A method for assigning individual contact processing resources of a contact center to contacts in the contact center is disclosed. On receiving a new contact at the contact center, a contact object corresponding to the new contact is provided within a population of contact objects corresponding to contacts being processed by the contact center. A programmed processing object corresponding to each individual contact processing resource of the contact center is provided. Each processing object is arranged to adaptively and independently select contact objects from the population of contact objects based on a value received for processing contacts from the population and a value spent on processing contacts from the population. Once a programmed processing object selects a contact object, an associated contact processing resource is assigned to the contact.