Understanding round robin vs. load balancing assignments

When managing incoming conversations, it’s important to choose the right assignment method to ensure your team handles customer inquiries efficiently. Two common methods are round robin and load balancing. While both automate the assignment process, they differ in how they distribute conversations among team members.

Round robin automatically assigns incoming messages to available team members in a sequential order. This method ensures an even distribution of workload among the team by cycling through members one by one.

Key points

• Automation: Round robin automatically assigns conversations to online team members.

• Online status dependency: If all teammates are offline, the system won’t assign the conversation. There is no queue to hold the message for later assignment.

• Missed assignments: If a teammate becomes available after an assignment was missed due to their offline status, the conversation won’t be reassigned automatically. The assignment will only happen when the teammate is online at the time the conversation comes in.

When to use round robin

Round robin is ideal for teams where an even distribution of work is needed, and there’s always someone available to handle incoming conversations.

See this article for an example rule build.

Load balancing, on the other hand, automatically assigns conversations based on availability, ensuring that conversations are queued and distributed as teammates come online. This method is particularly useful for managing varying workloads and ensuring no conversations are left unassigned.

Key points

• Automation with queuing: Conversations are automatically queued and assigned to the next available online teammate.

• Ensuring assignments: Unlike round robin, load balancing ensures that no conversation is missed. The system will hold the message in a queue until a teammate becomes available, then automatically assign it.

• Efficient workload management: Load balancing can be especially effective for teams that experience fluctuating availability or varying workloads throughout the day.

When to use load balancing

Load balancing is ideal for teams that need to manage workload effectively and ensure all conversations are handled, even if no one is initially available.

See this article to learn more about load balancing.

Imagine a team of four: Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo, and Donatello. The round robin assignment works as follows:

1. When a new message comes in:

   • Leonardo, Raphael, Michelangelo are currently online, Donatello is offline.

   • The first incoming conversation will be assigned to Leonardo. The next incoming conversation will be assigned to Raphael. The third conversation will be assigned to Michelangelo. 

2. If a fourth message comes in while Donatello is still offline, it will skip him and loop back to Leonardo.

If Donatello comes online later, they won’t be retroactively assigned any conversations that were skipped; the cycle will continue as normal from the point of the last assignment.

Imagine a team of three: Alvin, Simon, and Theodore. They all have an assignment limit of 1 conversation each. The load balancing assignment works as follows:

1.  A new message comes in:

   • Alvin and Simon are currently online, while Theodore is offline.

   • The first incoming conversation is assigned to Alvin.

2. If Simon goes offline after Alvin is assigned a message, and a second message arrives, the system will queue this conversation.

   • When Theodore comes online, the queued message will automatically be assigned to him.

3. If more messages come in while all teammates are offline, each message will be queued. As soon as a teammate comes online, the oldest queued conversation is assigned first, ensuring no conversation is missed.

Both round robin and load balancing offer distinct advantages depending on your team’s needs. If consistent availability is ensured, round robin can evenly distribute work. However, if your team’s availability fluctuates, load balancing may be the better choice to prevent missed assignments.

By understanding these differences, you can better configure your conversation assignments to optimize your team’s efficiency and ensure customer inquiries are handled promptly.