarios

All your workstreams have one default forecast scenario that
can’t be deleted. However, you can create new forecast scenarios or duplicate existing ones,
then activate a different scenario.
You must be a WFM admin or have permission to create new forecast scenarios.
To create a new forecast scenario

In Workforce management, click
Forecasting in the navigation bar, then select Forecast scenarios.
Click the plus icon ( ) next to Forecast scenarios, then click Create
scenario.

Enter a name for your new scenario and click Create scenario.

Set up your forecast scenario.




Importing forecast scenarios (EAP)


Importing forecast scenarios is currently in an Early Access Program
(EAP). You can sign up for the EAP here.
If you’ve previously used an Excel spreadsheet or a third‑party tool to forecast
your inbound volume and required staffing, you can import it into your Zendesk WFM account
using a CSV file.
Imported forecast data ranges replace existing forecast data where it exists or
add to it where it doesn’t. For example, If you have an active system scenario with
forecasted values from January 1 to December 15, importing a forecast for December 1 to
December 31 replaces the forecast values for December 1 to December 15 and adds the imported
data for December 16 to December 31. The system leaves January 1 to November 30
unchanged.
You must be a WFM admin or have permission to import a forecast
scenario.
To import a forecast scenario

In Workforce management, click
Forecasting in the navigation bar, then select Forecast scenarios.
Click the plus icon ( ) next to Forecast scenarios, then click Import
scenario.
Enter a name for your scenario.
Under Import,select whether you want to import your Forecasted inbound
volume only or both your Forecasted inbound volume and required staffing.


(Optional) If you selected Forecasted inbound volume, download and use the
Import forecasted inbound volume template. You can import up to one year of data
counting from today.
(Optional) If you selected Forecasted inbound volume and required staffing,
download and use the Import required staffing template. You can import up to one
year of data counting from today.
Open the downloaded importTemplate.csv file and edit it to include your
own data. To avoid errors when uploading your CSV file, keep the following aspects in
mind:

The first row of the example must be deleted
The data's timezone must be UTC
Use a data range up to 365 days from today.
Past timestamps in the file are discarded.
Ensure that the days are in chronological order.
Use numeric values only.
Ensure that no special characters are used that are not on the template
spreadsheet.
Data must be uploaded with 15-minute increments starting at 00:00:00 on
the first day. Entries like 09:10 will result in errors.
Add at least one row of data.
Delete timestamp duplicates.


Upload your scenario CSV file.
Click Import scenario.




Duplicating forecast scenarios

You must be a WFM admin or have permission to duplicate an existing forecast
scenario.
To duplicate a forecast scenario

In Workforce management, click
Forecasting in the navigation bar, then select Forecast scenarios.
Under Workstreams, use the drop-down menu to select a workstream.
Next to the scenario you want to duplicate, click the options menu ( ), then select Duplicate.

Enter a scenario name.
Click Duplicate scenario.




Activating forecast scenarios

Once you’ve created new forecast scenarios or duplicated existing ones, you can
set a different scenario as active.
An active forecast scenario means that scheduling and reporting consider that forecast. A workstream’s default scenario
is set to active and is visible in the Active forecast page.
You must be a WFM admin or have permission to activate forecast
scenarios.
To activate a forecast scenario

In Workforce management, click
Forecasting in the navigation bar, then select Forecast scenarios.
Under Workstreams, use the drop-down menu to select a workstream.
Click the scenario you want to activate to open it.

Click Activate.




Renaming forecast scenarios

You must be a WFM admin or have permission to rename forecast scenarios.


Note: You can’t change the name of the workstream's default forecast scenario.

To rename a forecast scenario

In Workforce management, click
Forecasting in the navigation bar, then select Forecast scenarios.
Under Workstreams, use the drop-down menu to select a workstream.
Next to the scenario you want to duplicate, click the options menu ( ), then select Rename.
Enter a new scenario name.
Click Save.




Deleting forecast scenarios

You must be a WFM admin or have permission to delete a forecast scenario.
Deleting a scenario is permanent and it can’t be restored.
To delete a forecast scenario

In Workforce management, click
Forecasting in the navigation bar, then select Forecast scenarios.
Under Workstreams, use the drop-down menu to select a workstream.
Next to the scenario you want to duplicate, click the options menu ( ), then select Delete.
Click Delete scenario.



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