Here are the top 10 reasons to purchase a cloud-based application vs. building them in-house:
Today, service desks are facing increased demand due to more end-user usage of complex software. Improving the performance of help desks requires solving problems quickly and efficiently.
However, many firms question what they should prioritize when changing their help desks. Should the firm prioritize cost cutting or customer satisfaction? Between changing handle time and abandonment rates, which decision will prove to be more valuable? At first glance, it might seem impossible to find a solution that solves multiple issues instead of merely changing priorities.
Technology, such as cloud computing, is becoming increasingly attractive in the healthcare management industry. Hospital CIOs, however, now face the difficult task of optimizing new technology while still maintaining the healthcare industry's ethical standards. Here are the top five challenges faced by Hospital CIOs in implementing new technology:
Most of us can relate to a time when we couldn't find the information we needed in a timely manner. Perhaps it related to fixing a broken printer, or more seriously, answering a client's question that could make or break a deal. Either way, valuable time and resources are spent trying to resolve work-related issues. Resolving these issues is usually the charge of the help desk personnel, but when every issue is directed their way, the burden on these employees may become quite overwhelming.
Unlike the plot of many sci-fi movies, the human race has yet to be dominated by artificial intelligence. And since we are not living in the world of I, Robot or The Matrix, we still need smart individuals to work alongside the technology we use. Neither can achieve maximum efficiency without the other.
Integrating people and technology is a critical step in constructing efficient collaboration within a business. A lack of integration might hold any business back from achieving its maximum potential growth.
At first glance, "inventory" might appear to be yet another item on a company's balance sheet. However, as most businesses know, the importance of tracking inventory cannot be understated. In an economy that constantly demands efficiency, it is becoming increasingly common for businesses to adopt Information Technology Asset Management (ITAM). Although managing the life cycles of inventory can be incredibly complicated, ITAM offers clients real-time monitoring of all assets, which enables businesses to significantly lower the risk of asset loss.
Colleges present different challenges for IT help desks than businesses. For starters, they have different customers and different hours. Students are extremely tech savvy, much more so than the average working adult, and possess high expectations not only for the technology available to them, but also for support.
In addition, students often use their own technology and work away from a physical campus. Unlike in a traditional business setting, in which employees mainly work on the company's devices, IT help desks must contend with compatibility issues more often.
Given these distinctions, it is not particularly surprising that a successful help desk for an institution of higher learning is fundamentally different from that of a business.
More than ever, businesses are analyzing market data in an attempt to better understand consumers' buying habits. However, data is often outdated by the time it reaches businesses, or the information is too broad and generalizing to draw any real conclusions. Analyzing market data is analogous to "looking in a rear view mirror," according to the authors of "Customer Intelligence: Connecting the Dots for Service Insight," who emphasize the importance of customer intelligence in anticipating consumer needs.
Every tech-savvy person has heard (or even experienced) customer support horror stories at least once. These tales usually lament the struggle of dealing with users who seem to have no right to be anywhere near a computer: users who cannot find the "any" key, users who cannot tell the difference between the spacebar and backspace key, or users who do not even know what an operating system is.
Even though home computers have become easier to use, customers might still feel confused or frustrated. When business customers contract engineers for new software, it is often difficult for the tech-savvy to speak the language of the customer and nail down exactly what features the client is seeking. Effective communication is vital in both customer service and business-to-business relationships, and learning how to speak the language of your client is often easier said than done.
If there is one thing that is constant in this day and age, it is change. Today's business pace demands perfectly smooth transitions or large amounts of money can be lost from interruptions in productivity. The optimal part of change is growth. If growth is the goal, then improving customer service should be top priority. According to author Seth Godin, "Customer service, like everything an effective organization does, changes people. Announce the change you seek, then invest appropriately in a system that is likely to actually produce the outcomes you just said you wanted." In order to have the best customer service, your company needs to have the best and most up to date software that addresses your customer service needs.
