Good communications

The lines of communication between the outsourced Service Desk and the other support groups need to work very effectively. This can be assisted by some or all of the following steps:

• Close physical co-location
• Regular liaison/review meetings
• Cross-training tutorials between the teams and departments
• ‘Partnership’ arrangements when staff from both organizations are used jointly to staff the desk
• Communication Plans and performance targets are documented in a consistent manner in OLAs and UCs.

In cases where the Service Desk is located off-shore, not all of these measures will be possible. However, the need for training and communication of the Service Desk staff is still critical, even more so in cases where there are language and cultural differences.

This will be covered in more detail in ITIL complementary publications, but, as a rule, outsourcing companies who offer off-shore Service Desk solutions should take the following into account:

• Training programmes focused on cultural understanding of the customer market
• Language skills – especially the understanding of idiomatic use of the language in the customer market. This is not so that the Service Desk staff sound like natives of the customer’s country (that type of insincerity is very quickly detected by customers), but to facilitate better understanding of the customer and the better to appreciate their priorities
• Regular visits by representatives of the customer organization to provide training and appropriate feedback directly to the Service Desk management and staff
• Training in the use of the customer organizations tools and methods of work. This is especially effective if similar training materials are presented by the same instructors as those used by the customer organization.

Date: 2014-12-29; view: 1087