Page 113 - ITIL® Foundation 3.15

Service Desk Support - Changes in Expectations & Deliverables
Help Desk Yesterday
Service Desk Today
Reactive - wait on user to call
Proactive - Notify users of problems early in cycle.
Focus on technical skills
Realization that both technical and Interpersonal skills are important.
Understanding of technology as only focus
Understanding of the business and business requirements are critical to an understanding of how to support the business.
Little to no standardization of process or response.
Increased usage of standardized response mechanisms, scripts, templates, and frameworks to pre-define support and delivery requirements. (ITIL, CobiT, MOF, Six Sigma, CMMI-Svc).
Scope limited to delivery of technical support only
Expanded scope of user expectations (technical support, knowledge management and delivery, change management, single point of contact).
Limited support hours
Support hours expanded to often include 24 hour / day x 7 day / week.
Users very limited in knowledge and experience with technology
Users have better technology in their homes than what is available at work. Leads to increased expectation of use-ability and support.
Small, significantly contained topics for support. Limited number of applications and little complexity
Complexity has grown to be a massive component of delivery. This then requires a well- instrumented control mechanism to make support capable of adequate delivery.
Telephone interaction or direct desk-side technician support were only choices
Service Desk will often provide the ability to communicate with telephone, chat, remote control, and self-service mechanisms, in addition to desk-side contact. User portals or dashboards make increased user understanding of the environment possible.
IT provided internal resources at each location to provide help desk support leading to much skill duplication and cost
Organizations will centralize the service desk to a single location, or provide a dispersed technology solution allowing for support personnel to work from home using the internet and other technology tools. Outsourcing of the entire function is also often considered due to the perception of cost effectiveness. May or may not deliver required levels of support.
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