This is a part of the report I created during performance evaluation of Desktop Support operations, I undertook this project during my summer internship. this is an on-going project where currently I am working on the implementation of the recommendations I made. A brief description of this project is provided under "Summer Internship" Experience.

1. 8/30/2013
Operations of
Desk side Support
IT Help Central
Soam, Neha
TEXAS TECH UNIVERSITY

2. Operations of Desk side Support
IT Help Central
August 23, 2013
Document Version 1.0
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3. Table of Contents
Executive Summary.............................................................................................................................................. 4
Introduction ............................................................................................................................................................ 6
Objective ................................................................................................................................................................... 6
Scope .......................................................................................................................................................................... 6
Description of Figure 1 ............................................................................................................................... 7
Role ............................................................................................................................................................................. 8
Project Goals ........................................................................................................................................................... 8
Project Phases ........................................................................................................................................................ 8
On-Site Services Operations ...............................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Desktop Support ......................................................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
How Desktop Support Functions?...........................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Responsibilities of Desktop Support Operations ...........Error! Bookmark not defined.
Executive Support ...................................................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
List of all the job profiles serves under Desktop & Executive support .................. Error!
Bookmark not defined.
Roles and Responsibilities of each job Profile .................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Number of employees serving each job profile ...............Error! Bookmark not defined.
Classroom Technology Services ........................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
How Classroom Technology Functions? ..............................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Responsibilities of Desktop Support Operations ...........Error! Bookmark not defined.
List of all the job profiles serves under Classroom Technology Services ............. Error!
Bookmark not defined.
Roles and Responsibilities of each job Profile .................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Number of employees serving each job profile ...............Error! Bookmark not defined.
Research & Observations .....................................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Information Gathering Phase .............................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Step Wise Research Plan ..............................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
How the research was being done? ........................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Questions included/asked in questionnaire.....................Error! Bookmark not defined.
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4. Sources of Information Gathering ..........................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Observations .............................................................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Some interesting facts & figures .......................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Recommendations ..................................................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Classroom Technology Services...............................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Conclusion..................................................................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Skills Acquired ..................................................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Accomplishments ............................................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Table 2: Table Summarizing Performance Evaluation & Improvement Solutions for
Onsite Services ..................................................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Glossary .................................................................................................................................................................... 9
References ............................................................................................................................................................ 11
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5. Executive Summary
This report covers IT Help Central’s internship project in which I played a role of
consultant who had to understand, evaluate, recommend & implement those
recommendations to improve the operations of On-Site Services. Here I was able to
implement my classroom knowledge in a real time project and identify problems and their
possible solutions.
To summarize the observations, recommendations & solutions I was able to provide to
different areas of ITHC On-Site Services, Table 1 below was created, listed here are the key
observations and their respective solutions. To view full table click here.
Table 1: Table Summarizing Performance Evaluation & Improvement Solutions for Onsite Services
Problems
Recommendations for
Desktop/Executive Support
Hardware or inventory(goingout/coming-in) Recording
Solutions
There is no way to measure
and track important metrics
for On-Site Services.
Metrics/KPIs measurement
Footprints reporting is too
complex and is hard to say it
is accurate, which makes it
next to impossible to retrieve
any reports required by
management.
Desktop Support is facing
problems in student hiring
process. From the kind of
talent they want to recruit to
the whole recruiting process
has become cumbersome.
Improvise reporting system
1. We can make use of the historical data
and calculate important metrics which can
give us estimates for current & future
performance. Or
2. We can improve the existing Footprints
system to measure the required metrics.
Or
3. We can make use of cognos to help
implementing the metrics generation
system
1. We can improve Footprints reporting.
Or
2. We can use cognos to solve our purpose
and also train management on cognos
report retrieving.
Desktop Support has to take
in/out hardware on a daily
basis to office which is not
recorded.
Student Hiring Process
improvement
We can improve the existing ITHC OSS
inventory SharePoint site to include
recording of other resources going out or
coming in.
1. We can re-vamp the whole recruiting
process to make it more formal. We also
need to improve the SA job recruiting
advertisement.
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6. On-Site Services as a whole
needs to improve their
documentation. They have so
much information which
needs to be recorded for later
backups.
Better Documentation
(example:- best
practices/training/new
software)
1. We should document and follow
Desktop Support best practices.
2. We should document "How to use?" for
any new software for quick reference in
future.
Frequent issues like virus
infections adds a lot of
travelling time as well as
consumes staff's crucial time
when only 20% of such
issues really need physical
presence onsite.
Automation of frequent issues
like spyware uninstallation
A considerable amount of
issues needs just basic
troubleshooting to get
resolved which can be
handled without going onsite
and spending time on
travelling
Consideration of remote
desktop for basic
troubleshooting
1. We can use Dell Kace (asset
management tool) to automate the virus
removal process either by pushing scripts
or by managing and enforcing compliance
with TTU system policies across desktops,
laptops and servers and thus reducing the
risk of malware, spyware and viruses
compromising endpoints.
1. We can use bomgar to remote logging in
and thus cutting out the whole travelling
time and also saving gas.
2. Windows Remote Desktop can also be
used but it has so many limitations
List of Recommendations for CTS
Issue Information Tab
doesn’t have relevant fields
for CTS hence currently they
are just using a certain
pattern for this tab which
further skews the statistics of
certain types of issues
registered on Footprints and
hence projects false
information
While conducting my
research I came to know that
vendor B has comparatively a
very high breakdown rate for
the device installation than
vendor A but still vendor B
keeps getting all the
contracts. Problem is if CTS
don’t have any data to prove
this rate it’s difficult to claim
it.
Footprints needs to be tailored
for CTS
1. We can add the relevant options on the
Issue information tab for CTS
2. CTS has to prepare a list of such
relevant options for fields :- "Type",
"Category" and "Sub-Category"
Vendor evaluation sheet
Vendor evaluation sheet can be
maintained to show how many times
vendor B's installation broke or
malfunctioned. For this sheet we need to
document room numbers, building names,
device names, vendor names and number
of times problem occurred. Over a period
of time we'll have figures to show the
vendor performance.
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7. Introduction
Objective
The objective of this internship was to understand and explore IT Help Central On-Site
Services’ operations in depth and make and implement recommendations to improve their
efficiency.
Scope
In order to understand the operations of On-Site Services in-depth, it is important to first
understand the departmental structure of IT Help Central (ITHC). Figure 1 shows the
ITHC’s departmental structure. This will also help in understanding the scope of our
project.
IT Help Central
Tier 0, Tier1
Tier 2
On-Site
Services
Support
Center


Service Desk
QTKM




Desktop Support
Executive
Support
Classroom
Technology
Services
Residence Hall
Support
Figure 1: IT Help Central Areas
This document covers only the sections shown inside the red rectangle in figure 1, which are On-Site Services’
Desktop Support, Executive support & Classroom Technology Services.
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8. Description of Figure 1
Below here is the description of the Figure 1 as well as each bulleted point exploring the
scope of the project:

IT Help Central is divided into two portions, Support Center & On-Site Support
Services.

Tier 0 & 1 plays as the first and also single point of contact for the customers having
any IT related questions or issues.

Only when an issue cannot be resolved at Tier 0 or 1 then it’s sent to Tier 2. Later in
the document we have discussed “How issues which can’t be resolved on Tier 1 are
allocated to respective Tier 2 support department.”

As shown in Figure 1, Support Center is at Tier 0, Tier 1 which consists of two areas,
Service Desk & QTKM (Quality, Training & Knowledge Management). Where
Service Desk provides online (phone & e-mail) help to all the customers across
university on IT related issues, QTKM trains new ITHC staff/students and also takes
care of TTU knowledgebase namely askIT.

On-Site Services, on the other hand, provides IT related assistance on the customer
site, and hence it’s considered as a part of Tier – 2 services. On-site Services consists
of 4 areas namely Desktop Support, Executive Support, Classroom Technology
& Residence Hall Support.

Each area has a hierarchy. Therefore, to understand the On-Site Services’ operations
we need to incorporate views and experiences of all of the employees from different
levels of hierarchy which includes staff members and students.

Also as discussed earlier, On-Site Services’ operations is not limited to the office;
staff and student assistants also go out on the customer site. Thus this document
covers both the areas of operations i.e. Office and On-Site.
In a nutshell, the scope of this project covers Desktop, Executive & Classroom
Technology Support’s operations and will include all their operation areas.
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9. Role
As an ITHC intern I had to play a role of consultant and evaluate & assess On-Site Services
operations and suggest recommendations to improve the current system.
Project Goals
Based on the understanding of the scope of project, project goals were decided as follows:
 To learn “How On-Site Services functions?”
 To evaluate Onsite Services Operations
 To make & implement recommendations to improve the efficiency of ITHC’s Desktop,
Executive Support & Classroom Technology Services areas.
Project Phases
To achieve the project goals successfully & timely, Project was divided into different phases
with each phase having a timeline. Phases are listed below in the order they were:

Information Gathering Phase: This phase covered researching about each area of OnSite Services followed by interview sessions with different staff members & students
onsite & in office.

Evaluation Phase: On the basis of information gathered, assessment of On-Site Services
operations were done. This consisted processing of gathered data, finding facts and
figures out of that data and comparing those figures with industry standards.

Recommendation Making Phase: Information gathering and evaluation phase helped a
lot to come up with a number of recommendations to fix some of the shortcomings in
support operations in order to increase the efficiency of On-Site Services.

Recommendation/Implementation Phase:
This was the phase where all the high
priority recommendations were to be implemented.
Overall the whole process needed critical analysis skills as well as team effort.
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10. Glossary
Acronym
Definition
askIT
A TTU Web Portal for IT related problem's solution
CTS
Classroom Technology Services
Footprints
Footprints is a web-based service management application from BMC
Software used to record and track support and customer service
requests. The Texas Tech University implementation of Footprints
includes workspaces for the TTU IT Division, as well as several other
departments/colleges. (In Footprints, a workspace is a collection of
issues or tickets for a unit, department, or service area. It is identified by
a unique name and number, and allows for custom fields, options, and
users specific to that workspace. Each workspace remains separate from
other workspaces, which allows for customizations specific to that
workspace’s workflows.)
GA
Graduate Assistant
HD
Hard Disk
HESS
Health, Exercise & Sport Sciences
ICC
International Cultural Center
IT
Information Technologies
ITHC
IT Help Central
ITST
IT Support Technician
ITSTs
IT Support Technicians
KPI
Key Performance Indicator
KPIs
Key Performance Indicators
MTTR
Mean Time to Resolve
QTKM
Quality, Training, and Knowledge Management
RHS
Residence Hall Support
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11. Acronym
Definition
SA
Student Assistant
SAs
Student Assistants
TTU
Texas Tech University
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12. References
Desktop Support Best Practices
http://www.slideshare.net/MetricNet/metric-nets-desktop-support-best-practices
Desktop Support Benchmarks
http://www.metricnet.com/desktop-support-benchmarks
Mean Time to Resolve (MTTR)
http://www.thinkhdi.com/~/media/HDICorp/Files/Library-Archive/Insider%20Articles/meantime-to-resolve.pdf?utm_content=091212_IndustryInsider
Agent Job satisfaction
http://www.metricnet.com/metric-of-the-month
Technical Support Cost Ratios
http://www.asponline.com/tscr.pdf
Eight Essential KPI’s for Managing Desktop Support
http://www.servicemanagementfusion.com/conference/~/media/HDIConf/2012/Files/
White%20Papers/Rumburg%20%20Zbikowski%20%208%20KPIs%20Desktop%20Supp
ort.pdf
Staffing the Desktop Support Function
http://www.servicemanagementfusion.com/conference/~/media/HDIConf/2012/Files/
White%20Papers/Rumburg%20-%20Optimal%20Staffing%20Desktop%20Support.pdf
Percent Resolved Level 1 Capable
https://www.thinkhdi.com/~/media/HDICorp/Files/LibraryArchive/Insider%20Articles/Percent%20Resolved%20Level%201%20Capable.pdf
Fundamentals of Desktop Support Operations
http://www.thinkhdi.com/~/media/HDIConf/2012/Files/speakerhandouts/Session509.pdf
http://www.askit.ttu.edu
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