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Don’t let digital transformation be a burden for your IT help desk
You wouldn’t ask your sales team to start coding your website in the same way you wouldn’t ask your marketing team to start cold calling prospects. So why do we ask our IT help desk to resolve issues that stem from cultural and behavioral change?
There is a common misconception among organizations that digital transformation is purely a software implementation. Therefore any challenges that arise fall on the IT help desk.
However, this could not be further from the truth.
This mindset needs to change as technology is only one small piece to a successful digital transformation. This perception is resulting in a flood of unnecessary support tickets, increasing support costs and reducing ROI.
Firstly, what does digital transformation involve?
Successful digital transformation requires not only a change in technology but also changes in strategy, culture, behavior, process, and skills.
“Don’t forget the human side of digital transformation, it’s the people who have to use the technology.”
Siobhan Thomas, Global Talent Acquisition Director, IHG
Getting the technology implemented is only the first part of the battle, ensuring your entire workforce changes the way they do things is where the challenges start.
IDC recently published their Designing Tomorrow White Paper which focused on digital transformation, surveying over 1,000 companies across America, Asia, and Europe. The research found that out of all the factors that create a successful digital transformation, technology was the least important.
How exactly is this impacting the IT help desk?
The IT help desk is flooded with support tickets but, the actual issue does not stem from an IT error; rather the issue is due to poor digital adoption and the previously mentioned factors.
Rather than providing the necessary training and communications to support the wide-scale change, organizations are instead expecting the IT help desk to act as the first point of contact for any issue.
The business effect
Each support tickets can reach upwards of $50.
Not only is this a huge overhead, but it also affects the meaningful contribution of your IT help desk. IT help desks should be resolving actual technical issues, but instead they often slip into a non-productive mode, “solving” the same issue for user after user.
In addition to the dreaded support costs, the time it takes for employees to have their issues resolved is also contributing to low ROI.
“It takes an average of 24.2 hours to provide the first response to an internal support ticket.”
Tasks are having to be put on hold while employees wait for a response. If employees have to wait a day for a response to their support ticket, their productivity will be hugely impacted. Users enjoy the power of discovery, working their way towards a solution; they don’t enjoy waiting for their support ticket to reach the top of the pile.
Enable users to take support into their own hands
There is a solution that does not involve overburdening the IT help desk.
Through equipping your workforce with the necessary tools, you can ensure that users self-serve their own success rather than contacting the IT help desk every time an issue appears. By moving away from the idea that the help desk is the go-to instructor and implementing a next-generation form of support such as a Digital Adoption Platform (DAP) you can dramatically reduce support time and costs.
A Digital Adoption Platform provides users with training and support directly within the application, exactly at the users point-of-need. Users immediately have a resolution to any issue or query before even thinking about submitting a ticket. The support a DAP provides instantly reduces the number of unnecessary support ticket and ensures the IT help desk can return to its intended function.
For more information on Digital Adoption Platforms, read about the Adopt solution.
