IT Manager's Handbook: Getting Your New Job Done (69 page)

There will always be exceptions, emergencies, and special cases, but published service levels can be an enormous help in keeping a support organization from constantly operating in crisis mode. Of course, it’s important that the service levels you set be ones that you can meet and that are reasonable for the user community. For example, don’t tell users that e-mails will be responded to within one hour unless you have a very high degree of confidence that you can do so consistently. However, promising to respond to an e-mail within a week may be a target that you can meet, but one that your users are likely to find unacceptable.

Ask for Help from Your Staff

When setting service levels, solicit input from your support staff, as well as users, as to what is reasonable and what is feasible. Then, before publishing your service levels, have your staff work with them for a while to see how well they meet them. Once you’re confident you have service levels that are both reasonable and feasible, let the users know. Post them on your intranet or send a company-wide e-mail. Afterward, monitor how well you’re meeting them. They aren’t carved in stone. It’s okay to adjust them if they aren’t working, and you may need to add to them as your support organization takes on additional responsibilities or types of services.

Writing Good SLAs

Good SLAs have several things in common:

•
The levels of service should be specific and clearly defined (e.g., write “remote access to the database shall have 99.99 percent availability M–F, 8 AM–5 PM,” not “the database will be available during normal business hours”).

•
SLAs should be written for the most requested tasks first.

•
SLAs should be defined in such a way that measuring their performance is relatively easy, and, preferably, can be automated.

•
SLAs should be written clearly so that they are understood by all. They should be focused on metrics that have meaning for the customer. Your customers may not be interested in a router’s uptime, but they are interested in the reliability of Internet access.

•
Consider SLAs for end-to-end tasks, as opposed to individual components. For example, consider the availability of the finance application to the end user, as opposed to individual SLAs for the network, the server, the database, the application, etc.

10.6 Further References

Websites

www.altiris.com
. (desktop management software).

www.bmc.com/remedy
. (Help Desk software vendor).

www.dameware.com
. (remote control software).

www.e11online.com
. (Help Desk software vendor).

www.helpdesk.com
. (Help Desk support).

www.helpdeskpro.net
. (Help Desk software vendor).

www.help-desk-world.com
. (Help Desk resources portal).

crm.ittoolbox.com
. (CRM site).

www.landesk.com
. (desktop management software).

www.microsoft.com/sccm
. (desktop management software).

www.numarasoftware.com
. (Help Desk software vendor).

www.pcanywhere.com
. (remote control software).

www.surveymonkey.com
. (survey tool).

www.teamviewer.com
. (remote control software).

www.thinkhdi.com
. (Help Desk Institute).

www.zoomerang.com
. (survey tool).

Books and Articles

Beisse F, (2009).
A Guide to Computer User Support for Help Desk and Support Specialists
. Course Technology.

Blokdijk G, (2008).
Help Desk 100 Success Secrets—Help Desk Need to Know Topics Covering Help Desk Jobs, Help Desk Software, Computer Help Desk, Help Desk Support, Help Desk Jobs, IT Help Desk and Much More
. Emereo Pty Ltd.

Gerbyshak P, Brooks J, (2009).
Help Desk Manager’s Crash Course
. Booksurge.

Greengard S, (2011). Managing a Multigenerational Workforce.
CIO Insight Magazine
. [May/June].

Jaffe BD, (1998). Taking the Measure of Customer Service.
PC Week
. [June 5].

Jaffe BD, (2000). Maturity Is a Help Desk Prerequisite.
PC Week
. [February 7].

Johnson M, (2011).
IT Service Desk: What You Need to Know for It Operations Management
. Emereo Pty Ltd.

Knapp D, (2009).
A Guide to Service Desk Concepts: Service Desk and the IT Infrastructure Library
. Course Technology.

Orand B, (2010).
Foundations of IT Service Management: The ITIL Foundations Course in a Book
. CreateSpace.

Preston R, (2011). Consumerization of IT Is No Fad.
Information Week
. [June 27].

Violino B, (2011). Workers without Borders.
Baseline Magazine
. [July/August].

Chapter 11

Connectivity:Social Media, Handhelds, and More

“One more thing … ”

Steve Jobs

Chapter table of contents

11.1
Get in Front of the Curve

11.2
The Power of All These Connections

11.3
How Does This Affect You as IT Manager?

11.4
Further References

The workplace, and the entire world, for that matter, is more tightly integrated than it ever has been. You and your employees can be connected 24/7/365 to your customers, fellow employees, former colleagues, long-forgotten friends and relatives, and to your offices across the globe. You are connected to a lot of people almost all the time.

That is both good news and bad news. We'll examine both sides of the issues in this chapter as we discuss the various ways today's technologies allow unprecedented interaction among people—your users, suppliers, clients, customers, vendors, and you—often the facilitator for many of these electronic connections.

This chapter discusses new technologies and the significant impact they are having on users, your staff, your company, and the ways they live and work. It discusses the benefits and challenges of some technologies, but more to the point, it talks about how you should be dealing with them as an IT manager, and what your role is.

No organization, no matter how systematically they try to avoid this issue, can elude the giant wave of mobility. Nor should you try. In previous chapters, the guidance has been to provide careful, measured approaches. In this chapter you'll see that the guidance is toward more flexibility and adaptability, and not being afraid to fail.

Instead of pretending you have a choice in the matter, we are going to provide you with some ideas on how to deal with it.

•
Embrace it.
Like the old IT departments fighting the infiltration of PCs back in the 1980s, you are facing a losing battle. You know all about the inevitability of the march of technology—why are you still pretending like smart phones are not something that the IT department has to be concerned with? See the section
“Get in Front of the Curve”
on
page 288.

•
See how other people are handling this issue.
For a long time, many IT managers knew exactly how many “computers” were in their environment. They had servers and laptops and a discrete number of software licenses to manage. Now all kinds of computational devices with all kinds of capabilities are being carried into the environment, sometimes through the “back door.” And these “computers” are being used in ways no one would have guessed just a few years ago. Like any complex problem, your first step is to define the scope of issue: just exactly what exists and how they are being used. See the section
“The Power of All of These Connections”
on
page 293.

•
Figure out exactly what (hardware and software) is being used and how and what you'll let into your system.
Like the other technologies you deal with daily, there are good ones, medium quality ones, and truly awful ones. Just because a user loves a new tablet's touch-and-feel doesn't mean you have to give them access to company shared drives on that device. But you'll have to do something about that issue. See the section
“How Does This Affect You as IT Manager?”
on
page 298.

•
Don't just cry out “Security risk!” every time someone asks about a new device or app.
If you just whine about it, without addressing it, eventually they are going to ignore you and will look for someone who can figure out how to get it done, and not someone who only talks about why it can't be done. If you provide an approved list, if you test several devices and apps and send out recommendations, if you warn against certain solutions or approaches, you'll be listened to.

11.1 Get in Front of the Curve

The Blurry Line between Company-Owned and Personally-Owned Equipment (BYO Policies)

In a 2011 survey by
InformationWeek
, 54% of technical professionals said that their IT group either officially or unofficially supports personally-owned devices. The feeling is that “You can't beat ‘em, so you might as well join ‘em.” While we hardly advocate such blatant submission for most IT issues, when it comes to holding back the tidal wave of personal devices into the workplace, we suggest you not try to resist but instead embrace, guide, and direct.

The line between what is a corporate tool and what is a personal piece of equipment has been blurred considerably as employees increase their use of personally-owned devices for their job, and the use of company-owned devices for personal use. It is in the best interests of both the company and the employee if that trend is recognized by the company and addressed directly. And one way to address the issue is for IT to implement a Bring Your Own (BYO) policy.

Due to their very nature and prevalence, there are many administrative issues associated with mobile devices. These include:

•
Dealing with procurement (devices, accessories, service plans)

•
Supporting users that have a myriad of different device types

•
Updates to operating systems and applications

•
Activities associated with lost, stolen, and broken devices and accessories

•
Monitoring service plans and costs, etc.

In addition, companies are dealing with frequent requests from employees to change their devices just because something newer came out, to change carriers, and to transfer their number to another device when they leave the company. In addition, many employees already have their own devices and don't want to carry a second one for work.

With a BYO policy, employees use their own personal device for work needs. In some cases, the company may provide the employee with a stipend to help defray the initial purchase of the unit, and/or some sort of reimbursement for some of the monthly charges.

The biggest technical challenge associated with BYO has been with security concerns regarding the organization's network, data, and e-mail. While using a personally-owned device for this access may not increase the risk, there is a concern that the company may not have as much control over the device. To address this, some companies have granted personally-owned devices access only if the devices allow for some degree of organizational management, such as remote wipe, screen timeout, use of passwords, etc.

A BYO program can eliminate a lot of the headaches associated with the administration and management of mobile devices. With careful planning the program can adequately address the organization's security concerns, while giving employees a great deal of freedom in the type of device they use. BYO programs usually save the company money, but that is because a portion, if not all, of the expense is shifted to the employee.

The New Technologies of Connectedness