Contact center AI faces its resolution test as metrics fall out of step
Artificial intelligence is moving out of the pilot phase in customer service, and knowledge management is emerging as the constraint that decides whether the investment pays off. Contact centers combine high interaction volumes, heavy labor costs and visible moments of truth with customers, which makes them the clearest test of where the technology delivers measurable returns.
That pressure is reshaping how suppliers position their platforms, from Cisco Systems Inc.’s bet on AI agents across collaboration and customer workflows to a wave of voice agent launches in the cloud contact center market — Gartner projects conversational AI will cut contact center labor costs by $80 billion this year. These environments are demanding and highly measurable, which makes them worth studying, according to Bob Laliberte (pictured, left), principal analyst for networking and observability at theCUBE Research.
“Contact centers have large volumes of interactions. There [are] significant labor costs and direct moments of truth with customers,” Laliberte said. “When something fails, the consequences are also pretty highly visible, and a poor AI interaction can increase customer effort, right? Damage trust and ultimately hurt the brand.”
