Service Desk Best Practices

The Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL) is a best practices framework that outlines how IT teams should operate in order to properly support their organization’s corporate objectives. According to ITIL, the service desk (also referred to as a helpdesk or call/contact center) is the centerpiece of any successful IT Service Management (ITSM) operation. In order to satisfy IT needs, service desks should provide a Single Point of Contact (SPOC) for their corporate end-users and/or third-parties.

Service desks provide communication between end-users and IT teams. They respond to and report on the status of IT incidents and end-user service requests. Ideally, service desks proactively inform end-users of all service-related events, actions, and changes that may affect them.

Service desks may perform the following specific management tasks:

o Incident Management
o Availability Management
o Problem Management
o Capacity Management
o Change Management
o Financial Management
o Configuration Management
o Service Continuity Management.
o Asset Management
o Security Management
o Release Management
o Service Level Management

Few service desk teams have been able to master these responsibilities entirely due to a lack of tools or skills. Point solutions, such as Configuration Management Database (CMDB) products, exist, but there are few fully integrated, easy-to-use platforms that can handle all of the areas a service desk may be responsible for.

Failure to fulfill the above responsibilities can be damaging for broader organizations. Among the most obvious effects are:

o Slow responses to incoming calls (creates longer resolution times)
o Poor incident recording and tracking (prevents proactive analysis)
o Inadequate status reporting (leads to customer dissatisfaction)
o Ineffective problem identification, diagnosis, and resolution
o Inconsistent monitoring and escalation procedures (can potentially violate SLA)
o Failure to properly close incidents (distracts staff from real issues)
o Poor second and third line support communication and coordination

The effects listed above aggravate tension between organizations’ IT departments and their corporate end-users and executives. They can also result in customer abandonment and threaten MSPs’ corporate reputations.

Solving such problems requires the right technology and education.