1. The Help Desk as a Pivot Point for IT Agility Mark Sheehan ECAR Fellow EDUCAUSE Midwest Regional Conference Chicago, Illinois March 18, © 2008 EDUCAUSE. All rights reserved.
This study is based in part on a survey released in January 2007.

2. On the Front Line: The IT Help Desk in Higher Education
See the full ECAR study report:
On the Front Line: The IT Help Desk in Higher Education
Report released December 3, 2007
Initial distribution to ECAR members
Publicly available July 2009
Key Findings and Roadmap publicly available now at:
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3. Respondent Demographics
Report based on survey
Limited to institutions with one or more central IT help desks
454 institutions in all
27.5% response rate
About half CIOs
The total respondent base is 454 institutions, limited to institutions with one or more central IT help desks.
Doctoral
Masters
Bachelors
Associates
24%
27%
19%
14%
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4. Agility
“[Ability] to move quickly and with suppleness, skill, and control.” –Encarta
“[Ability] to move quickly and easily.”
–Compact Oxford English Dictionary
Agility depends on situational awareness, balance, and poise.
Where did you come from?
Where are you going?
Where are you now?
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5. Help Desk Ecology Help Desk Client Central IT Community 9/25/2019
This is the view from the help desk
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6. Help Desk Ecology Help Desk Client Central IT Community 9/25/2019
This is more like what the clients and central IT see
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7. Help Desk Ecology
Help Desk
Central IT
Client
Community
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8. Help Desk Ecology
Help Desk
Central IT
Client
Community
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9. Help Desk Ecology
Help Desk
Central IT
Client
Community
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10. Help Desk Ecology
Help Desk
Central IT
Client
Community
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11. Service Desk Ecology Pivot point Help Desk Client Central IT Community
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12. The IT Infrastructure Library
Developed in the 1980s by the UK government
Goal: To ensure service quality as patterns of IT use and support changed during the “PC revolution”
Now the de facto standard for IT service management worldwide
Most current implementations are of ITIL version 2; version 3 was released in 2007
While the ECAR study was not specifically about the ITIL framework, ITIL principles lay under the phrasing of many of the survey questions, especially with regard to the management of those IT-organization activities that impact the help desk. Thus some background about ITIL is important.
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13. ITIL Processes Service Delivery book Service Support book
Service Level Management
Financial Management
Capacity Management
Service Continuity Management
Availability Management
Incident Management
Problem Management
Configuration Management
Change Management
Release Management
These are the principal IT service management activities discussed in the ITIL books.
Service Desk – an overarching “function”
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14. Help Desk vs. Service Desk
Incident Management
Often one of several points of contact with central IT
Speaks for itself, not always for the whole IT organization
Sometimes “the last to know” about central system changes
Incident Management
Single point of contact for all central IT services
Speaks for the entire IT organization
Not just an early recipient of information about central system changes, but
An integral player in central system decision making
These are the principal IT service management activities discussed in the ITIL books.
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15. Adoption of IT Service Management Practices
The ECAR study report steers clear of the term ITIL in most contexts, using instead IT service management (ITSM). Because the data portrayed here are derived from the survey, that convention is applied to them. Nonetheless, these are ITIL practices.
This slide shows that majorities of respondents had “adopted formal guidelines” (as the survey question read) for the first four ITIL areas on the chart. Only about a fifth of respondents had service level agreements (SLAs) in place for “one or more help desk services.”
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16. Number of Four Basic ITSM Activities in Which Help Desk Staff Are Adequately Included
Inclusion of the help desk in the ITIL service management activities of the IT organization is one of the characteristics that distinguishes a service desk from a help desk. This slide shows that nearly three quarters of respondent institutions say the help desk is adequately involved in two or more of the four activities (excludes SLAs).
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17. Overall Quality of Help Desk Services
Respondents were asked to evaluate the overall quality of their help desks’ services on a five-point scale from poor to excellent. Only three respondents (less than one percent of our sample) indicated that overall service quality was poor. About 11% indicated their services were fair. The bulk of responses were good (about 33%) and very good (about 42%). About 13% of respondents said their services were excellent. Presumably because the responses are self-reported, they seem to be biased a bit high (the bell curve bulges distinctly toward the high end). It would be very instructive to correlate these reports with client evaluations. Nevertheless, there is much internal consistency within the data set, with many significant associations between this finding and others.
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18. Inclusion of Help Desk in Central IT ITSM Activities, by Service Quality
Because N=3 for the “Poor” category, it must be disregarded. For the other categories of overall help desk service quality, these data show that as service quality assessments improve, the number of ITIL activities in which the help desk is adequately included increases. This suggests a linkage between “service-desk-like” behavior and overall help desk service quality.
Overall mean: 2.54 activities
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19. Help Desk Maturity (Derived from the Software Engineering Institute’s Capability Maturity Model)
Initial – Services are usually provided ad hoc and rely on individual efforts; past successes are often not repeatable.
Repeatable – Service responsibilities are formally assigned, success is usually repeatable, and basic project management techniques are used.
Standardized – Service quality standards are in place and used, consistency of services is a priority, and process improvement is a goal.
Managed – Quantitative performance goals are in place, service performance is measured, and service quality is predictable.
Optimized – Services are closely aligned to business strategies, services are easily changed to meet emerging needs, and process improvement is continuous.
Respondents were given the definitions listed in this slide and asked to characterize their central IT help desks in terms of one of them. The terms are a modification of the Software Engineering Institute’s Capability Maturity Model, which has been in use (and in refinement) since the mid-1980s (Ref pro tem.:
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20. Help Desk Maturity (Derived from the Software Engineering Institute’s Capability Maturity Model)
Initial – Services are usually provided ad hoc and rely on individual efforts; past successes are often not repeatable.
Repeatable – Service responsibilities are formally assigned, success is usually repeatable, and basic project management techniques are used.
Standardized – Service quality standards are in place and used, consistency of services is a priority, and process improvement is a goal.
Managed – Quantitative performance goals are in place, service performance is measured, and service quality is predictable.
Optimized – Services are closely aligned to business strategies, services are easily changed to meet emerging needs, and process improvement is continuous.
Respondents were given the definitions listed in this slide and asked to characterize their central IT help desks in terms of one of them. The terms are a modification of the Software Engineering Institute’s Capability Maturity Model, which has been in use (and in refinement) since the mid-1980s (Ref pro tem.:
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21. Help Desk Maturity (Derived from the Software Engineering Institute’s Capability Maturity Model)
Initial – Services are usually provided ad hoc and rely on individual efforts; past successes are often not repeatable.
Repeatable – Service responsibilities are formally assigned, success is usually repeatable, and basic project management techniques are used.
Standardized – Service quality standards are in place and used, consistency of services is a priority, and process improvement is a goal.
Managed – Quantitative performance goals are in place, service performance is measured, and service quality is predictable.
Optimized – Services are closely aligned to business strategies, services are easily changed to meet emerging needs, and process improvement is continuous.
Respondents were given the definitions listed in this slide and asked to characterize their central IT help desks in terms of one of them. The terms are a modification of the Software Engineering Institute’s Capability Maturity Model, which has been in use (and in refinement) since the mid-1980s (Ref pro tem.:
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22. Help Desk Maturity Findings
The most commonly selected level of maturity, at 40%, is the middle-of-the-road level, ‘standardized’. About 36% chose less mature levels, and about 24% chose higher levels. The distribution is thus a flattish bell curve, bulging a bit toward the low end.
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23. Inclusion of Help Desk in Central IT ITSM Activities, by Help Desk Maturity
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24. Overall Service Quality, by Help Desk Maturity
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25. Take Home Messages
The help desk plays a pivotal role in the agility of the IT organization
Inclusion of the help desk in central IT ITSM activities is associated with help desk maturity and overall quality of service
Migration from help desk to service desk may be a fruitful path
The help desk has a lot to contribute, and a lot to gain, from an ITIL implementation
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26. Mark Sheehan msheehan@educause.edu 9/25/2019
Please contact the author with questions or comments.
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