Technical Support Management

Services is a people intensive business. Finding, attracting, developing and growing the right talent pool is core to a successful Services organization. In this section, we will cover Attracting and Interviewing new hires, the Development of the talent pool from new hire to experienced support representative, and Retention of your top talent.

Attract – knowing what kind of people to hire is obviously dependent on how you have structured your Customer Support model from the Operations section, a business plan of how many people you need to cover the expected support case volumes both from growth with existing products and the introduction of new products, and the mix of skills you have in place and will need in the near future.

For each position type in your organization you should have a job description on file with your HR organization that has been reviewed and agreed to by a team of people in the job. It serves several purposes – provides a source document for recruiters, sets expectations for what the job entails to new hires, and is the foundation for the employee performance review.

Interviewing – beyond the required core technical skills, support representatives are Problem Solvers, need good Communication Skills, must be a part of your Team and its Culture, and have a Tolerance for Stress.

The interview process with the hiring manager, and the selected team member can focus on these key traits by testing technical aptitude, querying about game playing (problem solving), look at verbal and written communications and empathy, and asked about experience with high stress situations and get examples for how to handle it.

There many good additional resources on this subject – including this paper by Francoise Tourniaire, one of our contributing partners "The Complete Guide to Hiring Great Support Staffers", and this one by Kristin Robertson another contributing partner "Hiring The Right People".

Development – is an ongoing process that includes New Hire Orientation and Training (including mentoring), Training Plans for each employee, and the Support Specific training curriculum. Your support curriculum should include training on your Support Processes, your Product, debugging in your environment, Adjacent Technologies and the appropriate Certifications.

Retention – technical support can be a very fulfilling career for people with the right make up for it. It also can be a great training ground for people who want to pursue other opportunities in your company. In addition to the fundamentals of people management we discuss below, engaging your people in the operation of the support organization will help retain your best talent. Use them on process teams, special assignments outside the support organization, for mentoring, and other creative ways to engage them. Make sure you have good communications with the management team through one on ones, skip level round tables, etc.

Employee Reviews – should be a part of your company’s HR program, and should be managed and implemented rigorously. In addition to providing feed back and recognition to your top talent, it should also be used to identify marginal performers and manage them out of the business. Technical teams have an internal understanding of skill and contribution among the members. While they don’t like the onerous task of managing poor performance, they do expect management to step up and address the issue. Poor performance drags down the performance of the whole team, not just the individual involved.

Recognition – should come in many forms. Technical people, and support people in particular appreciate being recognized for a good job in the high stress environment in which they work. A recognition program should include peer to peer (an email thank you that includes the whole support team), spot bonuses/awards, and VP or Company level awards all of which get talked about in team and organizational meetings. Make sure it is well earned recognition.

Career Management - is very important to technical people. They like being challenged, and stretched to learn and master new skills. Core to career management is to help guide them in the decision of pursuing a technical based advancement or going the management route. Most will fall into one or the other as their preference, and special assignments like team lead, etc will help them decide. This means that you have to have robust job levels and pay grades that allow them to progress in a technical track that is competitive with their peers in other organizations like R&D.

Employee Satisfaction Surveys – should be a part of your Company’s HR program, and are a useful way to get additional feedback on issues that can be addressed to improve the environment – just as you use Customer Satisfaction Surveys.

Emerging Markets -For SSPA members there is an excellent document that describes these issues in the context of India - "Talent Management in Emerging Markets" which is published in Industry Research, June 2007.