Is every company help desk bad like mine?

baseball1988

I work in a help desk environment (pretty much like a call centre but call volume changes every time). There are days where you sit for 15 minutes without a call. When it gets busy, expect to get a call every 2 minutes (at least there is time to rest).

Every once in a while, business customers complain about the service they are receive. The problem is that business customers open several tickets, and my coworkers IN MY DEPARTMENT touch and update the ticket. If they are not careful and leave out some missing info, it causes confusion and customers get pissed off. Then, the boss will dig through voice conversations to find out WHO did it and WHAT happened. I wish i had the opportunity to START the ticket, work on the ticket from start to end.

Is it like this at your company's help desk?

I have pretty much two options right now:
1_ Find another HELP DESK job at a different company and hope the situation is different (with potential career opportunities)
2_ Self-study and obtain a certificate in the meantime. Hold tight and look for a position that doesn't require interacting with customers (Quality Assurance Analyst - my dream job)?

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Comments

drkat

baseball1988 wrote: »

I work in a help desk environment (pretty much like a call centre but call volume changes every time). There are days where you sit for 15 minutes without a call. When it gets busy, expect to get a call every 2 minutes (at least there is time to rest).

Every once in a while, business customers complain about the service they are receive. The problem is that business customers open several tickets, and my coworkers IN MY DEPARTMENT touch and update the ticket. If they are not careful and leave out some missing info, it causes confusion and customers get pissed off. Then, the boss will dig through voice conversations to find out WHO did it and WHAT happened. I wish i had the opportunity to START the ticket, work on the ticket from start to end.

Is it like this at your company's help desk?

I have pretty much two options right now:
1_ Find another HELP DESK job at a different company and hope the situation is different (with potential career opportunities)
2_ Self-study and obtain a certificate in the meantime. Hold tight and look for a position that doesn't require interacting with customers (Quality Assurance Analyst - my dream job)?

It's the same in every call center type helpdesk yes. They're motivated and budgeted by MTTR and CSAT. The volume definitely changes - I've been on desks where a single guy has taken upwards of 80 calls a day.

You should look for a spot doing what you wanna do - dont jump from one sinking ship to another.

Version4

There are many types of support gigs and not all of them are alike.

Primarily you have internal desks and external desks. Internal desks support only internal staff, not the public. External desks are usually a public only desk, but lots of them do public and internal.

Once you have the internal / external worked out, your next modifier is whether or not you are a call center or a helpdesk. Call centers are only concerned with call volume, speed to answer, FCR, CSAT, and other metrics. Call centers typically have dispatch staff that take the initial call information and pass it on to the entry level technician. True helpdesks are usually completely opposite of the call center. Helpdesks have metrics but you don't have managers breathing down your neck waiting for you to get off the call you are on so you can answer the next one. Helpdesks also generally resolve more issues faster and with a more personal feel. Both call centers and helpdesks can be internal or external (or both). Of course there are always exceptions.

What you describe is not like the helpdesk I came from. I came from a helpdesk that actually worked and resolved issues from start to finish. We were responsible for everything in the company software and hardware wise. If we couldn't figure it out, we would ask a support manager, if they didn't have the answer we would escalate a ticket to another group. Once the other group fixed it, we had to figure out if we were capable of fixing it and why it broke so knowledgebase articles could be written for US so the other group didn't have to take tickets at all. After all that we then called the customer back and let them know the issue was resolved.

Last, on the part about whether you should stay in the helpdesk or not......one word...... RUN

Run far away and don't look back. Combine both options #1 and #2 if you are adventurous.

Akaricloud

That sounds like a horrible helpdesk, I'd definitely try to switch if I were you.

Work on some certs for a few weeks then start looking for something else. With better qualifications will come better positions, even if it's just a better helpdesk position.

chrisone

Lets put it this way , most help desk techs have low technical experience otherwise they wouldn't be in the helpdesk to begin with, am i right?

Second , other than technical ability you need to have people skills. I apologize and i dont mean to belittle any helpdesk professionals, i too was in helpdesk but the reality is , if and once we all have advanced technical skills 99.9% of us would move on from the helpdesk.

So i believe most helpdesks suffer in this category because lets face it, the very talented and skilled workers will move on and away from helpdesk leaving those that are less technical and experienced. Its natural , such in a sense that its natural that the last batter in the line up is probably not a big threat to the pitcher in baseball.

baseball1988

Thank you all for taking your time to respond.

drdat: I will definitely pursue my dream job. But, I want to make the right decision instead of jumping to another company and face the same issue.

version4: I am fully aware of the different help desk positions available (internal and external) and thanks for the clarification. I work in a help desk (or call centre) environment where the manager doesn't care if you troubleshoot for hours on a single issue but my colleagues will definitely be hammered by calls. You described your help desk as "resolved issues from start to finish" and this is the type of help desk I want to work in. Unfortunately, we use a tracking system where anyone in the team can touch my ticket. The worst is when a business customer calls in and start yelling at me for something I didn't do wrong (it's my colleague that screwed up). I always have to sympathize and apologize for something I didn't do wrong. The norm is "don't transfer the call back to the original person" at my place.

Another major problem is: my colleague are closing my tickets when I spent so much effort on it. I suggested the solution and just waiting for the customer to call back to tell me that everything is working. My colleague will answer the call and they end up closing it. So, the manager sometimes assume my colleague had solved a major issue. Sometimes I would close my colleague's ticket. There were a few times where I was nice enough to inform my colleague to close it themselves because they deserve it.

Akaricloud: yeah, i should be studying for certs asap. Today, i am planning to send out a few resumes to see if any employers call me for interviews.

Chrisone: I agree with your post and I am still fairly new to the IT industry. However, I heard from my friends that their help desk environment is different. He is doing Application Support and barely pick up calls. Mostly support through emails and a couple calls per day. I was just curious if all help desk environments was similar to my situation before I start applying to new help desk jobs/other jobs.

Mc5ully

That sounds horrible!

I'm in NYC also and work for a small business with multiple offices. I would try to move to a small company also to get out of that insane help desk circus. That way you could learn more skills and have more job responsibility.

Version4

baseball, yep getting yelled at is par for the course on pretty much any support role that you are in, even if it isn't your fault. I experienced the same closing of tickets by co-workers where I had spent a long time on, only to have them make a quick close and get "points" for it. While the helpdesk is not where you want to be, unless you really like it and want to make it a career, it does offer you a lot of diversity to learn about everything you can imagine and it can point you in the eventual direction that you want to go - but you already know that.

I believe the comment about "having low technical experience otherwise why are you in the helpdesk" is not an accurate comment and I disagree. There are a vast number of political reasons why one could be stuck in the helpdesk whether or not they have a great personality and people skills or not. Other normal reasons, especially "in today's economy", are due to budgeting constraints. Hiring freezes, layoffs, re-structuring, consolidations, etc - they all play a role.

baseball1988

Version4 wrote: »

baseball, yep getting yelled at is par for the course on pretty much any support role that you are in, even if it isn't your fault. I experienced the same closing of tickets by co-workers where I had spent a long time on, only to have them make a quick close and get "points" for it. While the helpdesk is not where you want to be, unless you really like it and want to make it a career, it does offer you a lot of diversity to learn about everything you can imagine and it can point you in the eventual direction that you want to go - but you already know that.

I believe the comment about "having low technical experience otherwise why are you in the helpdesk" is not an accurate comment and I disagree. There are a vast number of political reasons why one could be stuck in the helpdesk whether or not they have a great personality and people skills or not. Other normal reasons, especially "in today's economy", are due to budgeting constraints. Hiring freezes, layoffs, re-structuring, consolidations, etc - they all play a role.

Hello Version4,

Thanks for the reply. I pretty much know the direction I want to take however it's not easy to pursue my dream job as a quality assurance analyst. I applied to various "QA Analyst" & "Software Tester" jobs while I am still employed but I didn't get any replies so far. In fact, I already have an university degree along with a college diploma but this still isn't enough for some reason. I accepted this help desk job initially (a year and half ago) due to "recession" but my dream is beyond help desk level. I know experience is more important than education nowadays but I am still trying to find a way to get me there. The main issue is that I don't have related experience to QA methodology, SDLC, software testing, creating test plans and executing it. I would assume I need to either 1. keep applying for QA jobs and luck out 2. find another Help Desk job with a great company that is growing 3. register for specialized courses in QA testing. I can only get Help Desk or Technical Analyst positions in the meantime.

Anyone here has switched from Help Desk to QA before?

gbadman

baseball1988 wrote: »

Hello Version4,

Thanks for the reply. I pretty much know the direction I want to take however it's not easy to pursue my dream job as a quality assurance analyst. I applied to various "QA Analyst" & "Software Tester" jobs while I am still employed but I didn't get any replies so far. In fact, I already have an university degree along with a college diploma but this still isn't enough for some reason. I accepted this help desk job initially (a year and half ago) due to "recession" but my dream is beyond help desk level. I know experience is more important than education nowadays but I am still trying to find a way to get me there. The main issue is that I don't have related experience to QA methodology, SDLC, software testing, creating test plans and executing it. I would assume I need to either 1. keep applying for QA jobs and luck out 2. find another Help Desk job with a great company that is growing 3. register for specialized courses in QA testing. I can only get Help Desk or Technical Analyst positions in the meantime.

Anyone here has switched from Help Desk to QA before?

I find it interesting that your dream career is in Software Assurance. My career journey has been the reverse of your intended path. I started out almost 5 years ago working for an IT consultancy. The core of their business model was to offer to implement software development or IT support projects for companies. So they employed an army of people they would deploy in software development, software testing and helpdesk roles. The great thing about working for a company like that is that it allows you a good view of the various fields in IT (and Telecoms). I spent a few months as a Software Tester, then a few as a low level tech in a support role deploying software and firmware upgrades to remote POS terminals, then a few months as a software developer and then a few months in a helpdesk role. However that helpdesk was of the more technical variety. It supported the test network of a mobile service provider, where you logged and did first line troubleshooting on the network issues raised by handset testers and did things like user access control, provisioning of SIM cards for the test phones and analysing poor signal strength in the test cellular network. But there was very little room to move up to engineer level. The helpdesk was almost a deep hole with a trapdoor at the top.

That last role (and the second to a lesser degree) was the one that turned me on to IP network engineering. Despite being in the ideal environment to go after what had been my dream career coming out or university (mobile network engineering), I realised upon closer inspection that my real passion was in something slightly different. The trouble was, it was tough getting into network engineering. After I left that job, I had no shortage of calls from recruitment agents. However, they were all either helpdesk or software testing. My attitude to the helpdesk ones was 'been there, done that'. I had no intention of going into what would almost certainly be a more meaningless helpdesk role than the one I'd left. It would have taken my career backwards rather than forwards. And for a pitiful salary. The software testing roles paid more, but I was aware that it was a deviation. In the end I took a job as a Software Assurance Engineer. I had limited options (since I had no intention of spending months out of work). I resolved to spend my time at that job studying for the CCNA so that my next job would be as an IP Network Engineer. And that is precisely what happened after two years at that job.

Which brings me onto my beef with software assurance. No matter how advanced or skilled you are in the art (and I have to concede it is an art. When you've spent almost 3 years altogether in the field, you have to give due respect to the professionals who do it to a high level of excellence. It's certainly a necessary function) However, I'm an engineer by nature. I need to create things, not test other people's creations. No matter how knowledgable and skilled I might have become as a QA engineer, I would never have felt fulfilled. Also, it's the creator vs tester reality that means that a Software Engineer will always have greater status and prestige that a Software Assurance Engineer (all else being equal).

If QA really is your real passion (as opposed to merely your current unenlightened belief), then my advice would be to seek out recruitment agencies specialising in the that field. All that's required at entry level is a logical and analytical mind, which your degree would have given you. If you manage to get with an IT consultancy like my first company, even better. And the thing with software assurance is that once you get your first role, you're not likely to ever be out of work long (assuming you stay in that first role longer than a couple of months;)). At least that's how I find it is in the UK. The thing sticks to you like glue!

gbadman

Also, there a number of cerifications in QA from a number of vendors. Read the book and take the exam. You have to take your development into your own hands in IT. If you're always looking for 'courses' you're severely limiting stunting your own growth. I did take the Cisco Network Academy CCNA course, and it was helpful being in that classroom environment, if only for the purposes of bouncing ideas off other people. However, I didn't go all out seeking it out. It happened to be there and I took it as a preferrable option to self-studying. Howeevr if it hadn't been there I would certainly have gone ahead and self-studied.

lsud00d

baseball1988, how long have you been at that company and in a Help Desk/Call Center role?

Do you have opportunities to get your hands on anything else...even if sandbox'ed? Have you asked for more responsibilities? Have you, without being asked, compiled in-house policies/procedures, or contributed to the in-house knowledgebase?

It's things like the above that facilitate advancement, if nothing because it's good on a resume and you can demonstrate your initiative, work ethic, and documentation abilities...all important in any IT role.

Anyways, for the time being, diversify your knowledge, but the bottom line in any job for me is personal satisfaction. If this job is turning you into a grouch or bitter person, or if you act differently towards your family and friends, then get out and go somewhere else.

baseball1988

gbadman: thank you for taking your time to share your work experience. You mentioned of deploying software upgrades on POS terminals remotely. It is very surprising because I also troubleshoot bank or POS terminals as well but I don't get the opportunity to test the units. I will definitely visit a recruitment agency sometime to check if they have any opportunities for me.

I am aware of the QA certifications available. Last year, I purchased a book called "Software Testing: ISTQB-ISEB Foundation Guide" and I was supposed to prepare and write a certification. It is not easy to self-study but I usually need to attend classes to have someone push me forward to learn.

Isud00d: I have been working for about 1 year and 6 months. Time goes by really fast and this is why I need to act fast before I get stuck in the hole. I don't have hands-on experience because most of the QA tools are not available for free. They are industry applications used within a company.

The company I work at only has 3-4 QA employees. It will take about 4 years to get there and there is no guarantee. Because the department is so small and there are so many help desk agents fighting to get into QA, I have decided to look externally in the hope to find something ASAP.

The main issue with my current help desk or call centre role is that the technology being used is in-house developed (which means technology is proprietary). Knowledge gained cannot be transferred to other companies. I can only carry on with the soft skills such as: strong analysis and problem solving abilities, customer service skills, a bit of network and PC troubleshooting skills, and that's about it. Whether I stay 5 years or 2 years, it won't make a huge difference except showing "loyalty".

Once again, thanks for replying. I have to head to bed and wake up early for work tomorrow. I will come back and check tomorrow night to see if any post anything else.