IT efficiency is a priority for businesses in competitive markets. One area of IT that can always benefit from increased efficiency and productivity is the helpdesk and support staff. But, how can we drive IT efficiency?
According to a study by Zendesk, internal support teams receive an average of 492 tickets per month. And the average number of tickets a support person receives per month ranges from 135 to 157 for midsize businesses (those between 100 and 5,000 employees in this study).
A common key performance indicator (KPI) for IT support teams is Mean Time to Resolution (MTTR), also known as “average speed to answer.” Bringing down the MTTR of your IT incidents helps ensure high end user productivity and satisfaction.
Another common KPI is First Contact Resolution (FCR). This is the percentage of service tickets or IT issues that are resolved on first contact with the helpdesk. A high FCR is typically associated with high levels of end user (or, in the case of Managed Service Providers, customer) satisfaction.
In fact, according to this article on askspoke.com “The most popular metrics measured by help desk teams include average speed to answer (aka MTTR) (79%), number of incidents logged (79%), average call abandon rate (68%), and first-contact resolution (FCR) rate (64%).“
At the end of the day, one of the most important service desk metrics is end user or customer satisfaction (CSAT). As noted above, improving MTTR and FCR both drive higher CSAT (let’s go crazy with acronyms).
While there are many ways for businesses to improve MTTR and FCR, and to generally enhance IT efficiency, there are two technologies that have a big impact:
- Remote management tools, and
- Knowledge management (IT documentation) systems that provide fast access to information
This article from HDI says- “Benchmarking data shows that support desks with remote control technology average FCR rates that are approximately 10 percentage points higher than those who do not employ this technology.“
In this blog, we’ll take a look at how fast access to IT documentation can help you reduce MTTR and increase FCR. But, before we get into that, let’s briefly check out some of the other common ways businesses can improve IT efficiency.
Ways to Improve Information Technology Efficiency
There are several ways to boost efficiency and ensure smooth IT operations.
Intuitive UI design: In this digital world, where users look for easy-to-use software products (“apps”), design cannot be brushed aside as an afterthought. A complex, non-user-friendly user interface leads to frustration and productivity loss. An intuitive UI is self-explanatory, easy-to-use, and does not require extensive training. Incorporating an intuitive UI design enhances the quality of your IT technicians’ daily routine and improves the overall efficiency of your IT operations. At Kaseya, we are highly focused on continual improvements to our UI to drive IT productivity.
Here’s a screenshot of the UI for VSA, our remote monitoring (RMM) and endpoint management solution.
Seamless workflows across tools: IT departments use a lot of tools on an everyday basis. Proper integration of these tools is essential to ensure seamless workflows that let you get the task done faster. Seamless “workflow integration” isn’t possible when you are using multiple point solutions from different vendors. It can only come from a unified IT management platform that integrates all of the core IT functions. With a comprehensive solution, you can boost employee productivity by making it easy to move between tools and access information.
Here’s a screenshot showing one-click access to the remote management function in the endpoint management tool from the service desk ticket:
How IT Documentation Can Reduce MTTR and Increase FCR
It is generally accepted that organizations lose 20 percent of their productivity due to poor documentation. IT professionals often deal with challenges caused by the inability to retrieve important information when they are working on a task. This adds to the time they take to resolve an IT issue and increases the MTTR.
One of the best ways to boost efficiency is by having access to critical information when and where you need it. When IT documentation is automated and seamlessly integrated into your endpoint management and service desk solutions, you can reduce the time it takes to find the right information. This allows you to resolve service tickets faster– lower MTTR, and on first contact with the helpdesk– higher FCR.
By integrating an IT documentation into their IT service desk, technicians can view IT asset information– for the asset pertaining to the ticket they’re working on, organizational data, and related IT process documentation in their service tickets.
Moreover, your IT team can get enhanced IT asset information in the remote management function of your endpoint management tool. Go from service ticket to remote management of the endpoint to device information in the blink of an eye to resolve the incident faster and more efficiently!
Maximize Efficiency and Improve KPIs
By incorporating IT documentation into your core IT management tools– endpoint management and helpdesk, your support team has fast access to the right information at the right time. This, in turn, will help maximize IT efficiency, improve KPIs including MTTR and FCR, and reduce IT operating costs.
To learn more, please read our Unified IT Management product brief.
