Building a Help Desk
Building a Help DeskThe first thing I want to talk about is managing a help desk, I think that managing a help desk can be like running an emergency medical center, in a rough neighborhood, with no supplies, during an epidemic. I believe for some time now, help desk workers and their bosses have been surviving under these conditions, performing triage for some internal users, answering basic computing questions for others. But as in health care, practicing preventive care is more efficient and effective than rushing from crisis to crisis. I think that much of the knowledge and many of the skills for managing a help desk are the same as those needed for managing any organization. The same guidelines that apply to developing, managing, and refining any department, often also apply to the help desk. But be for you try to define your leadership style it is very important to develop a strong foundation, I will do this by defining the help desk mission, establishing clear service policies, and positioning the help desk correctly within the organization. From this foundation, I will be able to make all other decisions regarding help desk structure and activities that may be derived.
I know that it is extremely important that I clearly define the purpose of the help desk at the outset with a mission statement. My mission statement will be a broad description of the goals of the help desk that will help to define expectations. With clearly defined goals, everyone within my organization will be more likely to be working toward the same end, and, with clearly defined expectations, it will be easier to evaluate whether the help desk has met its goals.
One mission statement I might use is "to increase the company's productivity by providing a single point of contact and responsibility for rapid closure of our users' technology problems."
My help desk will be a leading edge one that will leverage consolidation, and automation. I want my help desk to bring value to the software life cycle and all of IS's interactions with users. I believe that the role of the help desk is no longer just fixing problems; the best ones act as emergency hotlines and strategic tools. My help desks will guide their IT departments in monitoring where and when glitches happen and how to fix them, and they will coach the company on how to keep those problems from happening in the first place.
One idea I have is that self-service is Better Customer Service, most customers will want fast response whether my customers are having trouble using internal or external products or just have a general questions. I will implement products to let my customers themselves speed up the process of getting help, while freeing reps to handle problems requiring more attention. The way I will do this is by having my help desk use only state of the art technology....
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