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Thread: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

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    LWA
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    Question How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    Hey all,
    For background, I'm the IT Manager of a site that has around 300 employees. This year we've been tasked to reduce call volumes for common issues and questions.

    Typically we get asked a lot of similar questions time and time again by users, e.g.

    1. What is the maximum message size I can send in Outlook?
    2. What is the maximum mailbox size?
    3. How can I shrink this presentation?
    4. How do I turn of duplex settings on a printer?

    (These are examples of the most generic ones; We have far more that are specific to our in house applications).

    My question is, what would be the best way to deliver these hints / tips?

    I've considered the following:

    1. Laminated 'quick hints' guides
    2. Displaying tips in the weekly newsletter
    3. Displaying a 'tip' when a user logs in (plus the function to cycle through the tips)
    4. Displaying the tips on the intranet


    The idea being that users would check this guide and would prevent them having to raise an IT call.

    Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

    Thanks,
    Leon

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    Re: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    A long hold queue combined with a "have you tried consulting the documentation site on the Intranet?"

    Eventually everyone but the thickest user learns to help themselves

    (\___/) (\___/) (\___/) (\___/) (\___/) (\___/) (\___/)
    (='.'=) (='.'=) (='.'=) (='.'=) (='.'=) (='.'=) (='.'=)
    (")_(") (")_(") (")_(") (")_(") (")_(") (")_(") (")_(")


    This is bunny and friends. He is fed up waiting for everyone to help him out, and decided to help himself instead!

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    Guy
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    Re: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    No matter what you send them, they wont read it, time and time again they will ring with the same issues.

    Everytime they ask a question that the answer to is in the quick tips help guide, send them a *minor* electric shock down the phone.

    Shock theorpy ftw.

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    Re: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    In your support ticket system just ensure they pick a drop down that describes their problem, and if it's one of your four most common ones refer them to an FAQ instead of a support request form.

    If your problem is that requests are coming in through means other than an online form, then just drop those forms of support - insist everyone uses a web form.

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    LWA
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    Re: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    Quote Originally Posted by Lucio View Post
    A long hold queue combined with a "have you tried consulting the documentation site on the Intranet?"

    Eventually everyone but the thickest user learns to help themselves
    Indeed - however calls cannot be placed on hold in our system and so we have to address them otherwise we run out of SLA.

    Furthermore we have many shop floor employees who are not exactly computer savy hence I was thinking about the quick help laminated guide.

    Quote Originally Posted by rastamanblues View Post
    No matter what you send them, they wont read it, time and time again they will ring with the same issues.

    Everytime they ask a question that the answer to is in the quick tips help guide, send them a *minor* electric shock down the phone.

    Shock theorpy ftw.
    Maybe when I implement the new PBX system I'll ask Avaya if they have that 'feature'!

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    LWA
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    Re: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    Quote Originally Posted by kalniel View Post
    In your support ticket system just ensure they pick a drop down that describes their problem, and if it's one of your four most common ones refer them to an FAQ instead of a support request form.

    If your problem is that requests are coming in through means other than an online form, then just drop those forms of support - insist everyone uses a web form.
    Another excellent suggestion - we use a global online help desk system and we do promote this to be used over phone calls (obviously you can appreciate this is not always the case!). As such I think this will assist with people who use the on-line system but not those who visit IT or phone up. Definitely something to consider.


    Thanks again to everyone for responding.

    Edit: Back to back posting, bad form - apologies.

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    Re: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    Quote Originally Posted by Big Leon View Post
    As such I think this will assist with people who use the on-line system but not those who visit IT or phone up. Definitely something to consider.
    You let people visit you??! Insanity. I'd install laser defences immediately

    (Seriously - are these queries really real time critical? Or is it fair that people who've used the form should be put to the back of the queue when someone comes and bugs you in person? Overall service could be worse than if you insist on appointments for personal visits)

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    Re: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    Have a FAQ section on your online ticket system (I am assuming you have one). And give these ticket a low priority.

    A monthly newsletter might help too.

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    LWA
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    Re: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    Quote Originally Posted by kalniel View Post
    (Seriously - are these queries really real time critical? Or is it fair that people who've used the form should be put to the back of the queue when someone comes and bugs you in person? Overall service could be worse than if you insist on appointments for personal visits)
    We've worked really hard with the business to insist that users raise a ticket rather than visiting in person - however it doesn't matter how hard you insist, you will always get people visiting you in person. You may respond that we have to point blank demand that people raise a ticket else you won't help them however this does not help IT & business relations. I might add that due to user education and us politely reminding the users that we need the tickets, the vast majority is handled via the on-line ticketing system.

    However, to your point, people who visit IT without a ticket will be told that their issue will be actioned when possible (i.e. after the other tickets in the queue). IT staff will therefore assist them to raise a ticket or ask them to raise one themselves.

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    Re: How to provide users with helpful hints...?

    i feel your pain buddy. i've (fairly) recently ended up in a position where i'm part of a 4 man team thast supports 2 sites of approx 800 users per site.

    only problem is, my 3 colleagues are based at the one site in scotland, i'm the only member of the team based at my site & until i started they had no support other than remotely from my colleages and then only when they were able to provide it due to pressures from their own site

    so despite trying to insist people log things properly through our helpdesk (which is based in india) i still get in to work most days to find a queue of people outside my door

    its very difficult to maintian the balance between not being totally reactive to individual's problems, thereby letting the larger project type stuff slip, and coming across as being unhelpful & thereby antagonising your customers

    basically the only way its possible is with a little pain at the outset. a bit of "tough love" for your customers in guiding them towards whatever method of support you feel is appropriate.

    whatever route you chose to take i would advise ensuring you get buy-in for it from senior management in the areas which you support the most. ensure they understand what you're doing, why you're doing it and (most importantly) why this will benefit them in the long rn. this way when you do have the pain of "educating" staff to follow your chosen support mechanism, you know you're not going to end up with the weight of the entire company coming to bear upon you when some berk kicks up a stink because you didn't drop everything to fix his / her printer jam when they turned up at your door screaming at them

    personally, from the options you've sugggested above...

    i'd definitely avoid displaying hints & tips during login - nobody will read them, nobody appreciates their machine taking longer than it has to when logging in so that'll just antagonise.

    laminated sheets - might be an idea to post some around the building

    intranet FAQs area - if this can be populated with easy to follow (and i mean easy - screenshots with big red circles and arrow pointing at the buttons they need to click easy) do-it-yourself help guides, you can get into the habit of poitning people there. if you do this often enough, some (if not all) will at least check there first, especially if, for easy to remedy things you point blank refuse to do anything other than point them in the direction of the "how to do it yourself" guides

    just one other suggestion then i'll shut up, since i'm aware i'm starting to ramble on a bit....how about a "local expert" scheme? i ran one of these a few years back it was fairly successful.

    if you have individuals in each area of the business who are reasonably clued up on how things work in their area, enlist their help & disseminate information, hints & tips etc via these people. that way, for the easy to resolve issues that really shouldn't be getting escalated to IT such as "how do i make my margins bigger on this Word document" they can help out within their departments, leaving you & your staff free to deal with proper issues. these individuals often know all the tips & tricks for any bespoke apps used in their areas too, so save you having to train your staff in every possible app that may be used

    (also, i may be being cynical here, but its usually these slightly clued-up individuals who often don't know as much as they think they know who are the first to denigrate IT departments methods cos they think they kvould do better, thereby getting you a bad name, so getting them on-side helps enormously with the PR side of things!)
    if it ain't broke...fix it till it is


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