Play nicely in the ticket queue using the Play button or Guided mode

Optimising ticket workflow is top of mind for any customer service manager and becomes even more important as teams expand and share workload across multiple global offices. Here at Zendesk, it’s no different. I’ll share how we’ve implemented a Play button-centred workflow for Zendesk Customer Support teams.

If you’re not familiar with Play mode, it’s a way to automatically guide agents through available tickets in a set view. In Play mode, agents press the Play button to open the first ticket in the view. After submitting the ticket with their updates, the next ticket in the view opens automatically.

Why work in Play mode?
Play mode stops agents from cherry-picking the easiest tickets or the types of tickets they like handling the most. But beyond avoiding cherry-picking, working in Play mode also offers some real benefits. Here’s why we chose it:

• Efficiency: using the Play button allows agents to focus their mental energy on solving tickets rather than combing through the queue. It also saves time by automatically skipping tickets that others are already viewing.
• Workflow definition and priority control: using Play ensures tickets are addressed in order according to the view. We assign tickets a priority level during triage and this makes sure we use that field appropriately and consistently.
• Broadens the agent experience: agents have the opportunity to grow their skills in product areas they would usually overlook, giving them better overall product knowledge and understanding.

In this discussion, I will share more about how our teams are structured and which teams we decided to implement Play mode for. Both Play mode and Guided mode – a feature that requires agents to use Play mode when working through tickets – can be great when you need your team to keep moving through tickets that don’t take long to solve and also as a way to enforce best practice.

Guided mode will not be addressed in this discussion but it is available on Enterprise plans. It’s perfect for support teams that want to simplify agent workflows by automatically pulling the most important ticket from each view, as it reduces the need to spend time and resources manually assigning tickets. What’s more, when an agent skips a ticket they have to enter a reason, which gives admins insight into training and development needs.

In the full post, learn how we piloted our workflow before roll out and what changes we saw in ticket metrics as a result. We also hope you’ll ask any questions or tell us how you use Play mode with your team in the comments of the full post.