The document discusses the evolution of help desks and their increasing role in business-IT integration and strategic planning. It outlines how help desks are shifting from reactive problem-solving to proactive support through analyzing user data and customized IT solutions. The document also explores top future IT issues like cloud computing, data protection, and managing various devices and communications tools. It emphasizes that help desks aim to understand business goals and help maximize productivity through a long-term strategic IT plan.

1. HELP DESK
THE
OF
THEFUTURE
NAVIGATING THE PATH TO BUSINESS & IT INTEGRATION

2. Page
The Help Desk Evolution
Increasing Importance of Business/IT Integration
Top Future IT Issues
Steady Approach to Stable Applications
Moving from Reactive to Proactive IT
Developing a Long-Term IT Plan
Implementing Customized IT Solutions
The Help Desk’s Potential
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TABLE OF CONTENTS

3. THE HELP DESK EVOLUTION
A holistic approach to business-IT integration. The idea of “IT support” has certainly evolved
dramatically in the last 30 years; the Help Desk today is much more than a Call Center or a
small staff of internal IT specialists. The Help Desk is positioned to work with its business
partners to optimize IT’s rollin operations and development.The speed of the technological
evolution has intensified, especially as businesses transition from a centralized approach to
work and computing. Thewhen andwhere ofwork has changed, compelling Help Desks to
adapt and adjust to its customers’ requests and expectations.
TAKINGITTOTHENEXTLEVEL
A Help Desk—or Service Desk—can take
business to the next level of IT planning and
management. A Help Desk now aims help a
business expand its computing capabilities,
boosting productivity and efficiency in the
process, with a thoughtful, customized IT
methodology.
EXPERIENCED
Whileitmaybeeasytoenvision24x7operationswitha
remote workforce, the transition and implementation
can be difficult for any business that doesn’t
consolidate IT management and monitoring. Help
Desks, bytheirnature ofproviding continuous, remote
support to clients across the country, have met and
overcome these technical challenges for manyyears.
That experience—in dealingwith tasks like equipment
repairs, service outages, and incident resolutions—has
Help Desks well positioned to help any business
address the many issues involved with taking it
operationsoutsideitsbrick-and-mortarpresence.
Transitioning from Solving Problems to
SupportingBusinesses
GET AGILE
Help Desks also help businesses stay agile,
ready to adapt to technological changes and
advancements as they occur, and ready to
maintain business operations during
emergency situations and implement
disaster-recovery plans when necessary.
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About a third of
CEOs and business
leaders expect to
attribute more than
half of revenues to
digital by 2019.
DIGITAL
REVENUE
GROWTH

4. Cloud Computing
ITis the epicenter of business moving forward.
Help Desks, increasingly, strive to
understand the core business and its goals.
It’s interviewing key leaders, learning what
they’re trying to accomplish, identifying
challenges, and finding technology
solutions to overcome roadblocks to
success. IT and business communication is
more important than ever, so business can
keep pace with emerging technologies,
understand and meet customer
expectations, and have a strategic plan and
understand what tools and applications
they’ll depend on in the future.
Importance of Business + IT Support 2
Security Technologies
Cloud Computing
Business Analytics
Application
Development
Wireless/Mobile
(Source: Computerworld Forecast)
Global IT spending projected to total
$3.8 trillion in 2015, 2.4 percent
increase from 2014.
(Source: Gartner Inc. Forecast)
ITSpending Forecast
3TOP FUTURE IT ISSUESHow businesses will embrace IT support and
its advantages.
SMB spending on the cloud is expected to increase by 20 percent in the next five years,
according to PCWorld. Businesses are making the move to the cloud primarily for web-hosting
and email purposes, but with cloud vehicles like Microsoft Office 365, opportunities exist to
implement workflow processes and automation tools that improve business operations. Help
Desks increasingly will be tasked to develop and manage cloud- computing solutions, andv will
have to monitor and test applications that offer cloud alternatives.
Help Desks are consulting and advising businesses on how IT strategy and business strategy
intersect; they’re keenly aware of how technology is helping, or potentially hindering, business
growth. When IT and business are aligned and working together, technology supports the
business goials in many ways, which leads to smart investments and strong returns. The IT
conversation is changing from, “How can IT solve this problem today?” to “How can IT make the
business better tomorrow?”
As more businesses take their operations to the cloud, data protection and information security
is critical. Many businesses view systems and network security as a barrier to being productive,
so Help Desks will take the lead in ensuring businesses’ data is secure and encourage end-users
to encrypt their devices, especially laptops. Information security will be a significant task for Help
Desks, as work and information sharing is increasingly conducted on mobile devices
IT Driving Business
Data Protection
IT is no longer a barrier to business success—it’s a necessity to business success. IT is one of the
operational pillars of any organization, right there with sales, finance, marketing, etc. In recent
years, the conversation has shifted from the specific applications and networks IT develops and
works in, to the full-scale technology planning and support IT provides to an organization.
IT Investment Areas
Top Future IT Opportunities

5. ManagingVariousComputingDevices,
CommunicationsTools
Communication drives business. Technology has changed how businesses
interact with their customers, and it has set new standards for service
expectationsforend-users.Asayounger,moretech-awaregenerationenters
the workforce, IT support must adjust to meet new employees’ and
customers’needsandrequests.Theexpectationswillbehigh,forservicethat
solves problems quickly and easily. How will Help Desks and their partners
address these new expectations? Are self-service incident-resolution portals
needed?WillITsupportsolveissuesviainstantmessengerorsocialmedia?In
any situation, Help Desks will consult with their partners on identifying and
implementingtheapplicationsthatmakethemostbusinesssense;it’scritical
that applications have matured properly and have been tested for quality
andreliability.Aboveallelse,it’saboutfindingtherighttechnologytogetthe
right result for the business and its employees and customers.
STEADY APPROACH TO STABLE APPLICATIONS
Nearly 40 percent of
companies expect to stop
providing devices to workers
by 2016, due to
(Source: Gartner Inc. CIO Survey)
BYOD Benefits
Increased employee satisfaction
Reducing/avoiding costs
Mobile workforce
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6. MOVING FROM REACTIVE TO PROACTIVE IT 5
ShiftingfromIncidentResolutiontoAvoidance
Data-driven decisions. What are end-users calling about? How often are they calling about
a particular issue? The answers to these questions (as shown in the chart below) inform
where an organization is inefficient and dictate broader solutions that can solve these
problems.
Help Desks are increasingly bridging the gap for their customers, identifying inefficiencies
and observing how an organization interacts with IT. While initially concerned with
configuring and organizing IT environments for improved support, Help Desks are taking
the next step and thoroughlyexamining howbusiness can maximize ITservice and support.
Help Desks themselves increasingly rely on metrics like Key Performance Indicators and
Critical Success Factors to, in part, answer the question, “Are we operating as efficient as
possible?” Help Desks constantly review data on call volume, ticket times, talk times, etc.,
scoring and monitoring these and other metrics to ensure the work that needs to be done
is completed timely and correctly. Reporting on regular issues and resolutions represents a
significant challenge for businesses; often, they’re concerned with their main mission and
can overlook this necessary function.
Top10UserIssues
1. UserAdministration
I’mlockedoutofmynetwork.
VPNwon’tconnect.
2.Microsoft Outlook
Ican’tsignintoOutlook.HowdoI
sharemyOutlookcalendar?
3.Citrix
Needhelpcreatinganew
account.Needhelpchanging
usersettings.
4.EmailIssues
I’mnotreceivingemail.Email
send/receiveisslow.
5.Internet Browser
CanIchangemydefault
broswer?CanIsavemyfavorites
list?
6.Printer
Can’tconnectprinter.Can’tfind
networkprinter.
7. UserQuestion
Needtoaddusertoadminaccount.
Needassistancewithsoftware
update.
8.Site Connectivity
Websitenotupdating.Website
uptimeisslow.
9.ServerAdministration
Serverisdown.Websiteuptimeis
slow
10. Other
CanIsyncOutlooktomymobile
device.CanIrecoverdeltered
emails?.

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DEVELOPING A LONG-TERM IT PLAN
The technology and business
evolution continues. The IT
support sector, perhaps more
than any other industry, has
experienced first-hand how
computing has changed—and
improved—how businesses
operate and serve their
customers. Helps Desks have
morphed from a small, onsite
group of technicians, to
full-scale, remote, IT-integration
specialist teams, trained to
conduct a top-to-bottom
business analysis and then install
agile systems and networks that
will maximize an organization’s
ability to achieve its goals.
They’re focused on using data
analysis to develop the right
solutions, maintaining open
communication with their
partners and ensure the
business and IT plans are
aligned. They’re prepared for
whatever changes might come,
allowing businesses to focus on
their core mission.
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7-STEP APPROACH TO STRATEGIC PLANNING
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ENGAGE PARTNERS IN PROCESS
PRIORITIZE IT EFFORTS
ESTABLISH IT GOVERNANCE STRUCTURE
MONITOR IT PERFORMANCE
MANAGE IT VALUE
MEASURE BUSINESS BENEFITS
ALIGN BUSINESS AND IT
IMPLEMENTING CUSTOMIZED IT SOLUTIONS
ANALYZE PLAN DESIGN DEPLOY MANAGE
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8. Businesses have just begun to realize the potential positive effects of Help Desks. As Help
Desks become increasingly embedded with their business partners’ day-to-day operations,
understanding the systems and applications that drive the company, IT can improve those
operations and help the business in numerous and various ways. Additionally, as Help Desks
continue to adapt and adjust to their business partners’ needs, Help Desks themselves will
reviewand analyze howtheythemselves operate, identifyareas forimprovement, and install
new technologies and processes to augment their own service delivery—in the same way
they help their business partners every day.
THE HELP DESK’S POTENTIAL 8
Help Desks will continue to evolve into highly-skilled businesses technology
services, advising business partners and recommending the best uses of the
Help Desk’s services to maximize business productivity and efficiency.
Help Desks will increasingly assume the role of a trusted advisor to the
business partners, serving in a consultant capacity when identifying and
developing IT solutions. Help Desks will pursue all possible solutions,
including identifying third-party providers that will address the business’s
issues; the Help Desk will remain plugged in to ensure optimal IT service
performance.
Help Desks will seek to develop and install, where applicable, self-help and
self-healing options for business end-users to solve regular, general IT
incidents, either on their own or through automation, to drive down the need
for businesses to invest in and maintain internal IT support staff.
Help Desks will remain agile and flexible, staying current with emerging
technologies, applications, and operating systems, so that they can work with
a diverse and wide range of business partners. Help Desks will be able to
make recommendations and optimize environments for items like BYOD,
mobile or fixed devices, and cloud-based or physical, central data storage
centers.
Help Desks, in everything they do, will measure their performance with
various metrics and reports to identify their own and their partners’ areas of
success and improvement, suggesting and implementing technologies that
address those issues and improve business operations.
5 HELP DESK GOALS
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ImprovingInternalProcesses:
EnablingBusinessSuccess