In today’s technology-dependent world, providing seamless help desk support is paramount. A help desk acts as the frontline, addressing queries, resolving issues, and ensuring a smooth user experience. To excel in this critical function, organizations must not only deliver efficient service but also monitor and measure their help desk performance. This is where Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) come into play.
Understanding the Core of Help Desk Support
Why Track Help Desk Performance Metrics?
Tracking help desk performance metrics is essential for several reasons. Firstly, it provides a clear understanding of the efficiency and effectiveness of the support system. By analyzing metrics, organizations can identify areas of improvement, optimize workflows, and enhance overall satisfaction.
Secondly, performance metrics offer valuable insights into resource utilization. Whether it’s the time taken to resolve tickets, the number of open issues, or the efficiency of support technicians, these metrics help in allocating resources effectively, ensuring a streamlined help desk operation.
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to Track
- First Response Time (FRT)
The speed at which a help desk responds to a query is crucial. FRT measures the time it takes for the support team to acknowledge an issue after it has been reported. A quick response time enhances satisfaction and sets a positive tone for issue resolution.
- Resolution Time
Resolution time tracks the duration taken to fully resolve a reported issue. This KPI is vital in gauging the efficiency of the support team. A shorter resolution time indicates prompt and effective problem-solving.
- Ticket Volume
The number of tickets generated over a specific period provides insights into the workload of the help desk. Tracking ticket volume helps in resource planning, ensuring that the support team is adequately staffed to handle the incoming requests.
- First Call Resolution (FCR)
FCR measures the percentage of issues resolved during the initial call with the help desk. A high FCR indicates efficiency and expertise among support technicians, reducing the need for users to follow up on the same issue multiple times.
Mining Your KPIs for Actionable Insights
The four KPI pillars listed above are of course just the start of the larger customer experience metrics you will want to track. Other metrics such as Quality Assurance/Quality Control, Process Adherence, and Experience Level Agreements (XLA is the new SLA!) help provide a more comprehensive view.
Mastering these top four categories will provide you immediate and actionable insights into customer satisfaction, budget reduction, and more. Focus on the insights you gain from these and ask yourself the following questions:
- Do you have enough technicians on staff to meet your customer demand?
- Do you provide radically different service levels on different days of the week or time of day?
- Is there an opportunity to realign schedules for your existing technical resources to map your team availability to when your calls actually occur?
- Are your technician training sessions providing adequate exposure, context, and experience with common and rare problem/resolution types?
- To what degree do your existing knowledge base, solution documentation, product FAQs, ticket solution index, and scripts/canned responses help to drive consistent and efficient resolution times?
- Are your processes well documented? Are some solutions “over-engineered” (that never happens right?!)?
- Can you observe groupings of similar or related tickets that could be contained or proactively addressed with different or better customer-facing self-service tools, explainer videos, knowledgebase articles, or other assets to help customers resolve their own inquiries?
- Are there specific call types that are ideal for solution automation through AI-infused IVR, or voice/chat/email bots of one form or another (These recommended areas may still get mixed responses from contact centers that sell live helpdesk solutions because they lower costs. But these same recommendations receive HUGE appreciation from clients because they lower costs!)?
- Where is there opportunity to provide additional access, autonomy, permission, or training to your team? Is investing in additional education a potential efficiency (this is a leading question – upskilling is almost always a savings driver)?
AnswerNet HelpDesk Services: Your Partner in Exceptional Support
AnswerNet HelpDesk Services provides comprehensive support solutions for L1 and L2 environments. Contact us to customize your own list of performance drivers to help achieve your results. We’re happy to look through your internal ticket records, knowledge base, and channel metrics and explore how a qualified vendor can help drive your organization’s success.
