Panayiotis Christodoulou
Objectives
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The mission of a support group and the parts of a mission
statement
The steps in staffing a support position
The contents of a training program for support staff
How to manage a user support project
Which software tools help with project management tasks
The industry certifications that are available to support
professionals
About professional help desk and user support
associations
Ethical principles that guide the professional behavior of
support workers
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How product and support standards emerged
Common tools and methods support
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specialists use to evaluate and select
computer products
How organizations develop and implement
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product standards
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Product standards are lists of hardware,
operating system, network, and applications
software products that have been selected to
meet the needs of users in an organization. In
the early 1980s, it was not unusual for
companies to have a wide variety of hardware
and software to support. Different hardware
and software were not compatible. The lack
of hardware and software standards caused
many problems.
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Incompatible hardware and software provided for
limited opportunities to transfer and share
information between users. In order to repair broken
hardware, companies needed to keep large
inventories of PC hardware parts required on site.
Also, because the hardware platforms were so varied,
it was difficult to train and equip hardware service
technicians to repair all of the hardware in use. User
skills were difficult to transfer from one system to
another. These problems combined to increase costs
as support groups struggled to assist users with so
many different types of PCs and software. To help cut
costs, companies enforced product standards for a
small number of hardware configurations, adopted
standard operating systems and limited the number
of applications available in each software category.
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The responsibility for setting organization-wide
support standards varies from organization to
organization. To establish standards, generally
competing products are evaluated. During product
evaluation, the support staff researches and analyzes
computer product features, capabilities, and
suitability to solve specific user needs. This may
include collecting product information, conducting
performance tests, comparing competing products,
making
decisions
or
recommendations,
and
communicating the results of their work. User
support staff continually evaluates new hardware and
software products and upgrades by answering the
following questions:
1) Does the product or upgrade work as advertised by the
vendor?
2) Is a competing product significantly better than one
currently being used?
3) Is a new product or upgrade compatible with existing
hardware, network, and operating system configurations
the organization has in place?
4) Is the product cost-effective to acquire and maintain, and
will it increase user productivity?
5) Will the product help reduce the total cost of ownership to
the organization?
6) Is the product likely to become an industry standard?
7) Is it better to upgrade now or to wait for a future release?
8) Is the product stable enough (has few bugs) that it will
solve more problems than it creates?
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Individuals evaluating software and hardware have
several tools and information resources available.
Software vendors often offer evaluation versions of
their software and occasionally hardware vendors will
offer evaluation hardware components. A software
evaluation copy permits support staff to try out a
product’s features independently and assess its
ability to meet an organization’s needs.
When decision makers need to decide which of
several products they will select to support they use
tools such as industry standard or best-selling
products,
products
used
by
competitors,
benchmarks, weighted point evaluation method,
request for proposals (RFP) and acknowledged
subjective criteria.
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User support staffs often select industry standard products,
which are products that have a large market share. By selecting
popular software products, an organization might be able to
reduce costs because the products are more likely to have trade
book publications, training materials and support service
vendors. In addition to using popular software, organizations
often look at the software that their competitors use.
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A benchmark is an objective test or measurement
that is used to evaluate the speed, capacity,
capabilities, or productivity of rival products.
Evaluators
use
benchmarks
to
compare
competing products. Benchmark comparisons are
popular because they are objective. Benchmarks
are based on objective evaluation criteria, or
factors used in a product selection procedures
that are relatively unbiased. Another method to
evaluate software is comparison conducted using
several evaluation criteria of predetermined
importance to grade competing products and
arrive at a numerical score as a basis for
selection.
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To perform a weighted point evaluation,
evaluator importance of each criterion, rate each
competing product against all the evaluation
criteria, if more than one evaluator rates
products, compute the average rating for each
product for criterion by the importance of the
criterion, compute the total ratings for each
product and compare product ratings.
The evaluation criteria selected in the weighted
point method are based on several imporant
factors including specific type of hardware or
software product to be evaluated, the needs of
end users, support issues and cost.
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Many public organizations are required to use an objective
evaluation process, such as a bidding process or request
for proposal procedure. A request for proposal (RFP) is a
product selection or competitive bidding procedure that
uses objective criteria to choose among follows eight
primary steps. Step one is to conduct a needs analysis.
Step two is to develop a purchase specification for the
equipment or software. Step three is to define the decision
criteria and the importance of each criterion. Step four is
to write the RFP document, which describes the user
requirements, bidding procedure, and decision criteria.
Step five is to send the RFP to prospective vendors. Step
six is to receive written decisions step seven, the
organization analyzes the responses to the RFP. The last
step is to select the vendor and award the purchase
contract.
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Product evaluators base many hardware and
software purchase decisions on objective
subjective evaluation criteria can be used.
Subjective evaluation criteria are factors used in a
product selection procedure that are not directly
related to the fit between a product’s features
and a user’s needs. These factors include
personal
relationships
with
vendors,
convenience, personal preferences, and reliance
on traditional or historical purchasing channels.
Subjective criteria are neither measurable nor
repeatable from one evaluator to another and
there may be disagreement between evaluators
on results.
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Even though an organization often sets product standards,
it does not always mean that the standard is a “one-sizefitsall” requirement. Most organizations strike a balance
between allowing employees to select anything that they
would like to use and only allowing them to use one
product.
An organization’s computer product and service standards
can develop from a variety of sources. Often an
organization will form a committee to determine product
standards. A product standards committee is a group of
support specialists, end users, technical support staff, and
managers whose task is to define the current computerproduct standards, maintain them, and coordinate their
use in the organization. This committee may also set
acceptable use guidelines that govern how computers are
permitted to be used and the penalties for misuse.
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In many organizations there are two forces that
influence the adoption and implementation of
computer product and service standards. One
influence is the organization’s existing inventory of
hardware and software. The second force that drives
changes in product and service standards is the
continual arrival of new products, services, and
product upgrades. The decision to replace an existing
product or service is often difficult because of the
scope of the change if the installed base if very large.
Every decision to modify an existing technology
standard or adopt a new one requires analysis and
evaluation of products and services as well as the
examination of the support cost increases for
installation, upgrades, training, documentation,
troubleshooting, and help desk services.
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Objectives
Basic strategies to perform user needs
analysis and assessment
Major steps analysts undertake to analyze
and assess a user’s needs
Common tools that aid support specialists in
a user needs analysis project
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The support staff often analyzes and assesses
user needs to understand the user’s
environment and work situation. Once the
user’s needs are understood, the support
person can recommend products to services
that will provide a solution.
The needs assessment can take many forms
including
a
formal
assignment
from
supervisor or an informal request from a
coworker. Most needs assessments, weather
formal or informal.
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Each step in the user needs analysis can be
grouped into one of three phases: preparation,
investigation, or decision. In the preparation
phase, analysts try to understand the personal or
organizational goals as well as the decision
criteria and constraints. In the investigation
phase, analysts try to understand the present
situation and alternatives to it. The decision
phase is where analysts develop a model of the
proposed solution and decide whether to build or
buy a solution.
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In the first step, organizational documents such
as a written strategic business plan or a mission
statement can be used to determine the personal
or organizational goals. If these documents are
not available, it might be helpful to interview
managers, supervisors or individual purchasers.
There is a list of six questions that can be used
to find the information about the goals. The
purpose of these questions is to learn the big
picture of how the future system or service will fit
into the environment and culture.
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In the second step, it is important for the analyst to
consider what is feasible or possible in terms of time,
money or technology. Feasibility is an investigation
into the economic, operational, technical and timeline
constraints during a user needs analysis and
assessment
process.
Economic
feasibility
is
examining what budget constraints will influence the
final decision on the project. Operational feasibility is
what other systems, procedures or personnel will be
affected by the interaction with the new system.
Technological feasibility concerns the limitations, due
to the capabilities of existing technology, which
impose constraints on possible solutions. Timeline
feasibility concerns the time constraints, which may
rule out some possible alternatives.
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Step three is to clearly define the problem. Not all
problems are “computer” problems. Often, they can
turn out to be organizational, personnel, workflow,
political, management or resource problems. The
question “Do I really understand the problem I’m
trying to solve for this user?” should guide the needs
analysis from beginning to end.
Step four is to identify the roles of stakeholders.
Stakeholders are the participants in a user needs
analysis and assessment project who might gain or
lose from its success or failure. There are four kinds
of stakeholders that are important in a needs analysis
project. Stakeholders include end users, managers,
technical support staff, and the needs assessment
analyst.
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The support analysts should learn whom the end user(s)
are, and learn about their job responsibilities, computer
experience, training, background and how long they have
worked for the organization. The analyst should also
determine what managers will be making the final
decision, how knowledgeable about the application the
managers are, and what organizational and computer
experience they bring to the process. The support analyst
is a key participant and should clarify their own role in the
needs assessment process in order to understand the
roles of the other participants. If there is an existing IT
staff, they may be responsible for installing, configuring,
maintaining, and troubleshooting the system an analyst
recommends.
The needs analyst might want to develop a written profile
that summarizes information about each participant in a
project. A profile can include contact information,
background, primary job functions, and interests in the
outcome of the project.
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Step five is to identify sources of information.
Some common sources of information that a
support analyst should investigate are interviews
with end users or managers, surveys or
questionnaires sent to end users who will be
affected, ]procedural manuals that detail how to
operate the current system(s), direct observation
of the existing system or situation, forms used
for input into the existing system, reports output
from the existing system, problem reports or
help desk logs for the existing system, and
reports and recommendations from consultants
or auditors who have studied the existing
system.
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Step six is to develop an understanding of the
existing situation. In this step the analysts collect
and examine important papers (examples of
forms, reports, and documentation), interview
key participants (end users, managers, and
technical support staff), observe the operation of
the existing system, and develop a clear
understanding of what the existing system does
and how it works. The goal or outcome of this
step is to build a model that describes the
existing system. A model is a narrative or graphic
plan that approximates an aspect of an
organization (such as work flow) or a computer
system.
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Three key questions that support analysts need
to ask at the end of this step are “Do I
understand the existing system well enough to
explain how it operates to other participants?”,
“Do I understand which features of the existing
system users like?”, and “Do I understand what
users think is wrong with the existing system?”.
Without an understanding of each of these
aspects of the existing system or situation,
analysts are not prepared to consider alternatives
with which to replace or repair it.
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Step seven is to investigate alternatives to the
existing situation. In this step, analysts try to
resolve problems with the current situation or
system including alternatives such as adding
additional resources, making changes to the
current hardware or software, upgrading
current hardware or software, purchasing new
hardware and/or purchasing new software.
Sometimes it is useful to look at vendors that
provide solutions or products aimed at
specific markets.
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Step eight is to develop a model of the proposed
solution. The decision phase begins by building a
model that often includes a narrative description
of the proposed system or solution and one or
more graphic aids to help users and managers
understand the proposal. When the solution is
not obvious or when there is a legal requirement,
analysts my do a cost-benefit analysis, which is a
comparison of the expenses a project will incur
to the project’s payoffs to the organization.
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Step nine is to make a build-versus-buy
decision. The build-versus-buy decision is the
decision whether to build a custom system or
purchase one off the shelf. Sometimes it is
appropriate to purchase off-the-shelf software,
however, custom-developed software can have
the advantage of being designed to suit a user’s
exact needs. A turnkey system includes an
integrated package of hardware, software, and
support services purchased from a single vendor.
Table 9-1 on page 300 summarizes some of the
advantages and disadvantages of building versus
buying a system.
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There are a variety of needs assessment tools
that can aid an analyst. Some of the tools are
relatively easy for the analyst to write,
however, others require more extensive work
and, in some cases, special software.
A project charter is a short narrative that
answers basic questions such as what are the
objectives of the assessment project and
what the space of the needs analysis are.
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A cost-benefit analysis is often in the form of a
side-by-side comparison, or balance sheet,
which lists costs on one side and benefits on the
other. Table 9-2 shows an example of items that
might appear on a cost-benefit balance sheet.
Cost-benefit analyses are not always easy to
perform because there are some aspects of a
project that might be difficult to quantify.
Intangible benefits are expected results from a
computer acquisition that are difficult to
measure, quantify, or calculate.
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There are a variety of data collection instruments. An
input form is a paper document or display screen
image used to collect information about a business
transaction. Input forms are sometimes called source
documents. Output forms contain the results of a
business transaction or process.
Written instructions about how to perform a business
transaction or handle a routine organizational
procedure are called procedure documentation. An
operating or problem log is a list of events or
activities recorded in the sequence that the events
occur. Also, analysts often use interviews and
questionnaires to collect relevant information from
users about the work they do and how an existing or
proposed computer system might affect their work.
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Interviews and questionnaires should be
constructed
to
extract
the
appropriate
information. There are two basic kinds of
questions that can be used in an interview or
questionnaire format. An open-ended question
asks users to choose their own words, instead of
predetermined responses, to answer the
questions. In a forced-choice question, a user
chooses from among several predetermined
responses. Questions that are designed by a
team are often better than those written by one
person.
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Support analysts can often gain valuable insights
into user needs by watching them work. Direct
observation can be a powerful method of data
collection in situations where questionnaires,
interviews, procedure documentation, and other
forms of data collection aren’t possible, or as a
supplement to other materials.
A chart or a diagram can illustrate the flow of
information in an organization, relationships
between employees, or the parts of an
information processing system. A flowchart is a
schematic drawing that uses symbols to
represent the parts of a computer system or
steps in a procedure.
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An I-P-O chart represents the input, processing, and
output steps required to perform a task. An I-P-O
chart answers three fundamental questions about a
procedure that a user or a computer performs: Input:
where do I get the information with which to work?
Processing: What do I do to process or transform the
information? Output: What do I do with the
information when I’m done?
A prototype is a working model that support analysts
build to let users evaluate how the finished product
of an analysis project will actually work. Prototyping
has become an increasingly popular tool for support
analysts.Prototype systems can give users a realistic
preview of how a new system might operate.
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Project management software can help project
leaders and workers organize the steps in a large
project, set priorities, establish and monitor
project costs, and schedule staff and activities.
Not every needs assessment project requires all
of the steps and the use of every resource or tool
described in this chapter. The support analyst
chooses from different approaches and different
tools to use based on the task. The most
important fact to remember is that user needs
analysis and assessment is a process, and the
process and tools analysts choose to solve one
problem will likely be different from the process
and tools for another.