Building a World Class Help Desk

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Building a World Class Help Desk

• Philip Verghis
• Phil_at_philverghis.com
• University of New Brunswick, Canada

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Overview

• Types of Help Desks
• Requirements
• A well equipped help desk
• A world class help desk
• People, Process, Technology
• Predictions

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Types of Help Desks

• Two basic types
• Dispatch aka 'Triage'
• Pros Easier to set up
• Cons Frustrating for customers
• Consolidated
• Pros Takes a lot more work
• Cons Can be very stressful for analysts

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A well equipped help desk...

• Must have
• Champion
• Automatic Call Distribution (ACD)
• Service Level Agreements
• Call Tracking
• Problem Resolution
• Metrics

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A world class help desk...

• Must have
• A seat at the table
• Partnerships
• All the toys everyone has, and more
• Highly motivated staff
• Aggressive benchmarking
• Special Projects

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A world class help desk...

• Must be seen as
• Face of the IT department
• Chief customer advocate
• Innovative
• The place to be

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People

• Hire the best
• Motivate them
• Reward initiative
• Reward loyalty
• Team based environment

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Process

• " Automating a mess only makes it messier
  faster!"
• Three biggest challenges
• Setting expectations
• Synchronizing resources and demands
• Setting expectations

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Technology

• Least important, though an important enabler
• http//www.philverghis.com/helpdeskfaq.html

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Predictions

• Consolidated help desks
• First, exploding call volume
• Second, call volumes will stabilize but
• overall contacts will keep exploding

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Critical Success Factors

• Commitment
• top down, bottom up, outside in
• Collaboration
• Peers, customers (internal external),
  suppliers, vendors
• Communication
• Constant, unrelenting