7 Knowledge Management Tips for a Service Desk

A single point of contact for customers, the Helpdesk Services are the face of IT. As services become increasingly complex, agents now need to follow the range of technologies and procedures necessary to effectively support customers. This makes knowledge management more important than ever. Knowledge not only improves the quality of service but reduces the overall cost of assistance by increasing productivity.

1: Find out where your knowledge is and centralizes it

As technology evolves, knowledge will exist in increasingly different places. The information is stuck in emails, social media interactions, forum discussions, comments, tickets, and even in the brains of Helpdesk Support Services agents. If you don't already have one, consolidate your knowledge into a single repository or system as a simple solution. Centralizing all this content speeds up learning and helps your team make better decisions. If anyone has knowledge of a particular order, ask them to document it. If customers comment on service, update your documents with these comments. If your team receives several joint tickets, create an article on the subject.

Simply put, having a knowledge base to work with allows agents to respond and solve problems faster.

2: Make your knowledge accessible and usable

Resolving incidents faster means being able to find the information you need. Regardless of whether your knowledge base is agent only or available to customers, make sure your system is easy to update. In this way, agents can flexibly update content and offer the team better solutions. This not only improves the resolution of your first contact but can also reduce the cost per contact.

3: integrate knowledge management into the workflow

We all know it is challenging to spend time on objects when fighting fires. In an ideal world, creating and updating knowledge should be part of every agent's job. This is one of the essential aspects of knowledge-based support. Craig Samuel, HP's director of expertise, says sharing knowledge is not a technological problem. According to him, work processes and cultural problems represent 90% of the issues *. An effective knowledge management practice is to cultivate a culture of collaboration, moving from a focus on the individual to a focus on the team.

One way to integrate knowledge into the team process is to make sure articles are written before changes are implemented. When a new service is put into production, documentation is available to facilitate adoption and prevent accidents.

4: keep the information up to date to speed up agent integration

The time required to train new agents can become expensive. One way to get people to deliver value faster is to keep the knowledge available to your team up to date. Your team can do this by asking agents to refine items as they use them. This means that your knowledge base reflects the team's collective experience to date.

5: authorize customers and agents to express their opinion

Is your knowledge really useful? Customer feedback is the best way to refine your content to provide the best answers. Without comments, films in the dark. It can be as simple as a "push" or as rich as a comment section. In both cases, a feedback circuit improves the quality and performance of your knowledge.

6: Deflect self-service tickets

Not only is knowledge management essential for agents, but it is also important for customers. 60% of consumers use the self-service web to find answers to their questions. If knowledge is not optimally collected and shared, customers will simply seek answers elsewhere. Why not allow them to search for answers from a customer portal or intranet? Enabling self-service satisfies customers and frees up time for your team. Indeed, the results of applying knowledge-based support can result in up to 50% accident diversion.

7: measure to improve company performance

How does your knowledge add value to your organization? What are the most used articles? Measuring knowledge is the first step to improving your team's performance. Measures to consider include the number of articles assigned to resolve the first contact, the number of articles created and updated by the team, the number of articles used by the team, and the number of "incidents with links to articles.

Knowledge management is the key to an efficient service desk. It also stimulates a culture of innovation. As John Maxwell points out, "Change is inevitable, growth is optional."