your new career service & support!/media/hdicorp/files/support... · 2019. 7. 24. · indeed the...

YOUR NEW CAREER

SERVICE & SUPPORT!

Marketing

Marketing Your Support Organization: Changing User Perspectives

Desktop Support

Growing Pains: How Mature Is Your Desktop Support Program?

Strategy

Project Management Primer, Part 2

Budget

Budget Cuts? Again?

Leading IT Service & Support Sept./Oct. 2010

Source: FORTUNE, March 22, 2010 © 2010 Robert Half Technology. A Robert Half Company. An Equal Opportunity Employer. 0310-4010

Ranked #1 in our industry on FORTUNE® magazine’s list of the “World’s Most Admired Companies.”

1.800.793.5533

Recommended by 9 out of 10 customers.

“ Robert Half Technology has a passion for finding the right person for the role and not just someone to fill a chair. We value their quick response and excellent follow-up.”

Support Project ManagerRegional Airport Authority

Learn more at rht.com/testimonials

3www.ThinkHDI.com I The IT Service and Technical Support Community

letter from the directorLetter from the DirectorDear SupportWorld Readers,

The HDI community is engaged, vibrant, even feisty at times, committed to service, and growing in its influence every day. Since relaunching the HDI Community Blog just a few months ago, we’ve posted more than fifty well-considered blogs and thought-provoking questions, along with glowing commentary from truly happy people eager to invite others to join the party. Over in the HDI Groups, our forum members have dozens of active discussions going on where questions are answered and targeted solutions are shared peer-to-peer. Then, of course, there’s LinkedIn and Facebook, where hundreds of you connect every day, extending our community around the world. We’re looking forward to the 2010 HDI Service Management Conference & Expo in Miami from October 6-8, 2010, where we can have these conversations face-to-face. We hope to see you there!

Looking ahead to next year’s conference, HDI’s industry awards have long recognized the individual, team, and leadership achievements of our members. The application process itself inspires team camaraderie, generates tremendous pride in accomplishment, and recognizes excellence. It’s time to nominate your team or your colleagues for the 2011 awards, which will be presented at the 2011 HDI Annual Conference & Expo in Las Vegas. Flip to the “Community News” section (p. 52) for information on the award categories and submission guidelines.

HDI’s individual awards recognize members at both ends of the career spectrum, novice to experienced. In fact, many of our members began their support careers with HDI, earning their first industry certification as support center analysts and maturing into strong leaders as they added certifications in support center leadership, ITIL, project management, and a host of other industry-recognized certifications. The support profession is a career of choice these days, no longer just an accident or happenstance. In our cover story, “Welcome to Your New Career in Technical Service and Support!” (p. 34), Paul Dooley captures the essence of this new reality and outlines the steps to follow to take charge of your continuing professional development.

There’s plenty more in this issue to ponder, from current trends in internal marketing and customer satisfaction to strategies for dealing with budget cuts and upgrading to Windows 7. As always, we hope you enjoy this issue, and please let us know how we’re doing at [email protected].

Sincerely,

Cinda DalyExecutive Director of Business Content

Please send us your comments and questions regarding SupportWorld.

Letters to the editor should be sent to [email protected] or by mail to: 102 South Tejon Street, Suite 1200 • Colorado Springs, CO • 80903

We reserve the right to edit all submissions.

SupportWorld is published by HDI.

Copyright © 2010 HDI • ISSN 1559-3975

All rights reserved. Reproduction or use of the contents in whole or in part without permission of the publisher is prohibited.

HDI® and SupportWorldTM are registered trademarks of Think Service, Inc. HDI is a part of UBM TechWeb, a division of United Business Media LLC.

KCSSM is a registered service mark of the Consortium for Service Innovation.

ITIL® and IT Infrastructure Library® are registered trademarks and registered community trademarks of the Office of Government Commerce, and are registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.

All other trademarks or trade names are the property of their respective owners.

HDI publishes SupportWorld, a professional journal, six times per year.We welcome your input.

For advertising opportunities, contact James Lloyd, Advertising Sales Director: [email protected] • 212.600.3375

To submit articles, contact Megan Selva, Editor: [email protected] • 203.283.9437

For subscription and membership information, contact HDI’s Customer Care Center: [email protected] • 800.248.5667 • 719.268.0174

HDI • 102 South Tejon Street, Suite 1200 • Colorado Springs, CO • 80903

Executive Director of Business Content Cinda Daly

Editor Megan Selva

Art Director Kurt Volkmann

Contributors Roy AtkinsonAndrew Carey Paul M. Dooley Mark Fitzgerald Michael HansonPeter J. McGarahanMark Mizrahi Jenny RainsRich Razon Maurey Wolk

HDI is the only association that focuses specifically on the needs of IT service and technical support professionals.

Industry Resources: white papers, metrics tools, member toolbox, Focus BooksOnline TrainingProfessional Networking and Local Chapter Meetings

www.ThinkHDI.com/Join2010 I 800.248.5667

Member-rated Favorites:

Join Now!

6 ResearchThe Art of Customer Satisfaction Jenny Rains

10 BudgetBudget Cuts? Again?Roy Atkinson

12 Strategy A Project Management Primer for IT and Technical Support Professionals, Part 2 Maurey Wolk, PMP

16 ITSMThe Service Management Showcase Rich Razon

18 LeadershipService Leadership: The Time Is Now! Part 2 Peter J. McGarahan

22 Service Doctor

24 Local Chapter Listing

26 Marketing Marketing Your Support Organization: Changing User Perspectives Mark Fitzgerald

34 CareerWelcome to Your New Career in Technical Service and Support! Paul M. Dooley

40 Desktop SupportGrowing Pains: How Mature Is Your Desktop Support Program? Michael Hanson

44 Technology10 Windows 7 Features That Every IT Professional Should Know About Mark Mizrahi

48 OpinionCustomer Service: Is It Killing the Help Desk? Andrew Carey

52 Community News

6

12

48

10


table of contentsTable of Contents

32

16

18

2P A R T

34

Xena

26

40

by Jenny Rains

Is customer service like a fine wine? Does it get better with age? Recent HDI research suggests that this is indeed the case. In 2007, HDI conducted its first customer satisfaction benchmarking study. The technical

service and support industry showed extremely high scores

across the board. In 2010, HDI repeated the study and it

revealed significantly higher ratings. A fine wine, indeed.

The purpose of the HDI Customer Satisfaction Benchmarking

Study is to measure the level of customer satisfaction across a

diverse group of support centers in the technical service and

support industry. By using the HDI Customer Satisfaction Index

(CSI)—a standardized, incident-based evaluation tool—it is

possible to assess the performance of frontline technical support

analysts across several different demographics, from the

customer’s perspective. All of the surveys that were collected

from April 15 to July 15, 2010, are included in the 2010 results.

The HDI Customer Satisfaction Index collects data derived from

the answers to five standardized questions. The survey link is

sent in an e-mail from a third party to support center customers

when an incident is closed. Customers rate each question on

a scale of 1 (very dissatisfied) to 5 (very satisfied). The questions

and the summary of 2010 responses are summarized in

Tables 1 and 2.

The Art of Customer Service

“Making good wine is a skill. Fine wine is an art.”

—Robert Mondavi

6 SupportWorld I September/October 2010

researchResearch

The Art of Customer Service

T a b l e 1 : O v e r a l l S u r v e y r e S u l T S – 2 0 1 0

1 v

ery

Diss

atis

fied

2 S

omew

hat D

issa

tisfie

d

5 N

eutr

al

4 S

omew

hat S

atis

fied

5 v

ery

Satis

fied

% S

atis

fied

(Com

bine

d 4/

5 ra

ting)

1. The courtesy of the analyst? 1% 1% 3% 9% 86% 95%

2. The technical skills/knowledge of the analyst? 1% 1% 4% 12% 82% 94%

3. The timeliness of the service provided? 2% 2% 4% 11% 81% 92%

4. The quality of the service provided? 2% 1% 3% 10% 84% 94%

5. The overall service experience? 2% 2% 4% 11% 82% 93%

Number of:Companies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158Centers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 348Surveys . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208,334

Over 92% of customers are satisfied with each aspect of service

measured. Also, when the raw scores (i.e., on a scale of 1–5) are

averaged for each question, they result in high 4’s. In both 2007

and 2010, of the five service areas assessed, customers reported

their highest levels of satisfaction with the courtesy of the

analyst. Timeliness of service is the area where support centers

tend to have the most difficulty meeting customer expectations.

Additional research has indicated that about 80% of support

centers are measuring their customer satisfaction in some

manner. The majority of these support centers are utilizing

incident-based surveys like the HDI Customer Satisfaction

Index. Incident-based surveys are questionnaires that are sent

to the customer to request feedback regarding the support they

received for the incident most recently submitted to the



About the AuthorJenny Rains has worked with HDI in a research/ analysis capacity since 2003. Before coming to HDI, Jenny was the research/data analyst for one of the largest school districts in Colorado. Her areas of expertise include survey development, research design, data analysis, program evaluation, training, and project management.

Jenny received her B.S. in psychology from Sam Houston State University and a M.A. in experimental psychology, with a focus on research and statistics, from the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs.

support center. While this type of survey is helpful and informative for support managers, it should not be relied on alone for an accurate picture of a support center’s performance and reputation.

Incident-based surveys provide useful information about a particular incident and supply a large amount of timely information that can be summarized by category (e.g., type of incident, analyst, etc.) or time period. They are valuable tools for monitoring and improving support processes. However, to generate a more complete view of customer satisfaction, incident-based surveys need to be supplemented with periodic assessments of customer satisfaction (i.e., semi-annually, quarterly, etc.).

While the response rate for the surveys sent out during the customer satisfaction study was about 26%, the typical return rate for incident-based surveys is much lower. Periodic assess-ments, such as annual or quarterly surveys that take the pulse of the customer population at large, not just those who have called in with problems or requests, help gather information from many of those who have not called in with problems or requests and consequently received an incident-based survey. This includes customers who have ceased using the support center for whatever reason, as well as customers who have never used the support center. The feedback collected from these customers can be as useful for the support manager as the results of incident-based surveys.

Another reason the periodic survey is an important complement to the incident-based survey is the difference in survey content. While incident-based surveys assess the customer’s satisfaction with the support surrounding a specific incident, a periodic survey can gauge the public’s perception of the support center and overall customer satisfaction. For example, a periodic survey could ask customers to rate the convenience of using the support center to resolve support-related questions. While the

incident-based data is very useful, the gaps in the data collected can be filled with the second type of survey, which addresses the customer’s perception of the support center overall.

Incident-based surveys provide ongoing performance data that support managers can review on a daily basis. They allow for trending and summary reports, similar to those in the HDI

Customer Satisfaction Benchmarking Study, that are beneficial for a support center that is working to improve its level of customer satisfaction. However, relying on a single-survey approach will make it difficult to fully understand the customers and their needs. By implementing

both survey methods, a support center can more accurately determine whether their service is

truly like a fine wine, the flavors and textures developing and improving over time.

For a copy of the 2010 HDI Customer Satisfaction Benchmarking Study or for more information on the HDI Customer Satisfaction Index, visit www.ThinkHDI.com/csi.

Ta ble 2 : Ov er a ll avg. S C O r eS – 2010

2010 Overall average Scores # of Surveys = 208,334

1. The courtesy of the analyst? 4.80

2. The technical skills/knowledge of the analyst? 4.72

3. The timeliness of the service provided? 4.67

4. The quality of the service provided? 4.72

5. The overall service experience? 4.70

Customer Satisfaction Index Service

Are your customers satisfied with your service?

Do you know which analysts are your top performers?

How do your customer satisfaction ratings compare to others in your industry?

Learn all this and more. Visit www.ThinkHDI.com/csi and register for three months of customer satisfaction benchmarking—free.


• Plan for the unexpected. Oxymoron? It may seem like one at first, but your keen senses (and accurate reports) will tell you that, during the last year, your analysts and technicians spent a fair bit of time in firefighting mode. As much as your ITSM and ITIL principles and processes are in place to minimize firefighting, you’ll be there again, and probably about as often. Undercutting yourself by failing to plan for the unexpected can have serious consequences later.

• Partner with your vendors. Good vendor relationships can produce great results. Strong working relationships can be a “crystal ball” on forthcoming improvements and releases, as well as “Easter Egg” features in components you may already own. Your vendors can become great sources of business intelligence if you develop good working relationships with them.

• Take another look at everything. Extended warranties for equipment seem to make sense in a time of long replacement cycles. In fact, you may discover that most of your hardware failures occur in the default warranty period (in most cases, the first year), and buying the components you need may be considerably less expensive than the cost of extra coverage.

• Take another look at training. There are lots of sources for online training that reduce travel costs. As one example, think of the virtual classroom and online training provided

of most businesses to trim as much as possible from their expenditures. In many—if not most—organizations, IT support is treated as a cost center and, as such, is an obvious target for budget cuts.

In a time of rapid change and business refocus, how can technical service and support move forward and continue to be of real value to the business? If anything, lean businesses will look to IT departments to be more responsive and capable, not less. How can smart support organizations respond to these expectations? We’ve all heard the clichés: “Work smarter, not harder.” “Do more with less.” How can we make these g eneralizations a reality?

• Have a clear strategy. Understand what the business wants and needs from you and your team. Clearly communicate your willingness to assist and facilitate.

• Have your budgetary house in order. It’s one thing to know how much you are spending now; it’s another to have a financial plan that includes next year’s known costs, perhaps even the year after next. Project as much as you can as far out as you can.

• Plan for the expected. This may sound a little odd, but there are many elements of IT technical service and support that are predictable. New operating systems are rolled out with much advance notice and fanfare, for example, and major software releases are scheduled well in advance. Anticipating rollouts and related support needs/requirements can be key for both staffing and budget decisions.

• Integrate resource planning and budget planning. You’ll need to “rightsource” for projects and initiatives as well as day-to-day support functions. The support center is increasingly tied into projects, from inception to providing operational support.

by Roy Atkinson

We’re all in this together. The unbridled expansion of IT spending has come to a halt, driven by broad economic conditions as well as the desire


by HDI. Many universities and colleges also now offer free access to online courses. Businesses and organizations need responsive, informed IT service and technical support professionals, and going without training is not a good way to prepare for new challenges and demands.

• Network, network, network. Maintaining close ties with your peers in professional organizations can be extremely valuable. Reinventing the wheel is never cost-effective. Organizations like HDI can provide you with access to people who either are or have been where you are. Don’t underestimate the creative power of intelligent professionals.

budgetBudget

About the AuthorRoy Atkinson is president of HDI’s Northern New England local chapter, which serves Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. He writes for several blogs, is well known in the social media world, and is a frequent speaker at professional events on the topics of management, customer service, and communication. He is an HDI-certified Support

Center Manager and works in an IT support organization. He can be reached at [email protected].


elcome back to our ongoing series, “A Project Management Primer for Support Professionals”! In the last issue of

SupportWorld, I discussed the many valid reasons why support professionals are often tasked with managing projects. We established how this series will help you to manage your projects more effectively and I presented an overview of project management methodology. I also reviewed the first phase in successfully managing your project: project initiation. If you missed the article, you can find it in the SupportWorld archives at www.ThinkHDI.com. In this issue, we will dig deeper into the project management framework and discuss project planning.

How many times have you heard the saying “people don’t plan to fail, they just fail to plan”? If you’re like most people, you’ve heard it too many times! But there’s a reason it’s used so often: it’s true! It’s especially true in the world of project management. Of the five project management process groups (initiating, planning, executing, monitoring and controlling, and closing), project planning is perhaps the most important. A little extra effort here can help ensure that your project is a success.

a Project Management Primer for IT and Technical Support Professionals

Part One: Introduction and Initiating your Project

Part Two: Planning your Project

Part Three: Executing, Monitoring, and Controlling Your Project

Part Four: Closing Your Project and Summary

by Maurey Wolk, PMP

W


strategyStrategyWe’ll explore planning for each knowledge area in more detail in the following paragraphs, so be sure to reconsider what needs to be planned after you fully understand the range of things you could potentially plan for. Remember that planning for project integration management involves rolling up all of your plans for each knowledge area into one formal, approved document that you will use to manage the execution of your project. Also, recognize that your project plan is a living document and that it will be updated, or progressively elabo-rated, as your project moves through its lifecycle.

Project Scope ManagementPlanning for project scope management is all about collecting and finalizing requirements, defining the project scope (identifying what’s included in your project and what is not), and breaking down the required work into manageable pieces. During project initiation, you developed your project charter and your stakeholder register; now it’s time to use those documents as “inputs” to plan for project scope management. Communicate with your stakeholders and define and document exactly what is required to meet the project’s objectives. Leverage your experience and be sure you are documenting this information with enough detail that it can be measured once you execute your project. The resulting requirements documentation will be used along with your project charter to develop your project scope statement.

As a support professional, how often have you been asked to help out another team or participate in something that falls outside of your core responsibilities? If you’re like most of us, this happens regularly. In managing a project, however, you need to determine exactly what you need to accomplish and, just as importantly, you need to document that which is not part of your project. To be successful in fulfilling your project objectives, you will need to plan for and manage resources involving time and cost, and you’ll be accountable for managing risk and quality. It is therefore essential to document exactly what you need to deliver to meet your objectives. A thorough, well-written scope statement should define your deliverables and acceptance criteria, and also summarize any exclusions, constraints, and assumptions. In managing a project, you want to deliver exactly what is required—no more, no less. Once you have finalized your project scope statement, you can use that along with your requirements documentation to deconstruct your project work by creating a work breakdown structure (WBS). If your project work is complex, you’ll also want to create a WBS dictionary to further define what needs to be done to accomplish each work package.

There’s an awful lot to think about when planning a project, so what’s the best way to approach it? As we discussed in the last article, the Project Management Institute (PMI) has developed a structured methodology that is widely accepted as a best practice by the project management community. The PMI framework contains forty-two distinct project management processes that, combined, form the five process groups. The project initiation process group that we discussed in the last article has only two processes (“develop the project charter” and “identify stakeholders”). The project planning process group, however, has twenty processes—more than any other group! We can’t possibly cover twenty individual processes in this article, but there is good news: we really don’t need to. My goal in writing this article is to provide you with a short, structured approach for planning your project. Let’s get started.

Just as a project’s lifecycle has five phases (with corresponding groups of processes), all project management processes concurrently exist within one of nine knowledge areas:

• Project integration management • Project scope management • Project time management • Project cost management • Project quality management • Project human resource management • Project communications management • Project risk management • Project procurement management

This is important: you need a plan for each of the nine knowledge areas. In this article, we will discuss key points about planning for each project management knowledge area and how you can leverage your support and business experience to optimize your plan.

Project Integration ManagementProject integration management involves “planning to plan.” While we will cover planning for all of the knowledge areas, in the real world, projects often require more extensive planning in a few specific areas. This is highly dependent upon the specific project and you will therefore want to give serious thought to exactly how to focus your planning efforts. As an experienced support professional, you have significant experience in your environment and a wealth of historical information to leverage. Combine this knowledge with the specific criteria for your project and outline what needs to be planned.

14 SupportWorld I July/August 2010

Project Quality ManagementPlanning for project quality management involves determining the quality requirements for your project and/or the resulting product. This process also includes determining how you will demonstrate that the project has met these objectives. Your project has a purpose: at the most fundamental level, if the results of your project are not fit to be used for that purpose, project quality has not been achieved. Be sure to develop quality measurements, metrics, checklists, and any other tools that will help document and guide your quality management efforts. You should also consider how you will plan for process improvement initiatives, as your project work will almost certainly need to be adjusted at some level to meet ongoing quality requirements.

Project Human resources ManagementIn order to complete your project, you’re going to need help. Planning for project human resource management is essential to making sure you have the necessary resources, at the right time, to complete the work that needs to be done. Perhaps you’ll be using people exclusively from your own team, but more than likely you will need people from outside your immediate group. Most organizations operate on some type of matrix, meaning that you will be borrowing resources that have other responsibilities. You will need to leverage relationships, foster and build partnerships, and utilize your negotiation skills. You most likely have deep ties within your organization; be sure to utilize them effectively in developing your human resources plan.

Project Communications ManagementIt is often said that more than 80% of project management revolves around communication, so it’s clearly important to plan for project communications management. Your communications management plan should document the who, what, when, and how of your communication strategy. Make sure you identify and document communications requirements for all of your stakeholders. Communicating the right information, to the right people, at the right time, and in the most appropriate format will significantly improve the odds your project’s success.

Project risk ManagementProject risk management involves identifying the risks to your project and assessing the probability and potential impact of those risks. It also includes planning in advance what your responses will be should any of those risks occur. When people think about risks, they usually think about what can go wrong, but that is only part of what can happen—things can also go right! Experienced project managers know this and plan to minimize the probability and impact of negative risk and maximize the probability and benefit of positive risk. Your risk management plan should also

Project Time ManagementPlanning for project time management involves taking each work package (and/or further deconstructed work activity) and determining the sequence and duration of each activity. You’ll need to establish which activities need to happen sequentially and which can be done concurrently. By determining the work that has to happen in sequence and then looking at the longest single path from project start to end, you’ll know how much time you need to complete your project. You will also need to consider available resources, as that can affect your project schedule. Be sure to leverage your awareness of the organization’s operating environment and resource structure when planning for project time management. As a project manager, you are responsible for delivering your project on time. Proper planning in this area will help you justify the time needed to complete your project and maintain the credibility that played a role in your appointment as project manager.

PMI is the world’s leading organization for the

project management profession. Visit www.pmi.org

for information and resources on good practices and

globally recognized credentials that certify project

management expertise.

Project Cost ManagementIt’s no surprise that projects cost money, but planning for project cost management can ensure that you have identified and documented all expenses in a comprehensive project budget. Valid cost estimates are essential for making sure you get an approved budget that will allow you to complete your project successfully. Remember to utilize those organizational process assets that I discussed in the last article. To refresh your memory, organizational process assets include company processes, procedures, and historical information. Be sure to review completed project plans from similar projects, as this will help you to identify any costs you may have missed. If your organization takes a lot of time to obtain approvals for executing change requests, budget accordingly for the cost of any delays. Finally, remember to account for all direct and indirect labor costs, procurement items, and any legal, license, and regulatory expenses. Proper planning for project cost management is very important, as your ability to influence cost will be greater in the early stages of your project.

About the AuthorMaurey Wolk is a leader in bringing together people, processes, and technology to build world-class technology solutions. For the past eight years, he has developed and optimized client support organizations for one of the nation’s premier financial institutions. Maurey has led an extensive array of projects including global metrics initiatives, support

team consolidations, and the development of continual improvement programs. In addition to a wide range of technical credentials, Maurey is a PMP Certified Project Manager and an HDI-certified Support Center Manager. For additional information on how to ensure your technology projects are successful, visit www.computerns.com.

include risk response owners, the people responsible for executing risk responses in the event that any negative or positive risks happen during your project.

Project Procurement ManagementIn order to successfully complete your project, you may need to purchase certain things. Planning for project procurement management involves making decisions about what you need to buy (often compared to what can be produced internally), determining the procurement approach, and identifying prospective sellers. Depending on the size of your organization and/or project, you may be working with a purchasing agent or department, or you may be doing procurement on your own; either way, proper planning will mitigate many risks in this area. This is also an area where contracts can be involved, so be sure to involve your legal experts before signing any binding documents.

There you have it: everything you need to consider when planning your project. As you now know, there’s a lot of planning to do. Don’t underestimate the time and resources that will be required to properly plan your project. Be sure to think about all of the knowledge areas, and appropriately plan and document your approach to managing scope, time, cost, quality, human

resources, communications, risk, and procurement. Also, remember to integrate all of your plans into one final, formal, approved project plan. Finally, understand that this is a complex subject that can’t be thoroughly covered in one article, so if you’re tasked with managing a complex project, be sure to learn more about it and/or ask for help from a more experienced project manager. In the next issue of SupportWorld, I’ll discuss executing, monitoring, and controlling your project. That’s where the fun really starts! Stay tuned…


The Service ManageMenT

ShowcaSe1 2 3

A support manager’s attention and resources are perpetually split between three functional states: urgent, operational, and strategic. The manager’s goal is to address each of these functional states effectively while empowering all stakeholders to:

• Be aware of what’s going on in the moment, • Be proactive instead of reactive (i.e., move away from the

“urgent” state and toward strategic process improvement), • Focus on and maximize efforts in high-value areas, and • Do more with less.

Traditional reporting processes pose a critical barrier to achieving these goals. This article provides a seven-step plan that support center managers can use to optimize their workload and direct their efforts away from firefighting and toward more strategic, high-value initiatives.

Traditional reporting: a Day in Your LifeIn most technical service and support organizations, reports are the primary tool that managers use to obtain the insights they need to make effective decisions, prevent crisis situations, and optimize operations. By its very nature, a report provides information about events that have already occurred.

Reports are most useful for:

• Identifying trends (e.g., peak call times) • Understanding what has happened and (possibly) why • Rolling up detailed information into useful summaries • Conducting rear-view analysis and long-term planning

Reports are typically generated from information that resides in more than location, most commonly in spreadsheets and one or more help desk management or enterprise database systems. Extracting and consolidating this information is a time-consuming and predominately manual process, making the resulting reports even more out-of-date. Reports are most beneficial when they are focused on strategy and process improvement. Because these are backward- and forward-looking management tasks, the historical information that reports provide is very useful. But reports are designed neither to help with crisis management nor to assist with the day-to-day and hour-by-hour decisions that support center managers must make. Yet, with no better tools to help with, for example, monitoring SLA and OLA exceptions or keeping up with closing open cases, managers must generate more and more reports to get the answers they need to be efficient and effective. It’s a vicious cycle.

by Rich Razon


In essence, this is a misalignment between the support center manager’s primary management tool—reports—and his or her operational reality. But the effective use of operational performance metrics can help managers close that gap by:

• Minimizing or eliminating firefighting by heading off problems or addressing them as they occur,

• Managing exceptions on a daily basis by focusing operational attention on problems (or exceptions to predefined norms) rather than monitoring all aspects of operations at all times, and

• Maximizing the time spent on process improvement.

Building a Service Management ShowcaseWhen it comes to daily performance, the support center manager’s information needs can be summarized by answering the following questions:

• What’s going on right now? • What needs my immediate attention? • What can I do to prevent a “fire”? • Why is that happening? • How are we doing in comparison to X?

Support center managers can achieve these goals with a service management showcase, or performance metrics framework. There are seven steps to building a service management showcase:

1. Identify user needs. 2. Ask the burning questions. 3. Establish metrics. 4. Categorize and prioritize the metrics. 5. Assign meaning. 6. Determine consequences. 7. Present visual answers.

Adopting a holistic approach to service management through performance metrics helps support managers to optimize operations as well as their own effectiveness, while simultaneously eliminating traditional reporting processes. When developing your service management showcase, be sure to:

• Keep the focus on objectives and service quality,

• Draw information from all available systems, as necessary, to provide a complete picture of performance, and

• Tailor views of the performance metrics to each stakeholder group.

itsmITSM

About the AuthorRich Razon is responsible for the overall growth of PureShare’s client list, strategic accounts, and network of technology and solutions partners. He has more than twenty-five years of experience in enterprise automation, having been instrumental in the development and delivery of large operations support applications in several industries, including transportation,

banking, education, utilities, airlines, and defense. Rich has also cofounded a worldwide fund to help abused children in Southeast Asia and is active in several other international humanitarian organizations. Rich can be reached at [email protected].

It doesn’t hurt to have fun with it either. A dynamic and creative, yet essentially simple visual presentation of metrics can go a long way toward motivating staff and engaging executives and other stakeholders around a common view of the organization’s goals and vision. For more information, please visit us at www.pureshare.com.

This article originally appeared in the South Florida local chapter’s fall 2009 newsletter.


SERVICE Lead•er•ship:

T H E T I M E I S N O W !

by Peter J. McGarahan

en•gage your team /It’s not easy handing day-to-day operations off to your team, but it shouldn’t be hard either. As you leave day-to-day operations in the capable hands of your team, make sure you take the time to mentor/coach them—that is, lead by example. They need to see you in action to know what’s important, why it’s important, and how to handle any situation. Never assume that everyone can just figure this out. Make yourself available to them for coaching, answering questions, and making sure they know the boundaries for making frontline decisions.

I will never forget the lesson I learned one day when I called the support center while I was on vacation. When I asked how

2P A R T

“Arise, ye service leAder! The Time is now!”

In the last issue of SupportWorld, Peter J. McGarahan

exhorted support center executives to embrace service

leadership. Service leadership, he argues, comes

down to leadership, customer advocacy, business

savvy, a “get it done” attitude, and an ambassadorial

spirit. In this article, he focuses on the role of the

service leader on the help desk, with specific

guidance relating to delegating, reporting, marketing,

trategizing, and training.


For example: “Thank you for asking; everything is going very well. We’ve recently completed an assessment of our support operations against customer needs, industry benchmarks, and demonstrated best practices. From there, we created a 30–60–90 continuous improvement plan, which aligns our support strategy, structure, and services to better address our customers’ business needs and objectives. We delivered against phase I targets and have eliminated 10% of our calls, are solving more problems, are faster at level 1 while reducing the total cost of support to the organization. Our ‘shift-left’ strategy is working and I’d love to share additional results, our focus on delivering more business value, and customer testimonials at your convenience. By the way, please stop by the help desk any time to see us in action!”

strategic think•ing /It’s often difficult make time for strategy when you are focused on tactics. The following guidelines have seen me through many difficult situations:

• Assessment (where you are): How do we track our progress along the journey?

• Strategy, vision, end-metric, or result (where you are going): What is the right outcome for the customer and the business?

• Roadmap (how you plan to get there): How do we make forward progress?

These three simple guidelines have always helped me simplify and articulate information to senior management. The goal was for them to “get it quickly.” Always ask yourself, “In the end, how will I know if we are successful? What does success look like? How will I know if we have achieved it?” Envision the end first, then build the roadmap that will take you from where you are today to where you want/need to be tomorrow. And remember, your arrival must be empirical, quantifiable, visible, and well articulated.

Success depends entirely on how you define, pursue, and measure it. It comes by focusing on and working relentlessly toward the right end-metrics. In short, success comes to service leaders who plan the work and work the plan. Service leaders use this success strategy to inspire themselves and their teams to provide valued services to their customers. Remember, your customers are depending on you to make their voices heard! Don’t disappoint them!

everything was going, the senior team member replied, “Pete, we have everything covered, you trained us yourself. Go and enjoy your vacation with your family and do not call in here again. Got it?” Lesson learned. My help desk was functioning quite well without me.

just the facts /Management does not really enjoy hearing about problems on a regular basis. In your reporting, you need to establish the facts, the actual numbers, the real business impact, the costs, the trends, and what you recommend doing about it. Establish reporting that meets the needs of your audiences and stake-holders. I always tried to separate operational reporting, which was geared toward me and the team, from management/market-ing reporting, which should focus on areas that impact IT and the business.

Support leaders must know the numbers, the story behind those numbers, and how to tell/sell their successes.

sell your suc•cess•es /If you don’t tell people about your successes, who will? A help desk success story is a brief, eight-to-ten-slide presentation on the value proposition of the support organization. It should include information about:

• The breadth and depth of your services • Involvement in current IT/business projects • Business impact measurements • Cost-effective best practices • Customer testimonials • The many proactive roles in your organization

(contained in an organization chart)

Tell your support success story to anyone who will listen. It works. I know one CIO who was so impressed by the help desk’s success story that he had it mounted on an easel outside his office. As senior executives walked by and inquired about it, the CIO shared the help desk’s success story. That’s the kind of high-visibility, high-impact marketing money can’t buy.

For unexpected encounters with senior management, prepare an “elevator pitch,” a focused, deliberate, 20-30 second message that paints a memorable picture of the help desk’s business value (e.g., impact, results, continuous improvement, etc.).

leadershipLeadership


in place of a messy, weepy goodbye. I asked them to keep this list at the front of their minds as they engaged customers, teammates, and peers on a daily basis. I promised that if they focused on these ten best practices, they would be rewarded in more ways than they could possibly imagine.

the top 10 service and support best prac•tices /

1. Attitude is everything. Go into every situation with a positive attitude and the intent to do the right thing for the customer, for the right reasons.

2. No excuses, just solutions. Never dead-end your customer or assume you know the details of their issue/request with-out “seeking to understand.” Always ask the right questions and actively listen during all conversations.

3. Teamwork. Empowering the team to make frontline decisions and coordinate best practice processes is the only way help desks can survive and thrive in today’s demanding, complex environment. Remember your roles as the customer advocate and single point of contact (SPOC) for all customer issues, questions, and requests.

4. Customer advocate. Represent the “voice of the customer”! The customer trusts you to represent them and their issues/requests, coordinate timely resolutions, and eliminate recurring issues.

5. Total contact ownership. TCO is built upon the premise that the help desk will continue to address a customer’s issue/request and follow up on it until the issue or question has been resolved to the customer’s satisfaction. The entire team must diligently follow up on all unresolved issues (especially the ones without an updated status), no matter who is currently assigned to work on it.

6. Quality ticket documentation. Research, diagnose, prioritize, and document thoroughly (it didn’t happen if it’s not documented in the ticket). Always ask yourself, “If I was sending this to myself, would I have the right information to begin resolving the issue from the last troubleshooting step attempted by the help desk?”

7. Fun! Having fun is a key feature of successful teams. It is up to all of you to make your environment and help desk culture a place that is supportive, respectful, hard-working,

on-the-job ex•pe•ri•ence /I recently completed a four-month project for a customer where I was asked to replace the help desk manager, assess the team’s performance, and implement recommendations for continuous improvement. It was a wonderful experience to be able to practice what I preach and gain further insights into team and organizational dynamics. There were a few basic components missing from the way this help desk operated. In sum:

• They were not a team. • They had not embraced industry best practices. • They lacked trust, communication, and shared goals. • They were individual contributors, doing their jobs their

own ways with little concern for the right way.

I started my assignment by observing, interviewing, communi-cating, and building trust—leading by example. To me, the first step is establishing what is important to you in terms of performance and professionalism. You have to communicate what matters most to you, what you care about, and what they should care about! Once they understand, you must be relentless in ensuring that these are ingrained in their daily behaviors. Provide one-on-one and team training to show them and connect their new and improved actions/your expectations to results/consequences. We implemented daily fifteen-minute team meetings to rebuild the trust and open up the commu-nication channels. The team had come to rely on the manager to make all of their decisions for them and I believed this was holding them back. I pushed back on making decisions for them when I knew they could make them on their own or by consulting their teammates.

The natural leaders quickly rose to the challenge and helped the other team members who were struggling with new directives aimed at harnessing the power of the team. We used examples and scenarios to clearly communicate to the team the difference between unacceptable, expected, and over-and-above performance. The team agreed to police their own performance using a daily scorecard and work with other team members who needed coaching on the newly focused support best practices. I think the greatest satisfaction for me with this team was restoring their pride in themselves, their work, and their team. Pride is a key component of success. The help desk must take pride in its professionalism, its customer service culture, and its at-titude/approach in supporting the business. Then—and only then—will the organization respect it and treat its staff as the outstanding service professionals they are!

After transitioning my responsibilities to a permanent help desk manager, I sent this best practice top ten list to the team

About the AuthorPeter J. McGarahan is the founder and president of McGarahan & Associates. His value to the service and support industry and business is his thought-leadership. For over twenty-five years, as a practitioner, product manager, and support industry analyst and expert, Pete has influenced the maturity of the service and support industry. IT Support News named him one of the “Top

25 Professionals in the Service and Support Industry” in 1999, and support professionals voted McGarahan “The Legend of the Year” in 2002 and again in 2004 at the Help Desk Professionals Conference for his boundless energy, mentoring, and coaching and his valuable contribution to the support industry and community.

focused, and fun. Fun is much more “fun” when you all agree that you have earned it and deserve it.

8. Being proactive. This involves spotting trends, related issues, and recurring issues and working to ensure that you minimize business impact, communicate appropriately, and learn from every situation. It results in bringing visibility to issues and their impact, identifying what is needed to isolate the root cause and achieve a long-term resolution, and eliminating the recurrence of these problems.

9. First contact resolution. You should use all available resources (e.g., team members, training, tools, documentation, past incidents, etc.) to facilitate solving customer issues on first contact. It leads to a higher level of customer satisfaction, improves the help desk’s image, allows level 2 teams to be more responsive, and improves productivity. Research issues in depth and escalate only when you have exhausted all other avenues at the help desk level. If you don’t know the answer, research the issue or ask someone; either way, you will be better prepared the next time you encounter this issue.

Solve the business problem first and then address technical or policy issues. Always ask yourself who the customer is, what are they trying to do, what they can’t do, and how critical is it in terms of productivity, impact, and customer care.

Anyone can be a great service leader. So, once again, arise, ye service leader! The time is now!

To access the full version of this white paper, visit www.ThinkHDI.com/resources/whitepapers/.

10


The Service Doctor

Dear Dr. Jim,I run the service desk for my company. One of the things that I have observed since taking over this department is a correlation between the implementation of formal changes and an increase in the number of incidents that occur right after implementing the change. Whenever we get an influx of calls from users, we know from users that a change must have taken place the night before.

The worst part about it is that we rarely know about the change until we start getting calls. Now, whenever we get a quick surge in calls, we check to see whether any changes were implemented that could be causing the extra calls. The change department is often irritated when we call them to ask, but more often than not, a change was implemented right before the influx of calls.

Ask Dr. Jim

The change manager thinks this is just a coincidence; I can’t convince him to partner with us to reduce issues that seem to be related to the changes. The change manager appears to be under a lot of pressure to get a large number of changes implemented as quickly as possible; this is his entire focus. He is quick to dismiss my inquiries and seems to be unwilling to look at anything that might slow his team down in any way.

I also see them spending a lot of time backing out changes that have obviously failed and doing it more than once before the business is satisfied with the results. I think he fears he will be replaced if he doesn’t get better results. So, my questions are treated as an annoyance.

Do you have any suggestions that might help this strained situation?

—Pushy in Paramus

Dear Pushy,You have touched upon several sensitive issues that many IT organizations wrestle with. Some of your issues will be easy to improve, while others will require a lot of work and coopera-tion, not only between you and the change manager, but also with many other people in IT.

How can they become better informed? That’s a tough one. ITIL would suggest implementing a configuration management process to make you aware of the relationships between configuration items (CIs). CIs would be anything that you would want to control through change management. The configuration management process keeps a record of every one of those items that you want to control and it shares that information with those responsible for assessing, approving, testing, implementing, and managing changes. Awareness of these relationships is the key to reducing the number and severity of incidents caused by changes.

I hope this helps improve your situation and gives you hope that things can get better if you also improve the relationship you have with the change manager. Once he better understands the wider impact of failed changes and back-outs, he will be more amenable to working with you to reduce the number of incidents. Good luck!

If you want to learn more, I wrote an article focusing on configuration management and its benefits for the September/ October 2006 issue of SupportWorld. Check out the online archives at www.ThinkHDI.com.

Staying InformedI’ll start with the easiest issue first. Being better informed

about changes before they occur is pretty simple. I was faced with a similar situation early in my career. I was

the service desk manager in my organization and my team was constantly being surprised by an increase

in calls after changes because we were not aware of the changes ahead of time. As part of the

approval process, our change department had a weekly Change Advisory Board (CAB)

meeting to discuss impending changes. I was not invited to these meetings because they felt I had nothing to contribute to the discussion.

So I took another approach. I offered the change manager the use of one of my employees, at

no cost, to serve as the CAB recorder. The recorder is the person who takes meeting minutes and sends the notes to all the stakeholders and members of the board after the meeting.

The change manager saw that not only was he getting something for nothing, but he was also freeing up one of his people to do something else.

In exchange, I got a staff member in the change department, someone who could keep me and the rest of the service desk informed of upcoming changes and scheduled implementations. This gave us a chance to learn more about what the possible effects of the changes might be and what we could do to troubleshoot any issues that might occur. My situation improved vastly. You could make the same offer to your change manager and probably get the same results.

The Hard StuffBased on your description, there appear to be several conflicting forces at work here that are complicating the issue, chiefly the constant backing out of changes. This could be the result of insufficient testing, or not understanding the true impact of a given change. For example, when there is a change to a server, the change usually affects more than just the server; one or more applications on the server might also be affected. So, if the change fails, causing the server to operate abnormally, anyone using those applications may not be able to access them or the applications might not work as they normally would. Those individuals responsible for implementing and those testing the change need to understand the greater impact. It seems as though the change department in your organization is not fully aware of the bigger picture.

About the AuthorJim McKennan, a.k.a. Dr. Jim the Service Doctor, is often recognized for his highly developed customer service skills, as well as being an adept call center manager, speaker, and award-winning sales and IT professional. He is a senior consultant with Pink Elephant. Jim is active in HDI’s Sacramento local chapter. He is also the past Western Region Director of the HDI’s Member Advisory Board and is a member of HDI’s Support Center Certification Standards Committee. Jim holds a B.A. in psychology from California State University.

To submit a Service Doctor question for SupportWorld, send an e-mail to [email protected] or [email protected].

Jim also posts his prescriptions on his service desk-oriented blog, Dr. Jim’s Blog: blogs.pinkelephant.com/drjim. Check it out!

Service Doctor

HDI Local Chapter Listing

24

STaTe CITy CHaPTer NaMe CHaPTer CONTaCT POSITION e-MaIl aDDreSS PHONe NuMber CHaPTer WebSITe

aZ Phoenix Arizona JT Haynes President [email protected] 480.557.3620 www.azhdi.com

ab Edmonton HDI Edmonton Rona Chin VP Membership [email protected] 780.420.1005 www.edmontonhdi.com

ab Calgary Calgary Karen Bates VP Membership [email protected] 403.237.7500 www.hdi-calgary.org

bC Vancouver HelpDesk BC Clare Agapeyev President [email protected] 604.692.4614 www.helpdeskbc.com

bC Victoria Island Vancouver Island Debbie Scheibel VP Programs [email protected] 250.755.4477 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/vihdc

Ca Irvine Orange County Michael Fisher President [email protected] 562.400.3563 www.ochdi.com

Ca Los Angeles Los Angeles Kelly O’Connell President [email protected] 949.476.0879 www.hdila.org

Ca Sacramento Sacramento Randi Weitzman VP Membership [email protected] 916.922.3147 www.sachdi.com

Ca San Diego San Diego Linda Hill President [email protected] 858.627.5116 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/sandiego

Ca San Francisco Bay Area Bren Boddy-Thomas President [email protected] 707.524.3104 www.sfhdi.org

Ca San Jose Silicon Valley Rob Matheson President [email protected] 800.440.1904 www.hdisvc.org

CT Hartford Connecticut George Comenale President [email protected] 860.756.9214 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/connecticut

CO Denver Rocky Mountain Ellis Blevins President [email protected] 303.296.2345 www.hdidenver.org

DC Washington Capital Area Sandy Seroskie President [email protected] 202.895.1258 www.hdicapitalarea.com

De Dover Delaware Valley Aran McFarland VP Membership [email protected] 610.407.8585 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/delval

Fl Jacksonville First Coast Charlene Bates President [email protected] 904.861.6856 www.hdifirstcoast.com

Fl Miami South Florida Eddie Vidal President [email protected] 305.284.4760 www.southfloridahdi.com

Fl Tampa Tampa Cay Robertson President [email protected] 813.225.5112 www.hditampabay.com

ga Atlanta HDI Atlanta Krista Ciccozzi President [email protected] 770.226.3164 www.hdiatlanta.org

Il Chicago Chicagoland Dian Survance President [email protected] 630.536.0433 www.chicagolandhdi.com

Il Bloomington Central Illini LaDonna Spragg President [email protected] 309.657.8711 www.hdillini.org

IN Indianapolis Indiana John Gibson President [email protected] 317.849.2063 www.indianahdi.com

Ia Iowa Iowa Krista Lindholm VP Membership [email protected] 515.282.6876 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/ihdc

Ky Louisville Kentuckiana Mike Mulrooney President [email protected] 502.774.7669 www.ksfhdi.org

la Baton Rouge HDI Gumbo Kevin Cicero President [email protected] 225.231.4601 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/gumbo

Ma Boston New England Jeremy Kurtz VP Membership [email protected] 508.253.8178 www.hdine.org

Me Maine Northern New England Roy Atkinson President [email protected] 207.288.6665 www.hdinne.com

MI Detroit Motown Joy Goberville VP Membership [email protected] 248.619.3717 www.hdimotown.com

MI Grand Rapids West Michigan Brian VanderZee VP Membership [email protected] 616.451.3500 www.westmihdi.org

MN Minneapolis Minnesota Rachel Hogan President [email protected] 952.831.6888 www.hdimn.com

MO Kansas City Heartland Donna Saddler President [email protected] 913.461.7568 www.hdiheartland.org

MO St. Louis Gateway Chris Kientzle President [email protected] 314.286.0211 www.hdistlouis.com

NH New Hampshire Northern New England Roy Atkinson President [email protected] 207.288.6665 www.hdinne.com

NJ New Jersey Northern New Jersey Atul Sharma President [email protected] 908.981.7215 www.hdinj.com

Ny Hauppage Long Island Tom Franson President [email protected] 631.761.1476

Ny New York City Greater New York Orlando Hernandez VP Membership [email protected] 212.460.6343 www.hdinyc.org

Ny Rochester/Syracuse/Buffalo Western & Central NY Kelly McLaughlin President [email protected] 315.521.8317 www.hdiwcny.org

NC Charlotte Charlotte Carlos Witherspoon President [email protected] 704.328.4112 www.hdicharlotte.org

Ne Omaha Nebraska Dana Olson President [email protected] 402.690.0863 www.hdi-nebraska.org

NM Albuquerque Rio Grande Buzz Rogers President [email protected] 505.923.8172

OH Cleveland North Coast George Reichert President [email protected] 216.896.2172 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/northcoast

OH Columbus/Cincinnati Mid-Ohio Veto Mason VP Membership [email protected] 937.531.3129 www.mohdi.net

OK Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Stillwater Red Earth Melissa Lindhorst President [email protected] 405.744.7887 www.hdiredearth.org

ON Ottawa Ottawa Trevor Mahoney President [email protected] 613.236.7442 www.hdiottawa.com

ON Toronto Trillium Chantal Gallant VP Membership [email protected] 416.407.4975 www.hditrillium.com

Pa Philadelphia Delaware Valley Aran McFarland VP Membership [email protected] 610.407.8585 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/delval

Pa Pittsburgh Steel City Ivy Novick President [email protected] 412.826.0460 www.hdisteelcity.com

Pa Scranton Susquehanna Valley Marie Clark VP Membership [email protected] 717.271.2721 www.hdisvc.org

SC Columbia South Carolina Paolo Muccio President [email protected] 803.264.8472 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/sc

SC Greenville Upstate Justin Ramsey President [email protected] 864.240.5976 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/greenville

SK Regina Regina Yvonne Harrison President [email protected] 306.761.4328 www.hdiregina.com

TN Knoxville Knoxville Curtis Jones President [email protected] 865.805.6296 www.knoxvillehdi.com

TN Nashville Nashville Laura Edwards President laura.edwards@lifeway 615.458.0661 www.hdimusiccity.com

TX Austin HDI Austin Grace Lebeda VP Membership [email protected] 512.459.3638 www.hdiaustin.org

TX Dallas/Ft. Worth DFW Russell Burns President [email protected] 982.323.0067 www.dfwhdi.org

TX Houston Houston Vikki Jansen President [email protected] 281.359.0692 www.houstonhdi.net

TX San Antonio San Antonio Bernard Beaullieu President [email protected] 210.710.4161 www.sanantoniohdi.org

uT Salt Lake City Salt Lake City Phillip Kimball President [email protected] 801.587.6262 www.thinkhdi.com/chapters/slc

va Richmond/VA Beach Southern Virginia Linda Thorson President [email protected] 757.284.1994 www.hdisova.org

vT Vermont Northern New England Roy Atkinson President [email protected] 207.288.6665 www.hdinne.com

WI Green Bay Titletown Bob Wery President [email protected] 920.996.1145 www.titletownhdi.com

WI Madison Southern Wisconsin Erika Oliver VP Membership [email protected] 608.204.6440 www.hdimadison.org

WI Milwaukee Brew City Theresa Weinkauf President [email protected] 262.912.3213 www.brewcityhdi.com



The hierarchical value map (HVM) acts as a road map for the IT organization and indicates where the organization is doing well and, likewise, where IT can improve. The map also illustrates graphically how best to communicate with the business. Let’s put this into action and see how it really works.

Creating Hierarchical Value MapsTo create an HVM, begin by analyzing one of the services you offer to the business. For our example we will use e-mail. Envision sitting down with one of your customers and asking her to describe the features of your e-mail system.

Interviewer: So, tell me about some of the features of our business e-mail system?

Customer: Well, okay. I like that I can access it through the internet at home. I don’t like that it only gives me 100 MB of disk space before I have to download it from the server. And I use the e-mail system to get the word out to my team.

In the first part of the interview, you are looking for character-istics. For something like e-mail, those characteristics are the technical details. In laddering, these facts are known as attributes. After interviewing four or five people, your list may grow to include several dozen facts and the idea is to capture all of those facts and then later limit them to the most common and most important attributes.

Now take a moment and think of commercials you have seen on TV that market just the attributes of a product. Buy this car; it gets 35 miles per gallon. Do you go out and buy the car based solely on the fact that it gets 35 MPG? In appealing to people, you need to move beyond facts and identify benefits. Likewise,

very year the Society for Information Management (www.simnet.org) surveys CIOs on their top ten concerns. Business alignment and strategic planning have topped the list for the past decade. But are those really the top issues? I have no doubt that IT departments everywhere need to align more closely with the businesses they support, but I would contend that many IT organizations are in fact already closely aligned. What they lack is the ability to communicate that alignment to those they serve. Despite slick logos, catchphrases, and regular newsletters, IT is not marketing the value it provides to its businesses on a daily basis.

The key to marketing is knowing what your customers value. The hard part is learning that there is a difference between values and facts. Think of the service catalog. The vast majority of service catalogs are dry, factual descriptions of the services IT offers the business. Too many IT people see the facts as what they should be promoting, and never get around to understanding what the business values. To successfully show alignment, you need to move past facts and figures and communicate what individuals truly value. A marketing concept known as laddering, or means- ends analysis, will help you to identify what is valued by your users and help you find the message you should be sharing.

Laddering appears, at first, to be a rather odd name. It is an interview technique used by marketers to determine several aspects of a particular topic or product; when the results are charted, they can resemble the rungs of a ladder. The marketer using this technique will primarily gather information through interviews and afterwards write each point on a separate piece of paper. The individual notes are divided into four groups: attributes, product benefits, personal benefits, and values. They are then laid out on a grid that identifies the comment as an attribute, a benefit, or a value. Lines are drawn between comments that have natural links or relations.

marketingMarketing

E

Marketing Your Support Organization:Changing User Perspectives

by Mark Fitzgerald


Note that we end up illustrating the inverse of each of the user’s complaining statements. The customer complained that she is limited to 100 MB. As the marketer, you would illustrate this with the comment “provides ample amount of disk space.” The benefit would be “don’t have to download files.” This would be linked to “can access files quickly.” The personal benefit would be a little more abstract, something like “I can make good business decisions.” All of these would be marked in blue to indicate that they are not attributes your service currently possesses.

You eventually need to analyze the personal benefits and link them to personal values. Your customers may or may not articulate these values, but it should be clear how they relate. Researchers have identified ten motivational types of personal values you should use on the top rung of your ladder:1

________________________1 Sonia Roccas, Lilach Sagiv, Shalom Schwartz, and Ariel Knafo, “The Big Five Personality Factors and

Personal Values,” Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin 28.6 ( June 2002), pp. 789-801.

you need to ask why the facts are important. Once the customer has described the product’s benefits, you need to keep asking questions. Too often people are left to connect the dots them-selves. Instead of assuming, ask your customer how, precisely, the product benefits him or her.

Interviewer: So, why is it important for you to access e-mail at home?

Customer: It allows my boss to contact me to take care of important issues.

Interviewer: Why is it important for you to take care of important issues at home?

Customer: It is convenient.

Interviewer: Tell me, why is it convenient?

Customer: Because I don’t have to drive into the office to take care of issues after hours.

Interviewer: Why is that important to you?

Customer: It allows me to spend more time doing things I want to be doing, instead of driving back and forth to work.

We have now identified a personal benefit. Remote access to e-mail allows this employee to get important work done without too much loss of personal time. But Internet access was only one of the attributes. Another attribute was 100 MB of disk space. The user stated that she was not happy about having a 100 MB quota. This particular attribute is seen as a limitation. Ask questions to understand the negative impacts and don’t make assumptions:

Interviewer: So, tell me about this 100 MB of disk space.

Customer: Oh, it is awful. I constantly have to download files to my desktop.

Interviewer: Why is that a problem?

Customer: It takes forever and I end up losing e-mails that are important to me.

Interviewer: What is the impact of losing those e-mails?

Customer: I lose so much time and I end up having to recreate my documents.

Figure 1: Hierarchical Value Map – “E-mail Example”

ATT

RIB

uTe

Sp

RO

Du

CT

BeN

efIT

Sp

eRSO

NA

L B

eNef

ITS

peR

SON

AL

vA

LueS

FastAmple disk

space

I can make good business

decisions

I can access important

information

I don’t have to download files

Accomplishment

Accessible through the

internet

I can share information with multiple people

I can access information anywhere

I don’t lose personal time

Convenient

Comfort

With this exchange, we are still progressing up the benefits ladder. The difference between this example and that of remote access is that you have now identified attributes and benefits that are not being offered to the end user. In mapping out an HVM, you would indicate this with a different color. In Figure 1, red illustrates the attributes and benefits you own and offer, while blue identifies the aspects that need to be either improved or included in the future.

Think about things in your life you

want to change.


These interviews can be done one-on-one or as a group, though I prefer conducting them individually. In group settings, one person tends to dominate the conversation. For better or worse, people are influenced by the comments of others and this setting may result in group-think responses.

After conducting several interviews you will find that many attributes link to each other. In other words, many attributes may link to a single benefit, and this interlinking extends up the chain. Also, for presentation purposes, remember: “Don’t cross the streams…it would be bad.”2 Having lines crossed all over will make the map hard to read and even more difficult to understand.

Applying the HVM to Your OrganizationOur next step is to apply the HVM to an organization. Doing this exercise for a tangible product is pretty straightforward. It is easy to describe the attributes of a physical object. Examining an organization presents more of a challenge, but it works just the same as with a product. Let’s use the help desk as a second example:

Interviewer: Tell me about the help desk.

Customer: I love working with the help desk. They are pleasant to work with and make my job so much easier. They are always right there to answer my call.

Interviewer: Why is it important to you that the help desk is there to answer your call?

Customer: Well, I can talk to a real live person. I don’t have to wade through all of the phone prompts like I do when I call my bank.

Interviewer: Why is that important?

Customer: It allows me to explain the issue I am dealing with. And they can start fixing my computer right away.

Interviewer: Go on.

Customer: Well, it lets me focus on my job and I don’t have to worry about the computer.

1. Power 6. Self-direction 2. Security 7. Universalism 3. Achievement/accomplishment 8. Benevolence 4. Hedonism/comfort 9. Conformity 5. Stimulation 10. Tradition

In our e-mail example, we have identified two ladders. In a complete analysis, you would have about four or five ladders leading up to no more than three personal values. The further you go up the chain, the fewer boxes you should have.

Laddering TipsThe key to the interview process is getting your customers to talk about the product. You just need to help them along. The customer may start with a product benefit, but you will have to work him down to the linked attributes associated with that benefit. You will find yourself working up and down the ladder in the course of the conversation, and you will skip rungs all the time. In some ways, it’s like a crazy game of Chutes & Ladders.

Figure 2: Hierarchical Value Map – “Love Group”

ATT

RIB

uTe

Sp

eRSO

NA

L v

ALu

eSp

eRSO

NA

L B

eNef

ITS

pR

OD

uC

T B

eNef

ITS

I can focus on my job

and not on the computer

Computer support fixes the

issue for me

I can talk to a real, live person

People are pleasant to work with

People are helpful in trying to

solve the issue

There is staff enough to answer

the phone

Accomplishment

________________________2 Ghostbusters, DVD, directed by Ivan Reitman (Columbia Pictures, 1984).

The IT department is not there to

run an e-mail server; it is there to help

the business succeed.

31

When performing these interviews, it is tempting to interview only those that already like IT. Think of these people as your “love group.” If you were selling something, this would be the group of people already buying your products on a regular basis. Within an organization, this often works out to be about 20% of your users. But it is equally important to listen to and interview some people from your “hate group,” which also works out to about 20% of your users. These users tell you where you are alienating people and where you can improve.3

Interviewer: So, tell me about the help desk?

Customer: Well, they are never open when I need them and I always have to fill out some sort of paperwork before they will do anything.

Interviewer: When do you need them?

Customer: I need them to be there when I get in at 6 AM. If they are not there and I have a problem, my entire day is shot.

Interviewer: Tell me how that impacts you.

Customer: It totally stresses me out! If I lose those first three hours of my day, I don’t get anything done.

Remember, you are not likely to sway this group. Use this interview to identify things you can do to improve. You can leverage this information and use it to influence the “swing group,” the remaining 60% of the user group. You want them to join the love group.

Using the HVMNow that you have conducted the interviews and made a map, what do you do with the map? The map serves two purposes. First, it is a list of talking points. It shows you what to emphasize when communicating with your love group. The appeal comes from the personal benefit being linked to values. For example, an e-mail may be sent out business-wide to warn of an upgrade taking place over the weekend.

Subject: Important upgrade this weekend, please read

E-mail maintenance will be performed from 8–10 AM Monday, Dec. 28. E-mail will be unavailable for access from on-campus and off-campus locations. For questions about this outage, please contact the help desk.

Thanks, The Help Desk

This e-mail has all of the necessary facts. But it lacks appeal and misses an opportunity to market to the business.

Figure 3: Hierarchical Value Map – “Hate Group”

Relieves stress

Convenient to use

End user does not have to code

the ticket

Self-service is easy to use

Up-front paperwork is not

required

Open the hours that I need it

Comfort

ATT

RIB

uTe

Sp

eRSO

NA

L B

eNef

ITS

peR

SON

AL

vA

LueS

pR

OD

uC

T B

eNef

ITS

www.ThinkHDI.com I The IT Service and Technical Support Community

The key to marketing is to know what

your customers value. The hard part is learning

that there is a difference between

values and facts.

________________________3 David B. Whitlark and Gary K. Rhoads, Tactics of Everyday Leadership: Becoming a Plus-One Leader (BYU

Academic Publishing, 2006).


In contrast, consider the following e-mail:

Subject: Action being taken to improve enterprise communications tools

On Monday, Dec. 28, additional storage is being added to e-mail as part of our ongoing project to transform e-mail into our enterprise communication tool. As a result, you won’t have to lose time searching for important e-mails. There will be enough space keep them all online where you can access them from anywhere. As we complete the work necessary to make this all happen, e-mail will be unavailable from 8–10 AM. For questions or concerns about this outage, please contact the Help Desk at x5555.

Thanks, OIT Help Desk Remember, We Back You Up

ATT

RIB

uTe

Sp

eRSO

NA

L B

eNef

ITS

peR

SON

AL

vA

LueS

pR

OD

uC

T B

eNef

ITS

Relieves stress

Convenient to use

End user does not have to code

the ticket

Self-service is easy to use

All the staff knows my unique

environment

Up-front paperwork is not

required

Open the hours that I need it

Comfort

I can focus on my job

and not on the computer

Computer support fixes the

issue for me

I can talk to a real live person

People are pleasant to work with

People are helpful in trying to

solve the issue

There is staff enough to answer

the phone

Adapts to changing

technology

I don’t have to know computer

technology

Help us not feel intimidated

Has expertise that I do

not possess

I can vent

Accomplishment

The e-mail has all of the same facts, but it further explains how those facts impact the readers.

The second benefit of the hierarchical value map is that it tells you what to change with regard to your products, services, and department. Equally important, is tells you what not to change. Imagine a management conversation in which the help desk states, “We have been getting a lot of complaints that we are not open enough hours. How can we go about extending hours without increasing our costs?” Without an HVM, the first suggestion would be to stagger the work time of employees. It sounds good, at least on the surface.

With the HVM, we can see that some customers would like longer hours (Figure 4). We also see that the love group seems to cherish the fact that live people answer in a timely fashion. If the help desk is going to provide extended hours, they need to find a way to do it without negatively impacting (i.e., reducing) existing service. Staggering the work time may increase wait time as it reduces the number of available employees at specific times.

Figure 4: Complete Hierarchical Value Map


ConclusionFacts are just raw information. They are bland and, more often than not, do not motivate people to action. Think about things in your life you want to change. Perhaps you want to eat less, exercise more, or stop smoking. Will more facts about dieting really motivate you? Will they produce the motivation to change or do you need something more? The hierarchical value map is a tool for identifying what the “something more” is for your organization.

It is vital that the IT department align with the aims and goals of the business. The IT department is not there to run an e-mail server; it is there to help the business succeed. Means-ends analysis is a tool you can use to market the help desk’s value to the business.

To get your message out, you first need to talk to your customers and discover what is important to them. By interviewing your love and hate groups, you will be able to map out what needs to

About the AuthorMark Fitzgerald started his career at Boise State University in 2006. Prior to arriving at Boise State, he managed three other higher education help desks. Mark loves to teach others and participates in many workshops and conferences. He is the former chair of the HDI Higher Education Forum and is currently on the HDI Desktop Support Advisory Board.

Mark has a B.A. in marketing communications from Brigham Young University and an M.B.A. from Boise State University. He holds industry certifications from Dell, Novell, and HDI.

Always know the answer

to issues

Saves frustration

Engaging FriendlyMakes my job

easier

Provides answers in a

timely manner

Saves time

I do not have to continually check back

Can move on with my day

I don’t worry about computer

problems

I get the assistance

I need

I can leave my work at work

be changed and what needs to stay the same. By communicating what your groups value and how your department provides personal benefits, the help desk will demonstrate business alignment and value.

by Paul M. Dooley

34

YOUR NEW CAREE R

SERV ICE & SUPPORT!

You made the jump and took the position. Whew! Now you’re ready to start your

new job in technical service and support. Congratulations! It’s important that you realize:• It’s not just a job anymore—it’s a career!

• The support industry had matured over the years in terms best practices, variety of positions, and industry recognition.

• It’s where the action is. You are now in a position to really make a difference—improving customer satisfaction, lowering costs, and boosting productivity.

• In many support centers, you now have opportunities to grow and develop. Opportunities in the industry include technical and managerial advancement.


careerCareerYOUR NEW CAREE R

SERV ICE & SUPPORT!

Why the Increased Industry Focus on High-Performing Support Centers?

Organizations realize, now more than ever, that quality support is critical to organizational success.

• IT organizations are looking for quality support staff that have the right mix of technical skills and customer service skills (it takes both!).

• They know that the service desk/support center is the first line of defense for IT and that IT’s reputation depends on the quality service and support it delivers to users.

• Externally-facingsupport centers are looking to make support a differentiator in an increasingly competitive global marketplace.

The industry also recognizes how important it is to have trained, certified employees. According to Datamation, one of the top ten certifications an IT professional can achieve is in ITIL, due to the importance many organizations place on improving best practices. A key function in ITIL is the service desk and, of course, key person-nel at a service desk include:

• Support center analysts • Support cen

your new career service & support!/media/hdicorp/files/support... · 2019. 7. 24. · indeed the...

Documents