who is working in a support desk/help desk role?

with so many postings about what certs we wants and who does what, I get confused...

i am in week 3 of being a Support Desk Analyst, and I have to say I like it a lot

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Repo Man

That was my last job. i was hoping to get out but in talks to take another one paying 10-15k more so if offered I will take it.

size15shoe

Im currently an IT intern (which is identical to a help desk analyst in this role im working) and i honestly love it. I learn something new everyday.

Hypntick

Currently L1 help desk. Quite a bit different than my last job which was also help desk. That one was more technical, networking etc. This is more password resets and directing to other departments. Want out of this one asap, not exactly my cup of tea.

RouteThisWay

Friday is my last day in my Help Desk job. I start my System Administrator job on Monday at a new company

Krusty_47

I'm working at a helpdesk position right now but it looks like I will be heading to a new job soon.

IRONMONKUS

I'm in Desktop Support and am currently studying for the CCNA to move into the Networking side of things.

Dakinggamer87

I'm currently working as a PC/Network Tech but am working towards a Network/Systems Admin.

snokerpoker

I work for a contract company and am the dedicated onsite person for our biggest client. I do everything from helpdesk to server support and administration. I like doing helpdesk tickets for the most part as you get to meet and interact with the employees.

Lemonade727

I've been working at my most recent help desk role for about 4 months now. Our help crew is a small group (4 people including myself), yet our manager still finds things to bring over into our territory for support and tries to put as much on our plates as possible regarding separate projects as well. It keeps us on our toes without becoming too overwhelming and opens us up to a lot of new technology which is a great thing. I like the new experiences and knowledge gained from it, plus it's great resume fodder for when I try to either move up within the company or expand to somewhere else.

For example, just this week he brought me in to work with part of our proper Desktop Support group (since our help desk group is on the phone 90% of the time) on our new "Field Empowerment" project for the field users that came into our HQ. They've been struggling to get some kind of standard for hardware/software configurations on our field users machines so we had a large group come down so we could upgrade them to new hardware if required and then optimize the other machines if it didn't warrant a new laptop. Not anything too out there regarding what a help desk should work on but it's definitely more than what the help desk group at this company has done in the past and it's starting to bridge the gap between divisions.

Dr IT

On a L2 Helpdesk role as well with some interaction with projects mangement for on site .

Like the Support role but sometimes ignorant user get on your nerves.

Danny boy

Been working in L1 helpdesk for the past 14 months, mainly just password resets and logging calls. However I have a phone interview tonight for another helpdesk job which involves more troubleshooting and higher pay, so am hopeful of getting something better.

Mike-Mike

yeah, that was my next question sort of....

in my training they listed help desk as being much different than Support Desk, is that true? or just training fluff?

we're listed as Tier 1, but we do a lot of stuff.. reset passwords and unlock accounts in AD of course, but we remote in and do some troubleshooting, push software, etc.. is that the norm for help desk too?

miller811

I am working doing L2 network support on a very large enterprise network. VPN creation, modification, vlan changes, hardware support, WAN troubleshooting, enterprise wireless, etc...

the_Grinch

I've been in a helpdesk position for almost a year and ready for the change to something else. We have a 4 man team for 35 or so managed customers that we do everything for. I've done password reset, account unlocks, hardware/software troubleshooting, server administration (troubleshooting everything from the software to the hardware), account creation, printer setups (troubleshooting), everything related to Citrix, networking issues. Basically, we've grown without bringing on more people and the current rules require working on any issue for at least two hours before escalating. I touch new technology everyday pretty much and there are products that I have fixed that the vendors themselves had no solutions for.

Helpdesk can be truly trying most of the time. Some of our largest customers are medical and law related so we deal with the God complex on an hourly basis. I find that the job truly changes you and makes you much more cynical then you would believe possible. In the course of my year, I've had problems that were clearly user caused. As they yell and scream at you on the phone you tend to fall into that 1000 yard stare. Once they stop belittling you and settle on doing what you ask it some how by magic works. Most say it's about time, but in the past two months I've received 3 apologies. Plus you will always find those few users who are easy going and agree that their coworkers suck.

Ultimately, I wouldn't change the path I have taken thus far. I have learned to adapt and overcome, push myself beyond thresholds, and learned more technology then I can shake a stick at. Plus, my social engineering skills have improved 10 fold since taking this job lol.

Hypntick

Mike-Mike wrote: »

yeah, that was my next question sort of....

in my training they listed help desk as being much different than Support Desk, is that true? or just training fluff?

we're listed as Tier 1, but we do a lot of stuff.. reset passwords and unlock accounts in AD of course, but we remote in and do some troubleshooting, push software, etc.. is that the norm for help desk too?

Sounds exactly like the job i'm doing now actually. That's going to be the difference between internal employee facing help desk and external customer facing help desk. The internal ones tend to have more on their plate to do, although mostly password resets.

jtoast

One of my teams jobs is level 3 support for desktop client and core application issues. If my team can't solve it then we work directly with the vendor to figure out a solution. I rarely deal with actual users. Issues are usually escalated to us in the form of a consult ticket.

Mike-Mike

Hypntick wrote: »

Sounds exactly like the job i'm doing now actually. That's going to be the difference between internal employee facing help desk and external customer facing help desk. The internal ones tend to have more on their plate to do, although mostly password resets.

we only deal with internal colleagues, but we have over 55 thousand users

Hypntick

Mike-Mike wrote: »

we only deal with internal colleagues, but we have over 55 thousand users

Yep same here.

External facing help desks tend to do a bit less. Generally no remote access or anything like that. People tend to freak out if they see you remote in. Although external are also a lot more customer service based it seems. Just different types of calls, I never had password resets in my previous job. We didn't do passwords, we just did network stuff i.e. are you in the gateway, proper IP, wireless connection, MAC filter, port/switch resets etc.

This job however has a broader group of applications, but less depth of support. Is this something that can be fixed by a password reset, reboot or profile rebuild? If no, inform the group and pass the ticket to them. More routing to others, less troubleshooting. I'm a bigger fan of more in depth stuff, that's just me.