Tag Archives: MSP

IT Help Desk Support: The Knowledge Base

Manage Service, , ,
IT Help Desk Support - woman on a phone at her desk

IT Help Desk Support

One of the most important tools that your business’s IT help desk will need is a knowledge base. When your business does not have a knowledge base, your organization will increase the chances of providing support that is inconsistent, as well as customers who are unhappy and long telephone calls.

An effective knowledge base will also hold information that will help your customers and your end users to resolve some issues on their own, a long list of frequently asked questions, and additional documents that everyone in your support staff can access at any time. There are multiple ways that your IT help desk and IT management systems can benefit from using a knowledge base.

Obtaining More Knowledge

There will be many organizations that will have one person who knows a significant amount of information about IT and technical issues. While these people are always great to have around, sometimes others in the organization will direct all the hard questions to the IT help desk expert without taking the time to learn what needs to be done. Many people in the workplace will feel that documentation can be placed on hold because there is already someone who knows what to do. What will happen if that IT expert leaves the workplace? All of the knowledge that was once there is gone now and where will that leave everyone else? You will not have to worry about this happening with a knowledge base because the knowledge will always be there.

Reduction in Call Volume

Since your IT help desk agents will have the knowledge they need to find answers to their questions, the length of time they will spend on the telephone speaking to customers and end users will decrease. Instead of your customers and end users being placed on hold while IT help desk agents are asking questions, the help desk agents will be able to find the document they need, resolve the problem, and take the next customer’s phone call. When you can resolve problems quickly, customers will now spend less time waiting to receive assistance.

Reduction in Ticket Volume

When customers use your IT help desk’s knowledge base to find answers to their own problems, there will not be a need to constantly create support tickets with the IT help desk. Your IT Help Desk’s knowledge base can be used in the portal, the customer will be able to access the knowledge base area to create a ticket. When a customer finds information that helps them, they will be able to return to their job task with a solution.

Reduction in Costs

When you are able to save time by reducing call volume, tickets, and the length of phone calls, it is very likely that a knowledge base will help your organization save money on all support costs. While you are saving money by lowering costs, you should feel confident in knowing that you will not reduce the level of quality when it comes to the support you provide. You will actually be improving the quality of support because you will be providing support that is effective, efficient, fast, and consistent.

An IT help desk that has a knowledge base that is available at all times of the day will give everyone the opportunity to research a problem and find a resolution even when the help desk is closed. Not only can a knowledge base help you save money when it comes to operational costs, but you will also improve your chances of providing high-quality support that will remain consistent.

How efficient is your IT help desk? Does your help desk have a knowledge base that provides quality support? For more information on our IT help desk services, please do not hesitate to contact us today.

The Benefits an IT Managed Service Provider (MSP) Could Bring to Your Business

Manage Service, , , , , ,
Woman with beautiful smile holding a tablet and managed services concept in transparent bubble

Is it time to make a change?

No matter what industry your company works in, having an experienced team of IT technicians at your disposal is crucial in helping to ensure your team’s efficiency as well as in ensuring your company’s digital security. However, if you still have not outsourced these service, then you may be discovering that it is becoming costly, time-consuming, and stressful to maintain an in-house IT department. Thusly, if you have not considered doing so already, you should take a moment to seriously consider turning over your business’s IT needs to a managed service provider.

What is a Managed Service Provider?

At this point, you may be asking yourself what a managed service provider is, and how they could benefit your company. A managed service provider (or MSP) is a third party company that provides all or part of a company’s IT needs either on or off-site. An MSP is essentially a company that specializes in providing businesses with IT services, allowing them to free up resources within their company by outsourcing their IT department. Outsourcing IT to a managed service provider is growing increasingly popular amongst businesses due to the benefits they can provide. Here are just a few of the reasons you should consider transferring your company’s IT needs to an MSP.

Cut and Control IT Costs

As you have likely begun to discover for yourself, maintaining an in-house IT department can be extremely expensive. In fact, ballooning costs and costs that can fluctuate greatly from one month to the next are amongst the most common reasons why companies choose to outsource IT. By outsourcing your IT needs to an MSP you can control costs and help to make your monthly IT costs more predictable, as MSPs often charge a flat rate fee for their services. Additionally, outsourcing IT can save you money as you will not have to invest in hardware, software, or on hiring and training IT personnel. These costs will be spread out amongst the MSP’s clients helping to make IT costs more affordable for all parties involved.

Access to Highly Skilled Technicians

In order to ensure your company’s efficiency and security, it is critical that you have access to skilled IT technicians who are experienced in their field. However, many small to medium-sized businesses find it difficult and time-consuming to hire IT professionals. Alternatively, by partnering with a reputable MSP you will have access to a team of highly qualified and experienced personnel without having to do any of the headhunting yourself. MSP’s have the resources and experience to find the best people in the IT field who will be able to provide you with the highest quality of services.

Gain Access to the Latest Technology

For many smaller organizations, it is difficult to maintain their current IT department, meaning that they often are unable to keep up with the latest innovations in IT. However, as IT is their sole focus, MSPs work diligently to research and implement the latest IT technology, and they have the time and resources to train their staff on the latest techniques. By partnering with an MSP you stand to benefit from the latest technology without any of the risks and costs that can come from implementing this technology yourself.

Flexible and Scalable Services

When working with an MSP it is much easier to scale your services based on your current needs. This can be particularly beneficial for growing businesses, as you will not have to constantly work to expand your IT department to meet your growing needs. As the needs of your company evolve, your MSP will provide you with the flexibility to scale your services as needed without any headaches or hassle.

Outsourcing your IT needs to a managed service provider can provide your company with a variety of benefits. Contact us to learn more about these benefits as well as to learn about the services that we provide.

Is It Time To Make Adjustments To Your IT Help Desk?

Manage Service, , ,
IT help desk professionals in control room

Using a managed service company can help your internal IT resolve issues faster

For businesses, the IT help desk or service desk is an essential component. If your employees are constantly being slowed down due to problems with technology, productivity and efficiency will be slowed down as well. Businesses that have a good IT help desk on their side can keep everyone equipped to be efficient and productive. When everyone is productive and effective, this will result in less downtime.

At one point, having a “good” help desk was more than enough. However, things have changed significantly. Unfortunately, there are many businesses that are still operating a help desk that would have been better suited a few decades ago. One of the most common approaches to management today is measuring an IT help desk on customer satisfaction, the number of answered calls, and the number of resolved calls. Unfortunately, using this type of strategy or approach lacks foresight.

There are a few signs that will indicate your current IT help desk model is not headed in the right direction, including the following:

You Are Only Looking At It As Another Expense

When someone calls into your help desk and shares any type of information and feedback, this is giving you free and useful intel on how your help desk is operating. When you are able to discover this information and use it to provide feedback to the rest of the organization, you are tapping into the power of an IT help desk. Using this intel and using it to improve the IT help desk is also one of the best ways to reduce the call volume. If you are not doing any of these things, you are wasting an opportunity to use one of the biggest resources you have in your workplace. Your IT Help Desk can provide you with feedback from real users.

You Have No Solution For The Mobility Problems

In many workplaces, employees are given the freedom to commute and work remotely due to the power of mobile devices. Mobility is a growing trend in the business world, and sometimes employees will need assistance when they have mobility issues. If you have not dedicated any of your technology to solving mobility issues, now will be a great time to do so. Not every IT expert will be specialized in remote devices, mobile applications, mobile headsets, etc. This is where you will need the assistance of mobility experts who have the skills to solve mobility problems. If you are not currently equipped with an IT Help Desk that can solve mobility issues, it is not too late to get one. If you cannot maintain those skills and specialties in your workplace, you can consider outsourcing your mobility help desk.

The Calls Are Not Being Managed Properly

We know that you are logging your phone calls and categorizing them, but what else are you doing? If you are not doing more, you are not doing enough. Some calls that come into your help desk will contain vital information about technical problems, downtime, outages, etc. Taking the time to assess this information and prioritize it will allow you to provide feedback to others. You will want to do more than provide the basic information that is on the call log.

If your IT environment is currently struggling, there are ways of getting it back on track. You will not have to become experts overnight and you will not have to go above and beyond to completely modernize your IT environment. You can make some improvements to your current environment to modernize your processes, and you will be able to accomplish more than you think.

If your organization is experiencing any of the above signs, it is important that your management team embrace the fact that changes need to be made. Are you ready to rethink and re-imagine your IT help desk? Please do not hesitate to contact us today for more information.

Working WITH Your Managed Service Provider (MSP)

Manage Service, , , , ,
On site support with a managed service provider. Two business people and a laptop

Are you ready to make a change?

As a business owner or manager, you know how darn right frustrating it can be to get sidetracked with IT support issues, while trying to grow your business and keep employees happy. All too often, upper level professionals are asked to shoulder the responsibility of troubleshooting and solving network related computer issues, as well as problems that surface at the user/individual workstation level. You never want to walk away from the chance to improve your working environment or help out a peer, but the reality is: IT support should not be your job.

Breaking Free

There is no shame in knowing when enough is enough. All too often, the scenario is as follows: Your company’s internal IT policies are virtually non-existent, there is no clear understanding of who is accessing what applications and data from which device, and everyone is bogging you down with requests and cries for help.

Don’t get mad, get organized.

A good managed services provider will work with you to understand where and why problems exist within your organization. Once you can see the lay of the land and understand your technology infrastructure, you’ll begin to move forward in your mind with developing a strategy for freeing up your time, while adding additional technology resources to your toolbox, so that you are better enabled for success.

Change does not happen overnight, and you’ll need a trusted partner to guide you through the steps necessary for transforming your technology issues into opportunities for improvement. What do we mean?

Managed IT Support

Support is so much more than responding to issues. Being proactive and understanding what you need to accomplish with your tech as an organization, is a key step in moving forward with developing a good course of action. You need to understand where problems have existed in the past, and you need to know how you are going to prevent them from occurring in the future.

Opening up clear lines of communication with a managed IT support professional will help both the service provider and organization to benefit from the relationship. You must have a workflow in place that directs users to contact support when an issue comes up, so that it is documented and handled appropriately.

Your IT support staff should handle ALL issues related to the troubleshooting, maintenance, and IMPROVEMENT of your tech resources. Again, this means that management must work with the managed services provider to establish the proper procedures for resolving internal computer related issues and requests.

As a business owner or manager, you should find solace in knowing that your tech support can be seen as a trusted resource, specifically when you need advice and recommendations for streamlining technology, and meeting the needs of your users.

Where To Begin

Documenting what your network looks like, and how it used, is a key step in powering forward with a comprehensive plan for success. Your internal staff should know why they are accessing applications and data the way that they do, and you should act ONLY as a liaison between them and your tech team when making big changes or improvements to your infrastructure.

Managed IT support offers you more value than 24×7 monitoring of your network and tech assets. A good service provider listens to the feedback of all users within an organization, and makes the proper recommendations, while helping to establish a good strategy for growth.

Anyone using technology assets within an organization will be open to experiencing certain moments of hardship or confusion, and you should feel confident in your tech team’s ability to handle issues appropriately whenever they occur. The true value with any managed IT support team is knowing that as issues are resolved and documented, you are effectively building a plan for growth within your overall strategy.

Begin by listing all of the knowledge you have regarding internal IT support issues, so that it can be presented to, and reviewed with, your new managed services provider. Your support staff will have a better chance at efficiently resolving user related issues if they know where you are, and where you plan to go.

Moving Forward

Of course, preventing issues from occurring is top priority within the scope of IT support’s job responsibilities. The data collected from users and network monitoring tools must be consistently evaluated and considered. Your tech team needs to communicate potential problems with you, as well as help you to understand where your environment and users are within the ultimate goals of your technology plan.

Communication is VERY important when working with any vendor. Just as your IT support should be able to work with third-parties to troubleshoot and resolve application and hardware issues within your infrastructure, you too should be able to communicate easily with your support staff. This means that you should expect a careful ear when contacting IT support, as well as clear responses.

Once you have established solid procedures within your organization that enable IT related issues to be resolved in the proper manner, you’ll want to consider moving forward with improvements. Your support staff will have a good understanding of your wants and needs, and can make the proper recommendations.

Establishing a level of trust within all levels of the organization is a key factor in determining the success of your IT staff.

Speaking Of Wants And Needs

It is not selfish or irresponsible to think that your business can benefit from Managed IT Support. Your company’s most valuable assets are its employees, and freeing them from the matrix of confusion and complexity when resolving computer issues, will better enable everyone to work at the peak of their performance. Contact Us to take the next step.