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A service desk is a specific IT service that provides help for end users and customers, assisting them with their technical issues. In some cases, the service desk can also provide additional services such as inventory management, asset tracking, and reporting. The goal of a service desk is to quickly resolve user or customer inquiries, making sure that their needs are


Service Desk management is a process that helps ensure each call to a company is answered quickly and efficiently. A skilled agent diagnoses and resolves the issue, while keeping quality requirements in mind. For any issues that are unresolved at the Service Desk, an incident is created and passed on to higher-level resolver groups. By following these steps, contact center managers can minimize downtime and improve the overall customer experience.


In this blog, we will discuss the following:


1. The Service Desk is the first point of contact for any IT issues

2. What are the types of issues a service desk can receive?

3. What is an IVR and how important is it to the service desk

4. What are the 5 critical processes that a service desk needs to implement

5. How does a service desk manage each call?

6. Service Desk agents are skilled and trained to resolve issues quickly

7. For each call, a record is opened and handled

8. Unresolved issues are handed off to higher level resolver groups via an Incident

9. Quality requirements are kept in mind throughout the process

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The Service Desk is the first point of contact for any IT issues

The Service Desk is a key component of any organization's IT operations and provides the first line of support when users encounter problems with their IT systems. As the initial contact point between IT departments and end users, the Service Desk must provide a high level of service that meets user needs while ensuring reliable and secure system operation. Staff at the Service Desk are trained in problem-solving methodology and have access to sophisticated tools to quickly diagnose any technical issue that may arise. By streamlining this process, the Service Desk is able to respond quickly to incidents, minimizing disruption for users and maintaining business continuity.


What are the types of issues a service desk can receive?

A service desk can receive a wide range of IT issues, ranging from minor to complex. It is the responsibility of the Service Desk team to ensure that each issue is addressed in a timely and efficient manner. Common issues that might be encountered include hardware or software related issues, network problems, slow performance, virus or malware attacks, data loss and recovery, and user access. The Service Desk can help minimize disruption and maintain business continuity by providing timely support for these types of incidents.


List 10 issues that a service desk can face:

1. Hardware or software-related issues

2. Network problems

3. Slow performance

4. Virus or malware attacks

5. Data loss and recovery

6. User access

7. License renewals or expirations

8. Configuration changes

9. Software upgrades

10. New user provisioning


What is an IVR and how important is it to the service desk

An Interactive Voice Response (IVR) system is an automated telephone tool used to provide customer service. It is a communication platform that allows customers to interact directly with a computer via the phone. By utilizing IVR services, customers can access information quickly and easily without having to wait for assistance from a customer service representative.


IVR is an important part of a service desk’s operations. It helps to reduce the amount of calls that come into the service desk by providing users with a self-service option for their inquiries and technical issues. This way, customers can quickly find answers to their questions without having to wait for assistance from a customer service representative. Additionally, IVR systems can be programmed to offer intelligent routing of calls so that customers are directed to the appropriate service desk agent for their request. This helps to improve customer satisfaction as well as increase efficiency for the service desk.


IVR is an important tool for a service desk and should be considered when setting up or improving a Service Desk system. It helps to reduce the amount of calls coming into the service desk, improve customer satisfaction and increase efficiency. Furthermore, it can be used in tandem with other technologies such as chatbots or AI-based systems to further enhance customer experience.


What are Chatbots, Self-Service Portals, and Sense and Heal Technologies and how important are they to the service desk

Chatbots are computer programs designed to simulate conversation with a user. They are an increasing form of customer service automation as they can provide fast, responsive and accurate responses to customer inquiries or requests. Chatbots can be programmed to offer intelligent routing of calls so that customers are directed to the appropriate personnel for their request. They can also be used to provide self-service options, allowing customers to quickly access information or answer questions on their own.


Self-Service Portals are web-based applications that allow customers to easily manage their accounts and services. They typically offer features such as account management, product selection, order tracking and customer service support. Self- Service Portals provide customers with a convenient and efficient way to manage their accounts without having to contact customer service.


Sense and Heal technologies are powered by artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms that can detect potential technical issues in IT systems before they become major problems. These technologies enable the Service Desk team to quickly identify, diagnose, and address issues with minimal disruption or downtime. This helps reduce the time it takes to resolve service requests, improving customer experience and satisfaction.


By leveraging these technologies, a Service Desk can provide an efficient, reliable, responsive service for customers. This helps to ensure that customers are satisfied with their experiences, resulting in increased loyalty and business growth. Additionally, by using these tools, the Service Desk team can reduce the amount of time spent on manual tasks, allowing them to focus more on providing customer service.


What are the 5 critical processes that a service desk needs to implement

The first critical process that a service desk needs to implement is customer onboarding. This involves ensuring that customers are able to access their accounts and services with ease, as well as equipping them with the necessary information and resources needed to make their experience as smooth as possible. To facilitate this process, service desks should have clearly defined procedures for customer onboarding and the necessary technology and software to support it.


The second critical process is incident management. This involves logging, tracking and resolving customer issues quickly and efficiently. Service desks should have a dedicated system in place for recording incidents and managing their progress through resolution. This helps ensure that customers receive the best service possible by addressing issues quickly and accurately.


The third critical process is asset management. This involves keeping track of all the organization's hardware, software and other IT assets. It is important for service desks to have a clear view of the state of their IT infrastructure at all times in order to ensure that it remains up-to-date and secure.


The fourth critical process is change management. This involves ensuring that any changes to the IT infrastructure are documented and communicated clearly to all stakeholders, as well as ensuring that any potential risks associated with a change are identified and managed appropriately.


Finally, the fifth critical process is problem management. This involves identifying recurring problems and addressing them in a systematic way. Service desks should have a clear procedure for logging, tracking and resolving problems, as well as the necessary resources to ensure that all aspects of problem management are addressed efficiently.


These five processes are essential for creating an effective service desk within any organization. By implementing them, service desks can ensure that customers receive exceptional service, while also ensuring that their IT infrastructure remains up-to-date and secure.


How does a service desk manage each call?

When a customer contacts the Service Desk with an issue, the agent will open a record to document the details of the incident. The agent will then use their problem-solving skills and access to specialized tools to diagnose the root cause of the issue. If the incident requires further investigation, it will be elevated to a higher level resolver group. In any case, quality requirements are kept at the forefront of all decisions made by Service Desk agents in order to ensure reliable and secure system operation.


Service Desk agents are skilled and trained to resolve issues quickly

Service Desk agents are highly trained and skilled professionals who provide quality customer support. They possess a wide range of expertise that enables them to quickly identify and resolve our customers' issues. Our agents use the latest technology and methods to make sure that all customers receive an efficient and accurate response to their queries. As a customer service leader, you must ensure that your Service Desk staff is up-to-date with best practices and remains at the cutting edge of customer service techniques. You should strive to exceed your customers' expectations by consistently delivering reliable and timely solutions while maintaining a stellar reputation for excellence.


For each call, a record is opened and handled

Every incoming call that our customer service team receives is meticulously recorded and handled with the highest level of professionalism. Our well-trained staff members listen to customers' inquiries carefully, assess their individual needs, and provide a tailored solution. We guarantee that the recording process will be smooth and secure: our system safeguards customer data with robust encryption protocols. Rest assured that we are dedicated to providing you with an exceptional customer experience every time you contact us for support.


Unresolved issues are handed off to higher level resolver groups via an Incident

When an unresolved issue arises, it's important for the team to ensure that it is addressed in the most efficient and effective way possible. Transferring incidents to higher level resolver groups is often the best option, as their expertise and experience can enable them to handle the situation quickly and efficiently. By utilizing this method, businesses can improve customer satisfaction, reduce costs associated with resolving incidents, and ultimately create a better overall customer experience.


Quality requirements are kept in mind throughout the process

Ensuring the highest quality of product is essential to the success of any project. At our company, we recognize that meeting quality requirements is not only a single-step process, but one that needs to be continually monitored and maintained throughout the entirety of a project. Every member of the team is aware of their responsibility in meeting quality standards, and works tirelessly and collaboratively with colleagues to guarantee that each stage meets our objectives. We are confident that through attention to detail and communication across departments, we can ensure nothing goes amiss when it comes to keeping customer satisfaction at our highest priority.



The Service Desk is a critical component of any organization's IT operations. By providing users with the support they need to resolve issues quickly and efficiently, the Service Desk can help minimize downtime and maintain business continuity. With the right tools, training and processes in place, organizations can ensure that their Service Desks are well equipped to provide the highest levels of service.

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Process Objective:

The objective of the Service Desk process is to provide users with a single point of contact for all in-scope problems and requests. Provision of Service Desk Services will enable both direct and indirect (web, phone, e-mail, chat) interaction between the End User and the technical support organizations for question and problem resolution. Service will be provided through the Service Desk, which will leverage human, technical, and facility resources.

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Sample List of Benefits:

  • Improved Customer experience
  • Calls answered faster
  • Issues resolved faster
  • Fewer calls abandoned
  • Higher quality of agents
  • Interaction with the Service Desk agents will be positive
  • Service Desk agents knowledgeable
  • Service Desk agents trained
  • Fewer escalations
  • Better integration with other support groups
  • More customized service to the End Users

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Sample List of Observations:

  • Lack of proper triaging leading to client call-backs and delayed resolution
  • Lack of proper ticket documentation leading to delayed resolution
  • Lack of proper routing leading to increased misroutes and delayed resolution
  • Lack of proper skills-base routing leading to delayed resolution
  • Premature closure of tickets leading to increased re-open count
  • Lack of queue management leading to:
  • Missed SLAs (Speed To Answer)
  • Longer Talk Times
  • Longer Wait Times
  • Abandoned Calls
  • Longer hold times
  • Aux abuse (ER, Breaks, Lunch, After Call Work)
  • Ticket backlogs
  • Quality of Agents (technical, customer service, and client organization awareness)
  • Inaccurate calculation/in-effective SLAs/SLOs
  • On-Site Management Reliability
  • Voice and Accent Issues
  • Customer Satisfaction Issues
  • Lack of Proper Escalation Handling
  • Lack of Proper Outage Handling

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Sample List of Recommendations:

  • Improve with Service Levels: 
  • Average Speed to Answer (ASA)
  • Talk Times
  • Calls Abandonment
  • Case to Call Ratio
  • First Call Resolution
  • Customer Satisfaction
  • Response times to Web and Email Tickets

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  • Improve Roles and Responsibilities
  • Improve Policies and Procedures
  • Improve the Quality Management Program
  • Improve the Inbound and Outbound Queue Management Program
  • Improve the Performance Management Program
  • Improve the Tools Management
  • Improve the Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery Strategy
  • Improve Meetings
  • Improve Agent Morale
  • Improve Escalation handling
  • Improve Outage handling (Response Times, Analysis, Trending and Tracking)
  • Improve Staffing (Attrition and Schedule Adherence)
  • Improve Aging Ticket Backlog
  • Improve the Updating and Maintenance of the Knowledgebase

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  • Improve Refresh Training Programs: 
  • Agent Training
  • Voice and Accent Training (For Global Delivery environments)
  • Subject Matter Expert Training
  • Quality Training
  • Team Leader Training
  • Manager Training

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  • Agent Hire Services: ‍
  • Recruitment Drives
  • Resume Analysis
  • Interviews using Behavioral Based Structured Interviews
  • Background Checks

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  • Improve Governance System for managing the operations
  • Improve the Call Spike Mitigation Plan
  • Improve the End-User Self-Enablement Strategy
  • Improve Cost per Call
  • Improve the Right to Left Strategy / Continual Service Improvement Strategy
  • Improve the Reporting and Measurements System
  • Improve the Statistical Analysis Strategy
  • Improve the Knowledge Gathering Efforts
  • Improve the Transition Management Plan

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Sample Areas To Probe:

  • What is the current Governance System in your team? Do you have Daily, Weekly and Monthly team meetings? What do you discuss in these meetings?
  • Do you have regular meetings with SMEs and managers from different SD location (Hyderabad, Gurgaon and Italy)
  • Do you have action trackers in place? Who review it and what is the frequency of the review? (Demonstrate the action tracker)
  • What is the agreed headcount and what is the current team size?
  • What is the average tenure of SD agents in the team?
  • How many SME do you have in your team?
  • Do you have shift leads and SMEs available in all the shifts?
  • Is your shift roster aligned to incoming work load pattern? How frequently you update/change the shift roster?
  • Who is tracking login/logout of the resources? Do you have any report on login/logout, and on usage of Aux codes?
  • How do you manage workload between different locations?
  • How do you manage sudden spike of the call volumes? Do you get additional heads to manage high volumes?
  • Do you have dedicated resources for email/Chat support or everyone is doing everything?
  • Who Monitors the queue (Call in queue, long calls, long ACW, abuse of AUX codes)
  • Do you have Rewards & Recognition program on your team? What is the frequency?
  • What are the different performance metrics for each individual in the team? Demonstrate
  • Do you have skill assessment programs on regular basis (PKT)?
  • What are the main Causes for Customer Dissatisfaction?
  • How do you Identify Bottom Performers?
  • Do you have the roles and responsibilities defined and documented properly?
  • What is the Scope of your work? (demonstrate R&R documents)
  • What type of issues do you handle? Are you trained on these issues?
  • What are your hours of operations? Do you work long hours?
  • Do you get calls as per your skills or you get call for all skills and then your transfer the call to the right technical resource?
  • Who is managing the Queue, long calls, long ACW, abuse of AUX codes etc.? (in business hours and in non-business hours)
  • How many calls do you take in a shift?
  • What are the top call drivers? Which type of issues take long time to resolve?
  • Do you have all the Policies, Processes & Procedures defined for your team? Do you understand that? Where is it stored, and do you have access to it? Is the process being executed as per the contractual requirements?
  • Are these Policies, Processes, & Procedures part of New Hire Training (NHT) program?
  • How do you get the updates whenever there is a change in any Process/policy/procedure?
  • Do you have Training Coordinator? Are there any refresher training happening?
  • Do you have escalation process documented? Do you understand that?
  • Do you understand your severity metrics? What are the P1/P2 severity metrics.
  • How do you determine priority of any ticket?
  • How do you classify/categorize the ticket?
  • Do you have pre-defined closure codes for each issue? Are these closure codes integrated in the tool? Do you use it for all tickets?                      
  • Do you have centralized knowledgebase Articles? Are KB articles available for all issues?
  • Who Creates, update and validate the KB articles?
  • What are the Major SLA and KPI in your SD? (CSAT, AHT, ASA, FCR, Call to ticket Ratio-CTR, etc.)
  • Do you have standard templates to gather and document the required information about the issues?
  • Who updates the client portal with MI information in case of any MI/Outage?
  • Who updates the IVR with MI information in case of any MI/Outage?
  • When do you transfer a call to SME or to ASG?
  • What are the different tools do you use? (ticketing tool, email client, instant messengers, CMS, telephony, Reports, etc.)
  • Do you have access to all the required tools?
  • Did you get any formal training to use these tools?
  • Are these tools user friendly and easy to access?
  • Are there any issues with the tools?
  • Do you have monthly 1x1 discussions with your managers to discuss your issues, concerns, career path etc.?
  • Do you have a Skip Level Interviews with Sr Leaders in your team?
  • Do you have regular performance reviews?
  • Do you have weekly cross departmental meetings?
  • What are the Daily, Weekly, and monthly reports that gets published internally and with the client?
  • Do you have dedicated resources for preparing reports and presentations?
  • Does team understand the SLA and KPIs?
  • Are there any daily performance report or dashboard published with everyone in the team?
  • Are all SLA are measured correctly?
  • Do you get automated reports or are these manual reports?
  • Who prepare CMS reports and what is it used for?
  • Did someone barge the call on regular basis and provide you feedback on technical issues and VnA issues?
  • Do you perform Volume Analysis? (Trend, Count, Root causes, and Action Plan)
  • Do you perform FCR Analysis? (Trend, Count, Root causes, and Action Plan)
  • Do you perform Reopen ticket analysis? (Trend, Count, Root causes, and Action Plan)
  • Do you perform Repeat Incident analysis? (Trend, Count, Root causes, and Action Plan)
  • Do you perform analysis on Misrouted tickets from Service desk to other resolver groups? (Trend, Count, Root causes, and Action Plan)
  • Do you perform Backlog Analysis on Service Requests? (Trend, Count, Root causes, and Action Plan)
  • Do you perform Aged ticket analysis? (Trend, Count, Root causes, and Action Plan)
  • Do you perform Resolved ticket analysis? (Trend, Count, Root causes, and Action Plan)
  • Do you perform analysis on the tickets getting assigned to another resolver group or to deskside? (Trend, Count, Root causes, and Action Plan)
  • Demonstrate completed CSI program or DPPs in your service desk. What are the ongoing DPP/CSI Programs?
  • Do you share/recommend ideas for Service Improvement within your SD? Is there an idea tracker?
  • Do you have Ticket Quality Evaluation (TQE) process in place? Demonstrate the TQE parameters