What Are Topics and Skill Groups?

Topics and skill groups work together to route dialogues to the right operators.

Topics

Topics are categories of requests (e.g. "Technical Support", "Sales", "Billing"). Each incoming dialogue or ticket can be assigned a topic. Topics are created first and used as building blocks for skill groups.

Custom fields of a topic — each topic can have its own set of ticket fields (text, number, date, list). The operator fills these fields when working with a ticket. Fields are created in the field library (shared pool for the instance) and can be reused across multiple topics.

SLA and metrics — for each topic you can configure metrics (TFR — time to first response, TTC — time to close) and a calendar. SLA deadlines are calculated based on the calendar's working hours.

Skill Groups

Skill groups combine topics with operators. A skill group defines:

  • Which topics operators in that group can handle
  • Which operators belong to the group
  • Normatives — time to accept a new request and time to respond to messages (override global settings)
  • Email for tickets — default sender email for tickets assigned to this group

When a dialogue arrives with a topic, the system looks for operators whose skill group includes that topic. Only those operators can receive the dialogue.

How They Work Together

  1. Create topics (e.g. "Technical Support", "Billing").
  2. Create skill groups and assign topics to each (e.g. "Support Team" → Technical Support, Billing).
  3. Assign operators to skill groups.
  4. When a dialogue comes in with topic "Technical Support", it is offered to operators in skill groups that include that topic.