Fortune 500 Company-Consolidated Help Desk

The Challenge

With two disparate support teams providing similar support services, a Fortune 500 company desired to consolidate its' support structure by combining the level 0 and level 1 end user support services. Brazen was brought in to evaluate the situation and provide alternatives.

With the potential to impact an estimated 26,000 employees in more than 140 locations, and over 70 subsidiaries throughout The United States and Canada, the challenge would be to provide a seamless transition of services, without any interruption, and do so in less than 3 months.

The customer's existing support organization was made up of two geographically diverse teams using different operating procedures:

Support Team A - Was primarily responsible for supporting the Lotus Notes/Domino infrastructure, including Sametime and BlackBerry Enterprise Server, for the entire organization. Support requests for this team were submitted to a group of non-technical Level 0 customer service representatives in a facility on the West coast.
Support Team B - Was responsible for providing a broad range of infrastructure support services (both hardware and software). This team reported into a different management structure than Support Team A. Support requests for this team were submitted to technical Level 1 resources located in a facility on the East coast.

Consolidating operations without impacting end users would require an effective and easy to understand support structure, as well as thorough training and ramp up procedures.

The Goals

Consolidating the Level 0 and Level 1 support center operations and providing a single entry point for submitting all technical service requests was the customer's primary objective. Secondary objectives included the following:

Ease of transition: The customer's end-user productivity could not be impacted during the transition ofservices to Brazen.
Extend current hours of operation: The customer needed to expand the hours it provided support to end users from 12 to 15 hours a day.
Increase Scalability: The support center had to be structured to rapidly scale services and staffing levels, while providing consistent quality of service in response to changing demands.
Provide a better trained resource: Brazen had to identify a way to maintain a support staff of trained resources with knowledge in all areas of the customer's operating environment.
Maintain current processes: Help Desk operations had to be structured to support seamless delivery of all services using the customer's existing standard processes.
Improve overall help desk experience: The delivered solution had to maintain current customer satisfaction levels during the transition period and continually improve it over time. Improved satisfaction levels would raise the end users perception of value and increase end user's willingness to contact the support center for assistance.

The Solution

Brazen worked extensively with the customer to understand their business requirements and to develop the appropriate solution. Each phase of the implementation had to occur in rapid succession and with sufficient velocity to ensure that operations were ready on the target date. To this end the following plan was implemented:

Consolidate the customer's standard operating procedures: With two diverse support teams currently in place, Brazen would need to work with the customer and create a single set of Standard Operating Procedures for the new Support Center.
Train all service representatives to be problem solvers: It was no longer acceptable for Level 0 Technicians to simply answer phones and capture information. They would now be expected to solve basic user problems and only escalate more complex issues. All Technicians would need to resolve issues with a sense of urgency and establish a reputation throughout the entire company for efficient and timely service. To accomplish this task, a rigorous 4 week training program was created, which both existing Brazen staff and new recruits completed.
Retain qualified staff members. A certification path and growth plan for the analysts was implemented to decrease the risk of turnover.
Acquire the necessary hardware & make phone system modifications: Brazen would need to procure and configure the necessary equipment to mirror the customer's environment. Brazen's phone system would be programmed to replicate the end users system and tested to ensure that callers would easily adapt. Brazen would enhance the current call routing process to include additional greetings, more sophisticated call queing and a greater number voicemail options.
Create reporting to show results: A reporting package was created that would report provide the customer with a customized view of all the call statistics that were deemed most important. These reports would be used after implementation to show how well the Service Level Agreement (SLA) was being met.

The Results

Brazen successfully delivered an on-time roll out and with no interruption to the customer's operations. Initially, end users did not even notice the changeover. Brazen achieved compliance with the SLA well before the specified ramp up period had expired, and has since achieved the highest call satisfaction ratings and call time metrics, ever reported by the customer.

As a result of the high quality of personnel assigned to this project, Brazen has also been able to provide support on a number of out-of-scope projects. Because of the team's extensive knowledge of the customer's environment, these services have been provided at a significantly reduced cost, due to training time associated with these projects being extremely minimal.