Top Ten Tips to Improve Service Desk Ticket Queues Released by Info-Tech Research Group

TORONTO, Aug. 26, 2022 /PRNewswire/ - Info-Tech Research Group, one of the world's leading IT research and advisory firms, has published a new research-backed blueprint, Improve Service Desk Ticket Queue Management. As more employees gradually return to the office and adopt hybrid work, Info-Tech's data-backed blueprint will help organizations define clear processes and ownership for assigning and actioning tickets, improving service desk ticket queue management and customer satisfaction.

"Service desk and IT leaders often struggle with low efficiency, high backlogs, missed service-level agreements, and poor service desk metrics," says Natalie Sansone, Senior Research Analyst at Info-Tech Research Group. "Organizations often believe they need to hire more resources or get a new information technology service management tool with better automation and AI capabilities. However, more often than not, the root cause of their challenges goes back to the fundamentals."

As tickets come into the service desk via multiple channels, such as email, phone, chat, and portal, they are often consolidated in multiple queues, making prioritization much more difficult. Without proper prioritization, new tickets stay in the queue for too long without being assigned, and assigned tickets sit for too long without progress, leading to slow response and resolution time.

According to Info-Tech's research, one of the major obstacles to proper prioritization is that technicians have no guidelines on how to prioritize their work and have no easy way to organize their tickets or queue to know what to work on next. When there is a lack of authority or accountability for queue management, technicians only have a view of their own tickets while others fall through the cracks.

"Organizations cannot resolve incidents and fulfill service requests in time to meet service-level agreements without first getting the ticket to the right place efficiently and then managing all tickets in the queue effectively," adds Sansone. "Even though it sounds simple, challenges can occur around the queue management system, ranging from new tickets sitting too long before being assigned, to in-progress tickets getting buried in favor of easier tickets."

To improve matters, Info-Tech recommends that organizations define a structure by organizing the queue by content and assigning resources to the relevant queues to improve the service desk. A structured approach and clear guidelines on ownership and accountability for queue management will decrease response and resolution time along with the ticket backlog. Once these processes are defined, IT leaders can identify opportunities to build-in automation to improve efficiency.

Info-Tech's blueprint explains that a mature ticket queue management process is critical to the success of all other service desk processes. Info-Tech outlines the top ten tips to effectively manage a queue:

1. Define the optimal queue structure.
2. Design and assign resources to relevant queues.
3. Define and document queue management processes.
4. Clearly define queue management responsibilities for every team member.
5. Establish clear ownership and accountability over all queues.
6. Always keep ticket status and documentation up to date.
7. Shift left to reduce queue volume.
8. Build-in automation to improve efficiency.
9. Configure the ITSM tool to support and optimize queue management processes.
10. Don't lose visibility of the backlog.

"Without clear ownership and accountability over each queue, it becomes too easy to assume someone else is handling or monitoring a ticket when in fact, nobody is," says Sansone. "It's essential to assign a queue manager to each queue and ensure someone is responsible for monitoring ticket movement across all the queues for an effective queue management system."

Info-Tech's Improve Service Desk Ticket Queue Management blueprint can be downloaded and viewed now.

To learn more about Info-Tech Research Group and to download all the latest research, visit www.infotech.com and connect via LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. 

• Standardize the Service Desk
• Optimize the Service Desk with a Shift-Left Strategy
• Improve Service Desk Ticket Intake
• Staff the Service Desk to Meet Demand

Info-Tech Research Group is one of the world's leading information technology research and advisory firms, proudly serving over 30,000 IT professionals. The company produces unbiased and highly relevant research to help CIOs and IT leaders make strategic, timely, and well-informed decisions. For 25 years, Info-Tech has partnered closely with IT teams to provide them with everything they need, from actionable tools to analyst guidance, ensuring they deliver measurable results for their organizations.

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SOURCE Info-Tech Research Group