Have you ever tried to cop attitude with a help desk chat bot? It doesn’t work, nor does it get you to a resolution any quicker. It rarely works with humans either. To honor National Customer Service week, which is Oct. 2-9, we’re taking a look at some of our favorite past posts about friendliness and stellar service. And remember, kindness encourages the same. Pass it on.

Like present-day meat cutters, IT employees are not thought of as a friendly bunch.

What IT Can Learn From Supermarket Butchers (August 2009)

If you’ve noticed a change in attitude at the supermarket meat department lately, you’re not imagining it. Some big-name grocery store chains have begun a meat education renaissance, training their employees on everything from the difference between cuts and grades to the many ways to prepare and cook meat.

It’s an effort to make supermarket butchers more personable, more knowledgeable, according to a recent article in the Wall Street Journal. Read more. Read more…

Jenny Sweeney Customer Service butchers, Customer Service Week, Help Desk, juggling, South Philly, tech support

As featured on Forbes, May 18, 2011:

As 2011 proves to be another busy year of Microsoft version upgrades – for both Windows and Office – enterprise IT shops are trying bring the updates along as painlessly as possible. These may seem like simple upgrade projects to stay current with improved Microsoft features and capabilities, but end-users face particular difficulties adjusting to the latest releases. Specifically, three major end-user challenges associated with these upgrades threaten to place pressure on unprepared help desks.

For organizations moving from Office 2003 or prior versions, one of the biggest challenges for end-users is adjusting to the new Office fluent user interface, commonly known as “the ribbon.” The ribbon replaces the previous menu and toolbars in each Office application. With Office 2007, the ribbon was applied to most Office applications, with the notable exception of Outlook. In Office 2010, these differences carry forward and are coupled with the incorporation of the Ribbon into Outlook, impacting usability of this critical communications application used daily by virtually every corporate end-user. The Ribbon and other new aspects of the Office interface provide an opportunity for increased end-user productivity, but also represent significant changes in the look and feel of the core Office applications.

Jenny Sweeney Office 2010 Forbes, Help Desk, Microsoft, Office, upgrades

This week’s crop of articles restates the obvious: That smart phones and tablets are nudging out the PC in the enterprise. This is good news for the world’s workers (Increased productivity! Style! Portability! All access, all the time!), but it poses a challenge for IT departments. With new devices come increased support needs. (But that’s a topic for another post.)

Gartner predicts that by 2013, more people in the world will access the Internet on a mobile device than on a PC.

“Smartphones have conquered PCs” — CNN

According to research firm IDC, over the past two years, smartphone shipments have tripled, while PC shipments grew by only 45 percent. The trend, reports CNN, is indicative of a marked change in the kinds of devices people are using for everyday computing needs. The article also points to research from Gartner that predicts that by 2013, more people in the world will access the Internet on a mobile device than on a PC. Read more…

Jenny Sweeney Mobile Devices, tablets CIO.com, CNN, Forbes, Gartner, Help Desk, IDC, PCs, smartphones

Although the new devices debuting at the Consumer Electronics Show are dominating tech news this week, we came across two articles about the state of the help desk that warrant mention. The first, from Computerworld, reports that help desk calls in business are increasing; the second, that university students and faculty are sorely lacking in skills to get their tech problems solved quickly and efficiently. Read on:

In Computerworld, writer Patrick Thibodeau reports on a recent study conducted by the Help Desk Institute (HDI), in which researchers found that calls to the help desk increased for the second year in a row.

Some university help desk services need a technological makeover.

Thibodeau says researchers point to a number of factors that could be contributing to the increase: a multiplatform workplace, a more centralized help desk and thus better recordkeeping, complicated software upgrades, increasing awareness of help desk services, etc.

He quotes HDI analyst Roy Atkinson, who points to the fact that IT complexity is increasing, especially as users seek to connect multiple devices, including mobile phones, tablets and laptops to corporate networks. Read more…

Jenny Sweeney What We're Reading Bomgar, HDI, Help Desk, Mobile Devices

Forget a leisurely Sunday drive or going to a restaurant without a reservation. Today, everyone wants everything to be convenient and fast. We have drive-through everything – photos, pharmacies, weddings, and anything else you can dream of.

There’s no need to wait in line at the local Blockbuster; you can watch Netflix on demand. You can order your groceries online and have them delivered, print a boarding pass at the airport kiosk (no humans necessary!), and have your dry-cleaning delivered with just a click. Even GPS systems, which were once a luxury in cars, are becoming a standard. Have we lost our sense of direction? No, we like having a faster, more convenient way of getting there. Read more…

Jenny Sweeney Excel, ROI, Worker Productivity Excel, Help Desk, ROI, software support, Worker Productivity

Weather the storm by enlisting the help of Microsoft migration experts like PC Helps. PC Helps has successfully assisted in the Windows 7, Office 2007 and Office 2010 migration efforts for thousands of corporate end-users. The PC Helps Migration Assurance Plan is designed to minimize the learning curve and reduce downtime which allows end-users and internal IT staff to quickly regain the confidence and knowledge necessary to remain productive.
Learn more >> www.pchelps.com/emailweb/sd/O2K10_deplmnt/O2K10_lp.html

Jenny Sweeney Uncategorized Help Desk, Microsoft, migrations, Office 2007, Office 2010, ROI, Windows 7

On the surface, it seems a no-brainer: Why pay extra to hire an outside company for desktop application support when the demand does not exist? This perception is confirmed by the small percentage of all help desk calls that relate to desktop applications. However, those numbers represent only a fraction of what truly exists.

Lesson 1: Icebergs and Undergrounds

In the common view of desktop application support, calls typically account for less than Read more…

Jenny Sweeney Computer Literacy, PowerPoint, ROI, Worker Productivity best-of-breed, Help Desk, Outsourcing, ROI, software support, Worker Productivity

In previous posts, I examined why corporate workers hesitate to call their help desks when stuck with a software quandary. I referred to the so-called stupidity factor, or fear of looking stupid, as one of the top reasons.

In an e-mail response, a reader pointed out an even greater obstacle, something he called the infuriation factor. Read more…

Jenny Sweeney Computer Literacy, How To, ROI, Worker Productivity best-of-breed, CIO, Help Desk, IT leaders, Outsourcing, ROI, software support, Worker Productivity

In a previous post (see Real-Life Help Desk Tales, Part 1), I touched upon why people don’t call the help desk when they need software assistance (fear of looking stupid, unpleasant past experience, assumed time investment). In this post, I will take a closer look at the stupidity factor. Read more…

Jenny Sweeney Computer Literacy, How To, ROI, Worker Productivity CIO, Computer Literacy, Help Desk, IT leaders, mariachi band, software support, Worker Productivity

Consider the following scenario: The entire staff of an elementary school was recently upgraded to Office 2007. When Teacher A began creating a new lesson in PowerPoint, which is something she does on a regular basis, she couldn’t figure out how to align her text.

After more than an hour of trial and error Read more…

Jenny Sweeney Computer Literacy, Office 2007, ROI, Worker Productivity Cat Stevens, Help Desk, Office 2007, PowerPoint, ROI, software support, Worker Productivity