Workflow Automation
Business often regards IT as a cost centre rather than a productivity enabler. So in these difficult financial times, IT will be pressured once again to do more with less. The challenge for IT is how to improve processes to achieve cost reducing efficiencies while maintaining or even improving the quality of customer service.
For Help Desks that struggle to meet the challenge, being outsourced is a real risk.
Investing in a quality service management solution can deliver productivity improvements, reduce double handling and improve customer service. HelpMaster is the solution of choice for small to medium Help Desks.
Support Officer time is expensive
To reduce costs it is critical that Support Officers are freed from mundane and repetitive tasks in order to focus on those issues requiring their specialised skills. HelpMaster targets the following areas in order to reduce ‘time wasting’ activities:
No double handling of issues via email – any Help Desk tool can convert and email into a Job record only to have to be manually re-profiled, updated and assigned. HelpMaster applies intelligent analysis to the email subject lines and content to create a Job that is accurate and pre-assigned to the correct support team. Updates to the same Job via email extract only the key elements. Support Officers can rapidly assess the nature of the update without negotiating a Job history polluted with signatures and reply threads.
No time spent on sending email notifications – workflow process often require notifications and updates to be sent to key stakeholders and to customers as an issue is logged and progressed. Rather than the Support Officer opening their email client, find the relevant people and typing up an email, HelpMaster will send the correct email with up to date content to the right people at the required time in the workflow. No Support Officer effort required.
Reduce follow up calls to the Desk – customers need updates on their issues. The customer web portal is available for customers to review issue progress any time of the day or night. There is no need for them to contact a Support Officer, have them retrieve the record and read back the progress information. Customers can even log and updated their issues via the web and close them off.
Stop issues needing support – imagine not having to resolve an issue in the first place. Customers can resolve some of their more common and simpler issues (which make up a significant portion of Help Desk calls) by accessing the HelpMaster Knowledge Base via the web. Advanced searching algorithms, customer feedback and usage ratings ensure customers can access the right piece of information to resolve their issue rapidly and with ease. AutomatedKnowledge Base articles can even be emailed when an issue is first logged into HelpMaster, just in case they didn’t check the customer web portal first.
Rapid turn-around of repetitive issues – what Help Desk doesn’t have a small group of issues that take up the bulk of their time? The issue still needs to be tracked and managed and so the officer must spend time entering details into the system. But with HelpMaster Job Templates, Support Officers are freed from re-entering the same information over and over again. The template enters all the relevant information and can even automate the issue closure.
No need to enter and update customer records – having all your customers already in HelpMaster, with their correct contact information means Support Officers can get on with the business of resolving issues rather than maintaining database accuracy. Rely on HelpMaster’s sophisticated Active Directory integration to maintain customer records.
Support Officer time used efficiently
Enforce processes that deliver efficiency – designing an effective process requires a commitment of time, money and effort. All of the potential benefit can then be lost if the effort on the part of the Support Officer to comply is simply too much effort or too hard to remember. HelpMaster ensures process compliance is easy and virtually invisible to the Support Officer. Communication, data capture requirements, steps, tasks, approvals and instructions are managed by Job Templates. In addition, HelpMaster’s intelligent workflow builder accommodates dynamic changes to the workflow in order to enable processes flexibility and agility.
Use existing knowledge to resolve issues faster – it’s an issue that has already been resolved once, why spend time discovering the same solution over and over again? HelpMaster’s Knowledge Base will match possible solutions to the issue and provide the officer with advice and guidance for rapid issue resolution. HelpMaster will also match and identify existing support jobs that may also offer assistance with issue resolution.
Access to information where ever they are – wether a Support Officer is in the field or in the office, access it always available to HelpMaster via the Staff Member web portal. Officers can review, log and close Jobs as well as review information in the Knowledge Base and search for other Jobs. No need to call back the Help Desk to retrieve vital information. As a pure HTML interface the web portal is compatible with all browsers and with mobile web devices.
Manage priorities – issue priorities change like the tides for a Help Desk. As new issues arise officers must be constantly reassessing their workloads and focus to ensure the most critical are attended to first. HelpMaster’s Priority Manager dynamically updates, re-assigns and notifies Support Officers, ensuring the allocation of effort is effective and responsive.
New starter ramp-up – new staff need time to become familiar with the IT environment and unique organisational processes of the Help Desk. Reducing the lead time to productivity saves money and reduces pressure on more experience Support Officers. HelpMaster sophisticated workflow control and Knowledge Base reduces the learning curve; delivering an effective Support Officer sooner.
Satisfied customers
Access to help, all day every day – Customers want answers to their questions, and usually they want them right now. With the HelpMaster Customer Web Portal customers can access their existing issues, log new one and search for answers in the Knowledge Base at any time of the day. Customers can often find their own solutions faster than waiting in the Help Desk queue.
Being kept in the loop – Customers like to know how their issues are progressing. Rather than chasing the Help Desk for updates HelpMaster will send updates as and when required with appropriate and current email content. No effort for the customer, no effort for the Support Officer.
Never run late on customer expectations
– delivering a resolution or service on time is the cornerstone of customer satisfaction. HelpMaster ensures
service level commitments
are met by warning of approaching breaches, both to the owning Support Officer and to relevant internal and external stakeholders. A suite of
help desk reports
provide details on agreement compliance which can be distributed to business owners.