Top 5 Trends For Service Desks In 2021

When Service Desks assisted organizations with managing remote employees, it proved that support agents and ITSM tools were a great asset for their business continuity plans. So, is there a need to upgrade service and tools to improve employee service quality, enhance employee productivity, and improve employee morale?  

To improve employee experience and continue providing employees with remote services (as part of future work culture in 2021 and beyond), the top 5 trends that can be implemented in your Service Delivery Management are based on the key factors that drive the change in the service delivery model.  

What impacts the service delivery model change?

The traditional helpdesk procedure required employees to wait hours for assistance and fill out a support ticket with all the technical details. Post the pandemic, when the work from home culture took root, how the Support Desk operated had to change since employees were unable to call agents directly (although they couldn't, it was equally easy despite being away from the office).  

Rezolve.ai found the top 5 factors that pushed enterprises to adopt these new trends, as was evident from our research.  

Remote work  

Employees throughout the world were forced to work from home, although it was difficult initially, it soon became the 'new' normal. Few studies show that employee productivity has increased in the work-from-home format. However, it is the opposite of Service Desk Management. The way enterprises support employees has drastically changed and is based on the company's size and ROI. It brought automation and chatbots in place.  

According to Gartner, a survey reveals nearly half (47%) of company leaders plan to allow full-time remote work for their employees in the future. From 2021, it is expected that while most companies entail resuming offices, a small number will work remotely depending on the job culture; but the Service Desk must support both types of employees equally.  

Collaborative Tools  

Remember the mediums for collaboration we used back in December '19? Yammer, SharePoint, Skype, etc., but from January 2020 to date, we mainly use Zoom and Microsoft Teams. Communication had changed, but how had that impacted the Service Desk Self-service or Intranet? Employees did not use self-help portals or SharePoint due to an ineffective design and support, which prompted them to seek help from Conversational AI.  

Gartner & LivePerson's survey reveals that 7 in 10 millennials prefer digital communication, primarily through text message than through in-person communication. This brings us to the next point, which is conversation and support.  

Conversational Interface at Home  

As people have started working from home, the use of UX and UI gadgets has increased. We make use of virtual assistants from Apple and Amazon, such as Siri and Alexa. Everything is just a command away - from entertainment to infotainment to chores to almost anything. The employees started expecting support by asking questions about specific things and getting answers from their assistants.  

Gartner predicts that 25% of brands will achieve significant advances in CX/EX quality in 2021 and strive towards TX (total experience). This encouraged organizations to invest in the latest employee support models.  

Automation Need  

Gone are the days where Automation projects were either for nine months or even for a year. The use of AI, IoT, and Cloud-based systems have made hyper-automation simple.  

The rate at which employees seek assistance has increased, so looking out for the Service Desks is the next focus. Service Desk agents can focus on innovation and uplift through continuous improvement while providing better services to employees.  

Gartner predicts that by 2024, organizations will lower their operational costs by 30% by combining hyper-automation technologies with redesigned operational processes.  

Integrated Service Desk  

Especially post the lockdown and the onset of remote work culture, there is a huge demand for mediums where employees and enterprises can integrate a single tool into their systems. The modern system provides solutions to the Silo problems by default.  

In a recent webinar hosted by Rezolve.ai, 80% of business owners agreed that Employee Support Systems and Tools were among the top priorities in 2021.  

Let us look at the latest trends in Service Management.  

What are the latest trends in Service Desk Industry?

Emerging Service Delivery Model  

The old Service Delivery Model: First, let's take a quick look at the old and traditional delivery models. Employees may find information via self-service portals or by submitting tickets, but most make phone calls, write emails, or raise a ticket to get support.  

In contrast, employees need to apply for their choice of assistance, maybe Teams or Slack, for collaboration and have a conversation with a Virtual Assistant for getting the answers to their queries. In case the employee is not happy with the answer, a ticket is automatically raised, and you are connected to the dedicated support agent immediately. All this happens within a couple of minutes. There are two things that one needs to notice:  

• Employees don't have to raise tickets and wait for hours or even days to close them.
  
  
• Employee issues are automatically resolved with the automated support system, whether it is a technical/IT issue or a general HR issue.
  
  

ITSM to Enterprise Service Management

Traditional Silo-ed Approach: A group works in a silo when its members find themselves disengaged from other groups.  

Every company has its own best practices in Service Management and strategies designed to help its employees. Some of these could include a self-help portal for employees or a SharePoint where employees can download information. But often, employees aren't sure about which information is correct. Frequently, information obtained is incorrect or outdated.  

Having a ticketing system does not necessarily mean you have a Service Desk because it is much more than a ticketing system. Employee Support is more than just a helpdesk. Employee Support encompasses more than what a helpdesk can handle. To understand Service Management in the modern age, it is important to learn what employees need and bridge the traditional system gap.  

Employees are looking for quick support, and the problem with the traditional system is that employees have to search for the right support at the right time. Based on this principle, Rezolve.ai brings across a trend where employees can get support on Microsoft Teams within a single window.  

Single Window Approach: Employees no longer have to look for information from different departments. Be it project management, IT services, HR, finance, facilities; they can consult with Virtual Assistants through Microsoft Teams and get help from the same window across departments. Thanks to AI and Automation, this technology has made this possible, and we call it AIESM.  

Read about The Invisible Ticketing System  

AI Role in Transformation  

So, the question for the company leadership is - what can you not do conversationally in Enterprise Service Management? Artificial Intelligence can transform learning, knowledge sharing, task management, support, collaboration, and automation in a meaningful way using Chatbots .  

By leveraging machine data and analyzing it, AI can transform existing enterprises. The insights managed to gain few metrics used to improve the quality of employee service and identify improvement areas. These insights can also help monitor what is needed to improve the existing Service Desk Management and tools that are most effective in improving CSAT.  

Simpler Automation  

Automation is a vast subject, but six factors, as shown in the image below, consider when talking about Service Automation.  

Knowledge Automation is the process of providing relevant content to employees only when they need it. Knowledge is the slice of information that is relevant to a specific person at a specific time.  

Changing KPIs  

Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are an altogether profound conce pt. However, it is important to know that with a paradigm shift in Service Desk Management and Employee Support, there are changes in key KPIs that you must measure. Discover the updated KPIs that are important in the conversational AI world in this E-Book.  

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