The provision of call handling treatments to callers interacting with an automated call-handling system is managed by, for each of a plurality of callers, providing a sequence of call handling treatments to the caller in accordance with workflows; monitoring a measurable performance indicator associated with that caller's behavior; determining an association between the performance indicator and the call handling treatments provided to the caller; and recording the association. Then, based on the recorded associations, the system determines a pattern of deviation in the performance indicator attributable to the call handling treatments; and alters the workflow in response to the deviation by making a change in the workflow selected from promoting a call handling treatment to an earlier point in the workflow; demoting a call handling treatment to a later point in the workflow; adding a call handling treatment to the workflow; and removing a call handling treatment from the workflow.